June 17, 2023
Day 34 - still at Brownfield, TX
I woke up at 4:32am, and was moving the bike out of the room just before 6:00am. I rolled the bike off the curb beyond the overhang to get a good GPS signal. All of a sudden, I'm smelling smoke - and seeing it! My bike is on fire! After a few panicked seconds of thinking I knew that either the +6 volts or -6 volts for the accessories battery was shorting to the frame. I grabbed the terminals at both connections and yanked them off the battery. The fire was out. But I was seeing a lot of bare wire where the insulation had burnt off.
I'd left the key in the motel room, and had closed the door, but not all the way, since I was going to make one more sweep of the room to make sure I hadn't left anything. At least that worked out.
I rolled the bike back into the room and resigned that I wasn't going anywhere today. I walked across the side street to Stripes gas station/convenience store for a cup of coffee. I needed time to think. I needed some breakfast. After breakfast I'll assess what went wrong and see if it's repairable. I saw on Google Maps that there's an O'Reilly Auto Parts store a block away, so I could get parts and terminals there. They open at 7:30am.
Open at 6:30am was Cub Drive-in across the highway. I walked over there at 6:35am. There were already several local customers there. I had pancakes with ham, and orange juice.
Back at the motel room, I unloaded the bike and took a closer look at the situation. The right upper front basket support leg had bent almost ninety degrees at its end. The edge of the bent end had cut into the -6v wire to the socket that's used to power the Magellan MAP330 GPS. All the insulation on that wire was burnt off. The insulation on some of the other wires was damaged due to close proximity to this melted wire. I think I can fix this.
I was a little alarmed about the basket's support leg being bent, but maybe that happened when the bike fell upside down the other day. I removed the burnt wire socket, and got to work straightening out the support leg end. I have two fender washers with me and added those to the support leg ends on both sides to try to keep things straight.
Then I moved on to seeing how I might repair the 12 volt socket. The bare wire wasn't in too bad of shape. I decided that just replacing the missing insulation with electrical tape would be sufficient. So I used both Kapton tape and vinyl tape, which made an acceptable repair. I moved the socket location and wire locations so that if the support brackets bend again, they won't come in contact with the wires. Repairs all done just before 2:00pm.
Backing up, at 9:00am, I checked with the motel owner about staying another night. He offered to look for and give me some wire that he might have, but by then I'd figured out I didn't need new wire. After I knew I could stay here today, I took a nap from 9:20am to 11:30am. I think that did me a lot of good. Then at 12:30pm, I walked across the side street for a chocolate milk. So it wasn't constant repair work all morning long.
Later in the afternoon I looked at the tube patch situation. I removed the leaking patches from the tubes. The chain lube I'm using has a solvent in it, which did remove the sticky residue off the tubes. I found I had an old vulcanizing patch kit, so was going to use patches from that, but the vulcanizing solution is all dried up.
Moving on, I wrote and posted yesterday's report, which wouldn't have gotten done today if I've been on the road.
At 5:15pm I took off walking to Lone Star Cajun Seafood and Steakhouse for supper, where I had a bacon cheeseburger and a banana smoothie. I was the only one there when I arrived, and wondered how this place stays in business. By the time I left, the place was half full, so it's all a matter of timing.
Tools and parts are scattered all around this motel room. I need to get everything back together and on the bike. Also, I'm going to take a shower and then see about getting to bed.
I'll give it another go at putting in the miles tomorrow.
Jeff
Spent: $2.05 (coffee) + $11.37 plus $2.27 (breakfast) + $55 plus $5 (motel room) + $3.49 (chocolate milk) + $21.64 plus $5 (supper) = $105.82
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1 year ago
https://www.cyclechat.net/threads/why-does-my-puncture-repair-keep-failing.292421/#post-6998
1 year ago
Stay safe and enjoy.
1 year ago
Pretty sure you can get a new patch kit at a Walmart, or any bicycle shop of course. I always run out of glue before the patches are all used up, so my patch kit usually has lots of patches and not enough glue for them all. Hoping you get lucky and have no more flats.
1 year ago
After I figured out what caused the problem, it was a straightforward repair.
A long mileage day, not always so straightforward. Thanks for your wishes.
Jeff
1 year ago
Thanks. I liked the advice of setting a table leg on top of the patch.
Jeff
1 year ago
There was a short moment, as the smoke was bellowing, when I thought, "Oh, this is it!"
It was fortunate that I was right there when it happened and the bike was outside. I should have given more consideration to adding fuses to my circuit design.
All is well now. Thanks for your good wishes.
Jeff
1 year ago
I hadn't thought about Walmart having patch kits. Being that this reply is a few days late, I'm happy to let you know that I now have a glue-style patch kit, which I picked up at a bicycle shop today. But no more flats would be even better ;-)
Jeff
1 year ago