IAC's Sparky Visits Sluggo
Posted: Sat Jun 29, 2013 10:47 pm
When I arrived back in Portland, I thought to cram an unexpected visit upon Sluggo our Itinerant Air-Cooled Co-Administrator. Sluggo had blown a plug out on the way home from the LuckyLab last Monday, and I could feel the marshalling of energy it takes in the middle of our busy lives to tackle some large unwanted project. Sluggo was ready to pull the left side cylinder head in situe, but I dearly wanted to repair the plug threads without pulling the head.
Showed up at 4:00PM unannounced, to find out that Sluggo has a "day job" (I think I used to have one of those), and he would not be back before 10 or 11 PM. So, I hung out with Mrs Sluggo and their seven year-old son, Colin. Colin and I had some work to do. We had to determine which Colin was which. I told Colin that I had heard my name called out in a voice I haven't heard directed my way in a long time. Colin was delighted to share the experience. He decided he was to be Colin A, and I could be Colin B.
Figures. I get to be beta Colin. "I've been on this Earth 47 years before you! I should be Colin A." Implacable and extremely self-sure, Colin simply ignored me, "I'm Colin A."
"I'm a better mechanic than you," I muttered to myself. I also get to be the Hero, the swooping Itinerator to Save The Day.
Not so fast, Mr. "Hero" mechanic. This spark plug hole is not exactly easy to tap with that repair tap. My right shoulder which has been bothering me all summer is popping out with every nasty twist. Crazed with terror that I am poised to destroy the Itinerant Air-Cooled Co-Administrator's engine while he is at work, some "hero", huh, I am desperately trying to keep this tap job clean. One stupid errant aluminum head chip getting between the piston and the cylinder wall, and it's smoky oil burner city. The halogen light is burning my right cheek and heating up the fuel line snaking across the engine compartment, my right arm is wedged between the heater blower motor and the cross linkage of his monster carbs and his seriously engineered breather system:
I remove the tap at every turn, clean it, re-grease it, tap another turn, remove it, clean it, re-grease it, tap another turn, and my paper towels are shredding to death all over that tap and the cleaning pan, and I am nervously asking myself, "is this an Ego-Run-Amok job, or a true desire to help get this bus back on the road?"
Cleaned the combustion chamber and surrounding ports with a straw! taped to the hoover vacuum:
You can't be serious, I think to myself. Tapped the spark plug repair thread "insert" into the head with the kit's special loctite sauce, told Mrs Sluggo that I would be back at 9:00AM to double-check and help Sluggo start the reassembly. "Good-bye, Colin . . . . A."
Drove to thebig National Something cemetery, crushed with doubts, but there was sunlight out from under the clouds:
There was a beautiful beautiful ghostly mountain top hovering in the night light:
It was a sunny morning as I re-vacuumed the head area after Sluggo and I agreed to move the CHT ring terminal slot over to the "easy side" of the spark plug hole, to lock it into place as the plug is loosened or tightened:
Aghast, I bid Sluggo good-bye at 2:00PM the next day. Look how happy he is, he has no idea:
No idea that I am sweating bullets over the millions of failure points shining like little diamonds, and hoping that they managed to stay out of the combustion chamber.
"Let me know how it starts and runs."
"Oh I will. I am taking it to the Lucky Lab on Monday."
It rains on Sunday. Phooey. No rear wheel bearings for Chloe yet. No helping Hambone at Hambone Manor either. I am holing up at this Mall 205 Burger King in the rain, cranky. "I'll catch up on forum posts!" Good for me! Looking at the positive side of this rainy rainy grey gloomy never summer ever Portland experience. I am sorting photographs and trying to rescue a fraying narrative chronology very complex must focus . . .
"would you like me to refill your coffee?
WHAT? Burger King has never had WAITRESSES soliciting customers to imbibe more of that BILGE!
"uh sure, thanks."
"hey um snort snort dude, is that your bus?"
"yes"
"hey can I ask you some questions?"
"actually n . . . "
"yeah I <drone endlessly and disjointedly> so then he says I can store it at his pl<even more>"
Finally the guy falls asleep at his booth.
As I recover the narrative + pictures + Photobucket page, I spy a message in my inbox.
From Hambone. I am ready to give him the wishywash "gotta catch up on my posts" but I see a sentence that freezes my blood cold . . .
"P.S. call Randy, he is having engine noises."
