Quantcast

Ever have an "oh duh" moment?

Sandwich

Sandwich

Pig my fish!
Staff member
May 23, 2002
21,117
6,065
borcester rhymes
I just bought a used/refurbished lefty for the front of my bike. The guy said it was losing all it's air and couldn't figure out why. He sent it to cannondale on warranty and they replaced virtually every part of the internals...new damper, new boot, etc. It's like a new fork. I go to air it up, and as soon as I take the pump off, all the air leaks out. Uh oh. I grab a shrader valve tool and a couple spare valve cores and give it a turn or two...sure enough, it holds air. I can't help but wondering if cannondale rebuilt this whole fork for a $0.25 part. Either way, I win!
 
kazlx

kazlx

Patches O'Houlihan
Aug 7, 2006
6,985
1,957
Tustin, CA
I bought a $6000 stroker motor one time for $500 because it was leaking oil past the main seals. The guy thought the crank and block were tore up. I drove two hours to his house to take a look. When I saw he installed the motor and never installed the alignment pins for the timing cover, I knew right away it was fine. Gladly gave him his asking price before heading out....and knowing I had scored.
 
kazlx

kazlx

Patches O'Houlihan
Aug 7, 2006
6,985
1,957
Tustin, CA
Also bought a supercharged Mustang that 'didn't run' for $1000. Turned out the plug on the wiring harness for the fuel pump was disconnected.
 
Sandwich

Sandwich

Pig my fish!
Staff member
May 23, 2002
21,117
6,065
borcester rhymes
kazlx said:
I bought a $6000 stroker motor one time for $500 because it was leaking oil past the main seals. The guy thought the crank and block were tore up. I drove two hours to his house to take a look. When I saw he installed the motor and never installed the alignment pins for the timing cover, I knew right away it was fine. Gladly gave him his asking price before heading out....and knowing I had scored.
Click to expand...
dude that's awesome. I love those stories...then the buyer just slinks away hoping the seller won't notice. "yep, looks like toast. I'll guess I'll just pay your full asking price and run in the other direction as fast as possible...."
 
boogenman

boogenman

Turbo Monkey
Nov 3, 2004
4,324
996
BUFFALO
I've passed the 200 mile mark for teh season on the trail bike. I also got a crpa lot of hipity hops under me belt on the trials bike.

Haha purebred dog shows? WTF? I sell unicorn steaks on the black market but I'm not into dog shows.
 
sstalder5

sstalder5

Turbo Monkey
Aug 20, 2008
1,942
20
Beech Mtn Definitely NOT Boulder
I was given an old Kawasaki stand up jet ski that "didn't run". I cleaned the carburetor and replaced the spark plug and its run perfect for the past two summers and has been tons of fun. Don't know if that counts though since even a monkey could fix a 2-stroke but the guy that gave it to me was an idiot.
 
Matchew

Matchew

Monkey
May 26, 2006
511
0
NH / Mass (ugh)
This is one of my favorite stories my grandfather told me. Back in the day (I'm 23) he used to deliver oil in the Bridgeport, CT area and had a customer offer to sell him a Mercedes for next to nothing because "it wouldn't start and the engine was dead". The thing had been sitting for a few months in front of a dirt embankment and the tires were flat. He gives it a quick glance over and immediately knows he is about to get an amazing deal. He buys the car, pumps up the tires and tows it back to his house with his pickup later that day. All it took was shoving a wrench through the dirt clogging the exhaust pipe to get it running. He kept it for a couple years and sold it for something else fun.
 
kazlx

kazlx

Patches O'Houlihan
Aug 7, 2006
6,985
1,957
Tustin, CA
HAB said:
:rofl:
Click to expand...
Yea, that was an easy fix. Mustangs (the 5.0s) were notorious for having loud fuel pumps. As soon as the voltage was good on the battery and I didn't hear the fuel pump fire up...I knew it couldn't be all that many things. Towed it home and fixed it in about 5 minutes.
 
mandown

mandown

Poopdeck Repost
Jun 1, 2004
20,312
7,862
Transylvania 90210
I recently scored a perfectly good stack of dollar bills from some chump from Orange County. He said they weren't working right, so offered him a wheelset which I said was enchanted by a fairy princess. He did the trade. I took his broken bills and let them refrigerate in my wallet overnight. The next day, I pulled them out and spent them, and they worked like a charm.
 
boogenman

boogenman

Turbo Monkey
Nov 3, 2004
4,324
996
BUFFALO
because it is half of a fork?

If we start talking about what fork is moar better and why(moar shimz) I think we will be beating a dead horse......
 
Polandspring88

Polandspring88

Superman
Mar 31, 2004
3,066
7
Broomfield, CO
boogenman said:
because it is half of a fork?

If we start talking about what fork is moar better and why(moar shimz) I think we will be beating a dead horse......
Click to expand...
The lefty is clearly superior to an arched fork. It's slimmer profile takes up less space in your garage and collects less dust, both of which are important when you don't ride.
 
Westy

Westy

the teste
Nov 22, 2002
54,526
20,332
Sleazattle
A buddy of mine had an old boat generator that wouldn't run. On closer inspection it had a random hose clamp that was shorting the coil to the frame.
 
B

bean

Turbo Monkey
Feb 16, 2004
1,335
0
Boulder
A couple years ago I had the summer tires on my wife's car swapped for some snow tires. They were still good, I just didn't have a spare set of wheels to put the snows on. So I made it very clear that we wanted the old tires back. We went back and picked it up later that evening after closing. No tires in the back seat. I called the next day and they couldn't find them in the shop, so they searched through the dumpster. No luck there. At that point the shop was disinclined to do anything else and stopped taking my calls so I started calling their corporate head quarters. After a couple weeks of harassing people somebody finally called the shop and got them on a three way call where we came to an agreement for them to give us a set of new tires for the cost of mounting and balancing the next spring. Done.

A couple more weeks later I got a text message from my wife - "Why are there a bunch of tires in the trunk of my car and why did you stuff them in there so tightly?" The car trunk was so small I hadn't even considered that somebody might have put them in there and never bothered to check.
 
mandown

mandown

Poopdeck Repost
Jun 1, 2004
20,312
7,862
Transylvania 90210
i still remember when i went to get the dealer cost estimate for replacing my stolen stereo and built-in nav system, giving that monster number to the insurance company, and then taking the fat check and getting a nice new stereo installed at a small local shop for a fraction of the dealer cost estimate, and just using the nav on my phone, with my pocket getting the difference :D
 
kazlx

kazlx

Patches O'Houlihan
Aug 7, 2006
6,985
1,957
Tustin, CA
mandown said:
I recently scored a perfectly good stack of dollar bills from some chump from Orange County. He said they weren't working right, so offered him a wheelset which I said was enchanted by a fairy princess. He did the trade. I took his broken bills and let them refrigerate in my wallet overnight. The next day, I pulled them out and spent them, and they worked like a charm.
Click to expand...
I resemble that remark. Said chump then used the wheels in question to close the sale on a Knolly to purchase a shiny new Yeti 66C.
 
kazlx

kazlx

Patches O'Houlihan
Aug 7, 2006
6,985
1,957
Tustin, CA
Which Knolly did you break? I had a DT. It was a great bike, just replaced it with a DH and a trail bike. Otherwise, it was a tank.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom