This blog is about the wee adventure I had out with my dad and Baxter today, however I thought I would also add a few words about the misadventures this week, LoL
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| Myrtle up on the Moors |
What a nightmare few days I have had. It all started with me planning a leisurely ride out on Sunday on my Buzzraw. As I have not sold the bike, I thought I may as well enjoy it and go for a leisurely cruise. So I got all togged up, complementing the fashion of my bike, and went to head out. Well, it wasn't going to happen, as the bike's battery was completely flat. "Never mind" I thought I will pop it on charge and go out in the afternoon".
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| Batteryless Buzzraw |
After about 5 hours of charge I replaced the bike's battery into the bike's cradle and "whey hey", absolutely nothing. I checked the battery charger, it appeared to be working, so I left the bike to charge a little more.
By this time it was getting a bit late to go for a ride and the battery didn't appear to be working. I tried it in the bike one final time, and unexpectedly the bike's display powered up when I pressed the power button. It showed no errors and 100% battery... Strange.
So I thought I would get up early the following day and take the wee bike for a spin. Righty Ho! All geared up and ready to go with a mini picnic and a planned route. I went to get my Buzzraw and...crap, no juice yet again.
I have decided to keep the wee bike as a play thing. I haven't done many miles on it in the 3 years I have had it, around 85 I think. I have had to try and locate a new battery, found one on eBay, so that is another £190, but at least my wee bike should be good to go.
I took the old battery apart and Ern and I had a look to see if we could find any obvious faults. My dad has then left it on charge and hooked up a multi meter.
Ok so no Buzzing around until the new battery arrives.
Anyhow whilst I was on fannying about with my bike, my dad decided to start Myrtle up, as she has been standing in our yard for some time, up on stands whilst I have been waiting for her steel smoothie wheels to come back from getting powder coated. The nightmare continued, Myrtle refusing to start. By this time, I had come back out into our yard in a somewhat pissed off mood. My dad had removed Myrtle's oil Bath air filter and was checking to make sure her electric fuel pump was working.
My dad asked me to spin Myrtle over whilst he checked at the rear to see if anything was going on engine and fuel wise. As I spun Myrtle over, my dad shouted for me to stop. When I joined my dad at the back of the car, Myrtle had spat out what appeared to be oil from the crankcase breather, we then smelled a strong odour of petrol. Kind of reminded me of Herbie, when he didn't want to play.
We jacked up Myrtle, so she was sitting level off the ground and popped her on stands, then my dad dropped Myrtle's oil. When I say oil, it was a combination of oil and petrol, so much so that about 5 litres of stuff came out. Once the horrible mixture had been allowed to completely drain out, we replaced the oil with some fresh and tried Myrtle again. She pretty much started first click. My dad thinks the engine must have got flooded, however he has bought a compression tester to check everything is ok.
As Myrtle appeared to be running ok, no horrible petrol smell and ticking over, with no blue smoke I suggested we take her out for a run and that was today.
So this morning I packed a make shift picnic, with a flask of coffee and some yum yums, plus turkey sandwiches. Wor Baxter promised to be a good lad, so we took him for a ride out too.
Before setting out I asked my dad how much petrol he thought we had in Myrtle, as her fuel gauge isn't exactly reliable, "enough to get to the petrol station, at Cost Co's", he said. I wasn't too keen driving through to Cost Co's as it can get busy, and I am still learning the fickle nature of this car and its clutch, nevertheless, off to Cost Co we headed.
The first obstacle was in our backstreet, and the poxy speed humps. The first one we came to, Myrtle ground her front end over. I had to stop, take out the AirLift control and pop 95 psi in all four corners. Even modern cars rake over these humps, they are so steep.
Myrtle was running pretty good, I mean she has loads of rattles and is very noisy, but she now steers 100% better and has a decent turning circle. As we went from our house and approached Gateshead, almost at Cost Co's Myrtle's electric fuel pump sounded like a Tommy Gun, getting louder and louder. Myrtle eventually ran out of petrol, right at the side of the fuel pump at Cost Co.
This motoring Malarkey is expensive £56.76 of Super unleaded to fill Myrtle up, and then we were off for a ride out. We ended up going from Gateshead all the way up to Weardale and Teesdale
We drove to Hamsterley Forest to have our picnic and let Baxter have a walk and a breath of fresh air. It has been a lovely day weather wise, there were loads of people at Hamsterley. We sat at a picnic table on the green to have our stuff. A nice relaxing break before returning to work next week.
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| Ern & Baxter |
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| Ern enjoying the Turkey sandwiches I constructed. |
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| Myrtle 65 Bug |
From Hamsterley we just followed road signs to make our way back towards Stanhope and from there home. The electric fuel pump and regulator appears to have solved Myrtle cutting out, as she drove solidly today. My dad checked the oil dipstick and there doesn't appear to be any petrol in the oil. Myrtle's fuel gauge cannot be relied on, my dad mentioning he wished he had brought a stick to dip the tank, however when he looked under the bonnet into the petrol tank he said she had not used that much. I am still getting used to the clutch operation and found 3rd gear really difficult to get in, especially when trying to use the engine braking going from 4th to 3rd and panicking somewhat when going up some steep climbs with impatient drivers behind and not being able to hit 3rd, then having to drop to 2nd and on one occasion hitting 1st and almost throwing us through the wind shield "Oops". I definitely think a future mod will be a more powerful engine, not so much to thrash around, just something that you don't feel you are thrashing the life out of.
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| Ern Checking the fuel situation |
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| The engines the other end dad |
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| Myrtle 65 Bug aired up |
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| Baxter enjoying his ride out |
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| Myrtle 65 Bug |
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| Myrtle aired out, she wasn't sitting right down as pan on bumpy grass |
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| Nice to be out in the old girl |
I really enjoyed today, being on the quiet country lanes up in the moors, just tootling and spending time with my dad and Baxter, drove 115 miles today.
Upon arriving at home, Baxter didn't want to get out of Myrtle, I think he loves going out in the Wee car.
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| Baxter |
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| Baxter |
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