Mission Confidence Is High For The Ride On Sunday!
This was the bike at the last stage of reassembly, before it decided to be a complete pain and backfire every time you tried to start it. (Click on the link below)
After a lot of head scratching and conflicting opinions, Jimmy and I decided to give the Panther the old college try today.
The gas tank and seat were re-installed.
A gallon of new gas was added along with a new spark plug with just 2 degrees more heat than the one installed when I bought the bike. It is the exact plug specified by Phelon and Moore for the majority of bikes they produced in the Cleckheaton Works.
My brother Jimmy came over after his stint at a local hospital where he writes marketing scripts for the edification of knee replacement recipients.
We had quite a crowd to observe our efforts.
Leon and Barb are in from Arizona, Linda was here to work with Anne on the Uke lessons.
(Progressing very well)
After some research and cogitation, we decided that we would try kicking the bike.
We had the same result that discouraged us the last time, violent kickback.
More cogitation, we retarded the ignition slightly, still kicked back, retarded even more, no sign of life, advance just a hair "VOILA" it starts.
We then added a mark on the A/R lever showing the correct position for correct starting.
Leon was there right with us giving moral support.
Then the cheer leaders came out to see what all the smoke was about.
Speaking of smoke, the bike looked like it was running real rich, and with gas at 2 bucks a gallon, we didn't want that.
So we took the carburetor off and dropped the needle by one notch.
We'll see how that goes.
Jimmy the kicker is to be congratulated for his Stirling efforts and for bringing his kicking boots.
Both stands are still proving to be a bit of a challenge.
The center stand has been all bent out of whack some how.
However the side stand is so far wrong that it is not even funny. If you tried to set the bike on the side stand it would be almost horizontal.
After some review, I decided that the easiest fix was to machine the mounting face for the side stand.
The stand has been attached to the bike and will be tested on Saturday. (Tomorrow)
Ciao Bella
Norm
More after the bike meet on Sunday showing the Panther (We hope)
