It all began in 2018-June when I resumed college after vacation. My 13-year old Honda Unicorn wouldn't start at all.
Prior to going on vacation and for the last 3 years, I had to spend at least 15-20 minutes kick-starting with choke fully on. After the bike attained stable idling speed, I had to ride for at least 3 km on 1st - 2nd gear to warm up the engine. Once warmed up, I could shift to higher gears and ride on to college without any apprehensions of the bike stopping midway. However, post every bike-service, it would perform well for the first 10 days and then fall back to its old habits. I never questioned the mechanic because when I first gave the bike to him, almost 5 years ago, he did a good job. So, I simply kept trusting him, blindly. I bought into his explanation that it is an old bike so I should expect it to have some aging problems.
Anyway, after attempting to kickstart the bike everyday for 20 min., I would take the auto-rickshaw and then the Metro and then another auto-rickshaw to reach college.
After 4 days, I called the mechanic to who I normally give my bike for servicing and/or repair. After listening to the details I gave of the problem, he suggested that I bring it in for servicing which I readily agreed to. Later that evening, I thought and realised that I had given the bike for servicing in the third week of 2018-March and I had ridden only for a month before going on vacation. So, I told myself that something is fishy and I embarked upon an internet search.
I searched and searched and finally found something that I thought might alleviate my bike's problem. I tried it the next day and the problem went away immediately; this was after almost 3 weeks of Auto-Metro-Auto. That was the moment of truth. I resolved that I will not give my bike either for servicing or for repairs to the mechanic and that I would be my bike's doctor from now onward. As a kid, I used to open my bicycle up at least once a month and put it back together. Though that was more than 25 years ago, I knew that my innards simply know what to do in a given situation and my hands would do as needed. So, the first thing I did was to take stock of my bike's behaviour and cleanliness.
So, since 2018-Aug, I have been reading about my bike, bikes in general and watching a lot of youtube videos on how to do something or the other with my bike- the goal being to maintain the health of my bike and ensure that it performs efficiently.
Till date, I have fiddled with the carburettor, front disc brake, disc brake cable, air filter, engine oil, chain, chain cover, front wheel, rear wheel, clutch cable, rear brake, and spark plug. In this short time, I realized that though the principle of doing a particular repair is the same for a particular kind of bike, the actual act of doing the service/repair is not easy as it depends on the state of that part of the bike and how well it has been maintained till the point in time when you open it. I also learnt that my bike mechanic had been cheating- did not do certain tasks that he was supposed to do as part of normal service OR did not do those tasks diligently & honestly.
I am very grateful to all the people who posted videos on YouTube and similarly wrote about their experiences in how to maintain and/or repair bikes. These internet posts and videos guided me so that I know when and where I am going wrong. It seemed so easy to do a particular repair when I was watching the video but when I went down to the bike and started to check/open that particular part, I found that it is not as easy as I initially thought.
Anyway, last night, it dawned on me that I WANT to blog my MotorCycle Maintenance experiences. So, here it is. I hope to blog about each of my experiences in separate posts.
Interestingly, I observed that it is almost 6 years since my last post. Hopefully, I will be able to continue posting from now on.
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