Offta the grudge for a bit...

 

Boy..sure glad I didn't buy one of those new ones, with all those problems. My 1982 runs fantastic and in anudder year or so, I'll have it paid off...or maybe I'll wait 20 years and get one real cheap with 10,000 miles on it and all the bugs fixed........OH, WAIT ....WRONG FORUM ...SORRY!

 

Dodged storms as I took a rideabout this afternoon. 90* today, but it felt good on the ride. Somehow, I managed to avoid all the fresh chip and seal roads that are popular this time of year. I also managed to avoid all the idjots, as no one did anything stupid around me today. That alone makes for a very nice ride, since it seems rare that I have an incident-free day.

 

Shoulda bought a Chevy. Their radios kick ***!

 

Nice piece of equipment, Softy! Another beast, which is why it still exists. Freakin' hand cranks ain't for me. I've been smacked by more than one of those. Oooooops! OWWWWWW!

 

Bit me a few times today. Time to go home now.

 

ch ch checkin in......

 

Ain't sure this would do the same, but on old aircraft engines, turn the mags off, rotate it through a full compression stroke on all cylinders, get it poised on a compression stroke, mags on, pull hard. Never wrap your thumb around the prop or handle, that's how you break bones, can sting your fingers if it backfires, but at least they just slip off. Might lose a bit of skin, too... better'n breaking your thumb and/or wrist. For hard starting engines it pays to just keep a can of starting fluid with it. That old Wisconsin engine might be a bit low on compression after all these years, too. I like mags, real simple, don't even need a battree. Never hadda worry about a battery going dead on the old Harleys, didn't even have em.

 

Was happy the mag still had its polarity cause no one works on em anymore. Thanks for the thumb tip. Caught me a few times.

 

I overhauled mags, last job I had before going to the airlines. Run into a problem with that, send pictures, maybe I'll remember something about them. They're fairly simple, 'cept for some of the big multi point radial engine models. One as old as yours probably has some phenolic bits in it, kind of like fiberglass, got replaced by plastic and nylon.

If it's easy to get to the points, might slide a piece of fine emory cloth/sandpaper (like 600 grit) between them. They'd get little points up from the flat sometimes, throw the timing off a hair. I'd guess by now you've seen that in those older motors with distributor/point ignition.