My friend Mikey traveled to Japan for vacation, and he picked up a cool phone strap of some Spirited Away characters. I put it on my Nintendo DS.



He also got me Electroplankton which is so cool!

Honda has this cool scooter prototype that runs on gasoline and electric power. Yes, it’s a hybrid scooter! I am not too crazy about the looks, but the concept is cool, and it should get incredible gas mileage. Maybe even better than the ~100mpg my C70 Passport gets!

I put the new tire on the front, filled it with air, and it seems alright. I also checked the hi-beam light and it works nicely. I took it up to about 35mph tonight, I think it will go above 40mph, but I didn’t let it get up to speed. I guess the new tire was freaking me out a little. Next I gotta adjust the valve clearance, because it sounded like there was some tapping coming from there.

A couple days ago, we were searching online for Halloween costumes for the kids. We stumbled upon this costume of Abraham Lincoln, and Bay looks at it and says, “Willy Wonka!”. I thought that was kind of funny…

Last night I went over to the garage to work on the C70. Although I only have a small space to work in, it is adequate. Earlier in the week, I went to Home Depot and bought the materials for my homemade jack-stand. It consisted of two bricks, a bag of dirt, and a tarp. The bricks go on the ground, for height, then part of the tarp, then the bag of dirt, then put the rest of the tarp over it. The tarp is there so that the bag doesn’t puncture. Then I lift the bike onto that pile, and the front wheel is off the ground. The dirt is pliable enough that the bike “settles” into it and is pretty stable. In the future, I’d like to get a center stand, which would make working on the C70 much easier, but the parts for it would cost upwards of $50, so I will just use my “Home Depot Special”.

Anyways, I got a bit of work done. First, I replaced the bulbs in the speedometer, the neutral indicator, and the hi-beam indicator. The panel lights up nicely now. I couldn’t test the hi-beam light yet because I didn’t start the engine, but the neutral light works perfectly. Also, I replaced the air filter, which was all dirty and oily. That was the easy part, and took about 10 minutes.

Next, I disconnected the front brake and speedometer cables, then removed the front wheel. I then removed the broken fender, and tried to line up the replacement I bought a week earlier. Unfortunately, the fender’s mounting holes are off by about 3/4”. It’s secured by four bolts, and the top two line up perfectly, but the bottom two by the wheel hub don’t quite match. I will need to make a bracket or extension of some sort. But for the time being, the top two bolts are holding the fender securely in place. Even if the fender shifts, there is no possibility of it getting stuck on the tire because of the way it is positioned.

Next, I removed the old, cracked tire from the front rim. That was easy. But fitting the new tire on the rim was a pain in the rear. It was not pliable at all, and all attempts to get the bead around the rim were defeated. I was super hot and sweaty too, so I decided to call it a night, and bring the tire back to the apartment and have another go at it the next day. But, after taking a shower, and reading up on the correct way to put the tire back on, I decided to try again. (In the comfort of and air-conditioned room!) The secret trick to putting on a tire of this kind is to put some soap around the rim. Simple as that. A little soap and some elbow grease, and the tire went on relatively easily. My fingers are sore, but the tire is ready to be filled with air. While I have the front wheel off, I am going to replace the brake shoes. But that will wait til tomorrow night.

I can’t wait to take it out for a spin, though! With the new tire in front, I want to take it up to top speed and see how fast it can go.

Things left to be done in the near-term:

Replace rear tire
Replace drive chain
Fix front brake light switch
Make brackets for fender
Change oil

Oh dang, I just remembered I forgot to charge the battery. Oh well, it looked like it still had plenty of juice, but I try to charge it every couple weeks. 

I have never been a fan of the regular old Tabasco, but I recently went to Chipotle where they have the Smoked Chipotle Tabasco and the Jalapeno Green Pepper Tabasco. These are both excellent! The smoky one has a bbq-type flavor, a bit like liquid smoke flavoring, and the green sauce is more tangy. I’m not sure which one I like better, so I bought both of them at the supermarket today. I still like the red Pickapeppa sauce better, but these are good to put on mexican food.

While doing a Google search on “Honda C70” last night, I stumbled upon the Mad Bastard Scooter Rally ‘04, put together by CMG, a Canadian motorbike online magazine. I love to read stories like this. A group of several (6?) scooterists go on an endurance rally around Lake Ontario on scooters, including a Yellow 1981 Honda C70! I won’t give away the ending, whether they made it or not, but it’s a pretty cool story. You can also read about the ‘05 Rally here, although no C70’s made the trip in ‘05.

I have a fascination about motorbike journeys, and have been reading “Long Way Round” by Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman. Someday I’d like to take an extended trip on a bike too. Seems like a neat experience.

I pre-ordered Nintendogs: Chihuahua edition from Amazon a few days ago for the awesome price of $14.99. Today I received this email:

Hello from Amazon.com.

We regret to inform you that an error caused “Nintendogs - Chihuahua”
to be displayed at an incorrect price.

In accordance with our posted policies on pricing, we are unable to
offer this item for the incorrectly posted price. Therefore, we have
cancelled your order for this item.  At any given time, despite our
best efforts, a small number of the millions of items on our site may
be mispriced. We do, however, verify prices as part of our shipping
procedures. If we discover that an item’s correct price is higher than
our stated price, we will, at our discretion, either contact you for
instructions before shipping or cancel your order and notify you of
such cancellation. This policy is posted in the Help section and is
accessible through numerous other areas of our web site.

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

We value your business and hope that you will give us a chance to
serve you again in the future.

Sincerely,

Please note: this e-mail was sent from a notification-only address
that cannot accept incoming e-mail. Please do not reply to this
message

The fender that arrived for my C70 should fit on nicely. The mounting holes on the top are placed differently than on the original fender, but the forks actually have bolts in the correct place for the replacement fender as well, so it should work out. The only problem is that I only have about an 8’x4’ space to work on it in the garage. The rest of the garage is filled with our moving stuff. I need to stop by Home Depot to buy some bags of dirt to make my homemade motorbike jack to lift the front of the bike up. Then I can change the front tire, and replace the fender at the same time. Speaking of the fender, the color turns out to be a really nice dark greyish-blue. It is actually one of the colors I was thinking of painting the bike, so I guess it’s decided. I shouldn’t have any problem finding a matching color at the auto parts store. The photo above is what my bike will look like. I am even going to paint the side covers white to match the legshield. I just need to search for a luggage rack like the one in the photo, but it shouldn’t be too hard to find since they are still produced in Japan.

The other night I decided to take the C70 out for another spin. The cub turned over and started right up, but then it died after about half a minute. I couldn’t get it started again, so I wheeled it back towards the garage. Before I actually put it in, I decided to try one last time, and lo and behold, it started up. This time, the bike’s weight and/or metal mass was enough to trip the entrance gate, so I was cruising around the neighborhood in no time. It was about 85°F out, so the wind felt really good. It is so much fun to ride, even if it’s only at a rather tame 30mph. I think it could probably hit 40mph easy, but I will wait until I put on the new tires before I try. I also need to get a new chain, because the one that is on it now is stretched and rubbing against the chain guard. I also fixed the right rear signal: the bulb wasn’t contacting the wire properly. Anyways, the ride was tons of fun. I rode around the old neighborhood, since it is not busy at all and I can have the whole road to myself. I am getting used to riding it, and shifting is becoming second nature. My friend Chris told me a bit about the correct way to apply pressure to the brake on a motorcycle, so I kept that in mind when slowing down at the stop signs.

The list of things to do are:

Fix speedometer bulbs
Fix front brake lever switch
Replace chain
Adjust pistons
Replace tires
Replace fender
Replace petcock