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In a manner no way typical of me I realised I had a few hours before I started my shift to register our flight details and print off the boarding passes as I was finishing at midnight, up early and out for the airport by 08.45 the next morning. That was a flap. Then it wouldn’t let me print off the return flight boarding pass so I had to download and register with the app to get an electronic boarding pass. I’d run out of time so I had to do that at work. I got it all sorted. Just. Then midnight finish, 01.30 before I got to sleep, up at 07.00, not the best of starts to the day.

We got to the airport and, because we’ve always stowed our bags in the hold, had no idea about the restrictions for carry on goods. Wendy had her perfume, hairspray and such stolen off her. We got held up as the bags were refused by the scanner for carrying liquids, etc. It was massive stress. We sat waiting for our flight, it was a bit late boarding, that’s how close we were, when Wendy came over proper poorly so we had to come home.

To be honest I was doing it more as a stressful chore I’d already paid for, than as something which I wanted to do. I’m still not feeling 100% most of the time, and if Wendy was too poorly to do her museums and art galleries and such it was just going to be a waste of time.

When I got the long bolt and improvised a way to disassemble the clutch off the bike (in the workshop manual it say “do not attempt to disassemble the clutch off the bike”, so that was nerve racking) I realised it wasn’t the clutch inner that I’d broken, but the clutch pressure plate. *blubbing intensifies*

So, £120 for clutch inner, £80 for new clutch bearing, £70 for a 6 ton press to separate then rejoin the inner and outer, and £140 for a complete clutch assembly (that I bought after panicking about the inner, and before committing to buying a press, then learning I needed a new bearing to do it) that I don’t need.

Bought the £49 clutch pressure plate. Fitted the new clutch plates, pressure plate and spring and refitted it on the bike. While I had the clutch side engine casing off I fitted my new clutch cable at the same time. Then refitted the engine casing. I fitted the clutch cable to the handlebars and tried it. Nothing. The lever was solid. I took the engine casing back off, and took the clutch mechanism apart again. Same. Reread the book. Not doing anything wrong. The clutch mechanism has a triangular piece. That fits to the bottom piece. It is three identical sides, a ball bearing in a groove on each side. Identical. But, what it doesn’t say in the book, if you twist the triangle it pulls the cable through and puts it under pressure, so when you pull the clutch lever there is movement. If you don’t twist it, it is already at it full range of motion in the direction the cable pulls it.

I was saying in my last blog it had been months of the Sportster project looking like it would be forever before I could get it on the road, if at all, then suddenly it was a sprint to the finish with me taking it for it’s MOT today.

*sigh*

On Friday I had what felt like acid reflux, by Saturday it had moved to an irritating cough and feeling crap. I did a test and yup, it’s covid. Super. I was OK with it if it was just going to be a bit of a cough. I went to bed and then it really kicked in. Solid headache the painkillers just wouldn’t touch, lasted until this morning, sweating then shaking so bad my whole body was going into muscle spasms, my bones aching,etc etc. All the good things.

My last blog started with me in despair over #ProjectTractor. I’d rebuilt the engine and was failing to get it running. One job in a seemingly endless list, but a biggie. Then, as I was blogging, I realised the new coil for the ignition module has the spark plug leads connecting from the opposite terminals to the cylinders. Right terminal is now front cylinder. I was wildly optimistic that would solve that particular problem. The following morning I cut a new spark plug lead to reach to the front cylinder and tried again.

I had a bunch of false starts and mistakes. I left it in gear, then I realised I’d only connected one spark plug cap, I left the inspection cover off when I started it, I forgot and let the loose ignition switch short out on the engine. Stupid, stupid things. Anyway, the first morning I got it running on Easy Start (and one cylinder, I later found out) and I was ecstatic. The next morning I put the tank back on and tried starting it with just the carb. It ran fine. Since then I’ve been running it for 30 seconds at a time in bursts, around work, to start the running in process. Now I’m going a bit longer each time.

I’ve ordered a clutch upgrade kit, a clutch cable, a new gasket (that one is leaking) and more oil. That should all be arriving tomorrow. While I was at it I’ve ordered some better indicators, a 10mm drill bit (to drill out the rear mudguard a tad for the indicators) a low resistance torque wrench (one that is accurate from 5- 25nm, my main one is really only good over 20 nm) and some better locktite.

I worked all weekend to finish the Sportster build, but it’s not working.

I made a few mistakes. I forgot to put in oil seals so had to take the barrels and heads off again. For some reason the one of the throttle cables doesn’t quite fit. It’s the return cable so just the pull cable should be sufficient for starting it up. Then I spent hours trying to set up the simplest thing with the new ignition device. The instructions say front cylinder, TDC, compression stroke, then just rotate the unit slightly until the light goes out. At the exact point the light goes out, screw the unit into place. Easy.

I spent hours. It’s not made any easier by Harley’s stone age attitude. To turn the engine over you have to put the bike into gear, take the pistons out, jack up the arse end, and rotate the wheel by hand.