By the entrance ramp to the 205 north, Hambone is getting a visit in minutes and Randy dropping by in an hour. I help Hambone disassemble his rear wheel bearings all the while feeling like a guilty child waiting for his parent to show up at the principal's office, it is that bad . . . Colin beta, Colin BAD.
So what happened, Sluggo? Fill us in right here. . . with a status update!
Colin
Showed up at 4:00PM unannounced, to find out that Sluggo has a "day job" (I think I used to have one of those), and he would not be back before 10 or 11 PM. So, I hung out with Mrs Sluggo and their seven year-old son, Colin. Colin and I had some work to do. We had to determine which Colin was which. I told Colin that I had heard my name called out in a voice I haven't heard directed my way in a long time. Colin was delighted to share the experience. He decided he was to be Colin A, and I could be Colin B.
Figures. I get to be beta Colin. "I've been on this Earth 47 years before you! I should be Colin A." Implacable and extremely self-sure, Colin simply ignored me, "I'm Colin A."
"I'm a better mechanic than you," I muttered to myself. I also get to be the Hero, the swooping Itinerator to Save The Day.
Not so fast, Mr. "Hero" mechanic. This spark plug hole is not exactly easy to tap with that repair tap. My right shoulder which has been bothering me all summer is popping out with every nasty twist. Crazed with terror that I am poised to destroy the Itinerant Air-Cooled Co-Administrator's engine while he is at work, some "hero", huh, I am desperately trying to keep this tap job clean. One stupid errant aluminum head chip getting between the piston and the cylinder wall, and it's smoky oil burner city. The halogen light is burning my right cheek and heating up the fuel line snaking across the engine compartment, my right arm is wedged between the heater blower motor and the cross linkage of his monster carbs and his seriously engineered breather system:
I remove the tap at every turn, clean it, re-grease it, tap another turn, remove it, clean it, re-grease it, tap another turn, and my paper towels are shredding to death all over that tap and the cleaning pan, and I am nervously asking myself, "is this an Ego-Run-Amok job, or a true desire to help get this bus back on the road?"
Cleaned the combustion chamber and surrounding ports with a straw! taped to the hoover vacuum:
You can't be serious, I think to myself. Tapped the spark plug repair thread "insert" into the head with the kit's special loctite sauce, told Mrs Sluggo that I would be back at 9:00AM to double-check and help Sluggo start the reassembly. "Good-bye, Colin . . . . A."
Drove to thebig National Something cemetery, crushed with doubts, but there was sunlight out from under the clouds:
There was a beautiful beautiful ghostly mountain top hovering in the night light:
It was a sunny morning as I re-vacuumed the head area after Sluggo and I agreed to move the CHT ring terminal slot over to the "easy side" of the spark plug hole, to lock it into place as the plug is loosened or tightened:
Aghast, I bid Sluggo good-bye at 2:00PM the next day. Look how happy he is, he has no idea:
No idea that I am sweating bullets over the millions of failure points shining like little diamonds, and hoping that they managed to stay out of the combustion chamber.
"Let me know how it starts and runs."
"Oh I will. I am taking it to the Lucky Lab on Monday."
It rains on Sunday. Phooey. No rear wheel bearings for Chloe yet. No helping Hambone at Hambone Manor either. I am holing up at this Mall 205 Burger King in the rain, cranky. "I'll catch up on forum posts!" Good for me! Looking at the positive side of this rainy rainy grey gloomy never summer ever Portland experience. I am sorting photographs and trying to rescue a fraying narrative chronology very complex must focus . . .
"would you like me to refill your coffee?
WHAT? Burger King has never had WAITRESSES soliciting customers to imbibe more of that BILGE!
"uh sure, thanks."
"hey um snort snort dude, is that your bus?"
"yes"
"hey can I ask you some questions?"
"actually n . . . "
"yeah I <drone endlessly and disjointedly> so then he says I can store it at his pl<even more>"
Finally the guy falls asleep at his booth.
As I recover the narrative + pictures + Photobucket page, I spy a message in my inbox.
From Hambone. I am ready to give him the wishywash "gotta catch up on my posts" but I see a sentence that freezes my blood cold . . .
"P.S. call Randy, he is having engine noises."
By the entrance ramp to the 205 north, Hambone is getting a visit in minutes and Randy dropping by in an hour. I help Hambone disassemble his rear wheel bearings all the while feeling like a guilty child waiting for his parent to show up at the principal's office, it is that bad . . . Colin beta, Colin BAD.
So what happened, Sluggo? Fill us in right here. . . with a status update!
Colin