Grace & The Art of Scooter Maintenance
Posted: Tue May 29, 2007 11:52 pm
or, perhaps Stebel 101
On the way home tonight, I had the opportunity to make use of my very nice and loud Stebel air horn.
A pickup truck was backing out of a driveway on a hilly and curvy back street I like to take on my commute. It's not a high traffic zone, so he probably was not watching for a scooter blasting (at the speed limit) up his hill.
I thought to myself, "self, this may in fact be a perfect opportunity to make your presence known with that nifty Stebel Nautilus Air Horn you've installed."
So, I confidently pressed the shiny candy like yellow button on the left, and... nothing happened. Not so much as a wheeze or a whimper. I slowed down considerably, now more humble than a few moments previous.
When I got home, I asked my 8 year old daughter Grace if she would help me fix the horn on my scooter, since she's very cool and she likes to help her old man. She of course said yes. In the garage she said to me "I can see myself riding a scooter some day", and I agreed.
I was pretty sure I knew what happened, one of the wire end connector thingys fell off the horn connector thingy. Grace applied her highly technical mantra "lefty loosey, righty tighty" to remove the single large screw on the front, and I did the rest.
I was right, the red wire was not connected to the horn. May have had something to do with me applying tie down thingys to the loose wires under the floorboard yesterday. In fact, I would bet good money on it. I spent several minutes looking for the pesky critter and right before I was about to give up and start removing plastic parts, I found it, tightened it up a little, and reconnected it where it belonged. A little electrical tape to prevent too much movement to shake it loose again.
Grace had the honor of doing the live test to confirm horn operation, she nearly leapt from the scooter when it sounded. We then put the front cover back on, Grace put back the main screw "righty tighty", I did the two little ones, and we were done.
I kinda like working on my scooter with Grace.
Oh, one more thing: you know how they recommend testing the controls on your bike before you ride? Maybe there is something to that.
On the way home tonight, I had the opportunity to make use of my very nice and loud Stebel air horn.
A pickup truck was backing out of a driveway on a hilly and curvy back street I like to take on my commute. It's not a high traffic zone, so he probably was not watching for a scooter blasting (at the speed limit) up his hill.
I thought to myself, "self, this may in fact be a perfect opportunity to make your presence known with that nifty Stebel Nautilus Air Horn you've installed."
So, I confidently pressed the shiny candy like yellow button on the left, and... nothing happened. Not so much as a wheeze or a whimper. I slowed down considerably, now more humble than a few moments previous.
When I got home, I asked my 8 year old daughter Grace if she would help me fix the horn on my scooter, since she's very cool and she likes to help her old man. She of course said yes. In the garage she said to me "I can see myself riding a scooter some day", and I agreed.
I was pretty sure I knew what happened, one of the wire end connector thingys fell off the horn connector thingy. Grace applied her highly technical mantra "lefty loosey, righty tighty" to remove the single large screw on the front, and I did the rest.
I was right, the red wire was not connected to the horn. May have had something to do with me applying tie down thingys to the loose wires under the floorboard yesterday. In fact, I would bet good money on it. I spent several minutes looking for the pesky critter and right before I was about to give up and start removing plastic parts, I found it, tightened it up a little, and reconnected it where it belonged. A little electrical tape to prevent too much movement to shake it loose again.
Grace had the honor of doing the live test to confirm horn operation, she nearly leapt from the scooter when it sounded. We then put the front cover back on, Grace put back the main screw "righty tighty", I did the two little ones, and we were done.
I kinda like working on my scooter with Grace.
Oh, one more thing: you know how they recommend testing the controls on your bike before you ride? Maybe there is something to that.
