Legal!

I finally got every last scrap of paperwork and was able to register and license my scoot! Now if I can get it mechanically lined out...its at about 90%.

Still not Registered to ride

The dealer for my scooter answered my email yesterday and said (regarding the MDO and paperwork) "They are on the way". When I sent him the stuff, it took two days. I guess I will probably get it tomorrow or Monday. I hope he followed my instructions and sent it to my work address. If he didn't, it might get shredded. I got my Netflix out of the mailbox yesterda and they looked like a dog had chewed them up. I don't think I will be able to return them in the envelopes they came in.

I just found out that the carb that is on my scooter is the one they generally use on the CF Moto 244cc engine. I am having a bit of a time figuring out how to adjust it while it is still attached to the engine. The adjusts are on the bottom and buried...

WARNING: KEEP BACK 300 FEET!

The other day (when I blew out my disc again) when I was putting my
scoot back together, this piece was the hardest to get back on.
Beware, if you take this off, it will TOTALLY suck to put back on. My
friends in the scooter/help group told me that it was bad (really bad)
to have a handful of screws left when I got done putting things back
together. I'm keeping my ears open for rattles... Like I told them,
the good news is no missing screws up front, so if any body panel
detaches at 50mph, it ain't gonna hit ME! WARNING: KEEP BACK 300
FEET! DRIVER NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR FLYING DEBRIS!!!

Dude, its starting to feel like the Millennium Falcon!

Scooter Update -MCO and Dealer info

I have not started the scoot in a couple days due mainly to ice storms. It is supposed to be [relatively] warm today. What do you want to bet it doesn't start??? Well, I've still got a bunch of starting fluid...

Here's an update on what's going on with registration: I went in tothe county clerks office and they said that since the certificate of origin was not signed by the importer (Goldenvale, Inc.) then I had to get it signed by them first. Since John and Linda of Valley Scooters are on vacation until Sunday, I contacted Goldenvale directly and they were happy (for a $20 fee) to overnight me a new MCO signed. To their credit, they did not charge anything for doing it, just for the overnight charge--and they didn't mark up for handling or anything--the reciept was $20 even and said "Airborne" on it.

I live in an apartment and the postal carriers are not too particular how they shove things into my tiny mailbox (as witnessed by my Netflix DVD's showing up almost ripped out of the envelopes) so any time I have a package of any importance, I get them shipped to work. I left at about 11am on Thursday because of the ice storms and didn't get my package until Friday. I put the MCO into a priority mail envelope also with specific instructions and a copy of Kentucky's registration form (the TC96-182) which is mandatory. The instructions basically said to fill out the back of the MCO (I put hot pink post-it noteswith arrows saying "fill out this section" and for the TC96-182 "sign here" and "fill out this section") and also had notated to get the sections of the MCO and TC96-182 notarized. Does this sound complex or tedious? Well, I sent the form once, and Valley Scooters didn't fill it out completely OR get it notarized. Then I sent them an email with a PDF that contained instructions with pictures of the sections they needed to fill out and get notarized. What they did was (on a scrap peice of paper even) fill out the instruction sheet, and get IT notarized and then priority mailed to me. This has been going around and around and I am getting really sick of not being able to ride on good days. I hope that everything goes perfect this time (because it looks like for KY it has to be perfect).

The only problem I forsee is that Goldenvale siged it, but did not notarize, so I'm looking at possibly spending another $30 or so to send it priority mail BACK to Goldenvale, plus charges to get it notarized, and then also overnighted back to me (they only offer overnight service or regular mail).

This is sooooo tiring. Hey, at least it's not Georgia!!! From whatI hear, this could go on for months (instead of just a month).

This Morning (i.e. Bobbie Holsclaw hates me)

I just thought I would entertain my wonderful readers with the details of my clusterf*ck this morning...

Got the kids to school and then I came back home. I geared up, drove the .5 miles down to the County Clerks office. Waited in line for about 10 minutes and went up when the lady called my number. I told her I was there to register the vehicle, and she said "You need it inspected first." So I went out and the county police officer was getting something out of his SUV right beside me and I asked him "where is it you're supposed to pull in to get the inspection." and he said he would do it right there. So he took my drivers license and the MCO (Manufacturer's Certificate of Origin), verified the vin, checked the lights and then told me to come inside and he would call my name. After a couple minutes he called me over and handed me the paperwork. He said "Nice bike. How much you give for it." and I told him. He seemed impressed.

Well, that was the good news and here lately it seems there is always bad to go with. I went back and got another number. They called my name. I went up and the lady looked at my paperwork. The MCO had not been signed by Goldenvale (the importer) when they sold it to Valley Scooters (the dealer). She said I have to get it signed and come back. Well, Goldenvale is in California, and Valley Scooters is in Connecticut. I called Goldenvale, and they are going to overnight me a new MCO. THEN, I have to get Valley Scooters to re-sign the damn thing and they are on vacation this whole week. Plus, they have to get it notarized, and also fill out this other stupid document (which they have done wrong three times now) that is required by Kentucky on all out-of-state vehicles. I swear, if I get all this done and go back in--and they find SOMETHING ELSE wrong, I'm killing somebody.

MCO Fiasco, Version 2.0

Well, I rode the .5 miles down to the county clerk's office this morning to register my scooter so I can start riding it back and forth to work.

....DENIED>>>

That's right. The original seller of the scoot (Goldenvale) sold it to my dealer (Valley Scooters) but never signed it, so in the state of KY, it's invalid. Also, Valley Scooters did not fill out the required form and have it notarized like I instructed them, so that mandatory paperwork is also invalid.

I have no recourse but to wait on my dealer and hope for the best. If he is as helpful as he's been on my last two issues, then I don't think I'l be riding the scooter anytime soon.

"Its not a DAMN MOPED"

I was irritated today. It was cold as hell, but decent weather so I decided I would go in a little late and run to the county clerks office to register my scooter. I dropped the kids off at the bus stop (actually I waited until the bus came) and went home to get my helmet and paperwork. Well, the scooter wouldn't start!! After talking with some of my buddies online, they were advocating making sure the carbureator was tuned in by the air and fuel adjustments. You have to have it running in order to make the adjustments. I tried starting again and no luck, but it was trying to start. I gave it a little starting fluid, and it began to idle. I got it running and took both kids (one at a time!) slowly and carefully around the parking lot. I brought the battery upstairs to charge fully overnight. I hope I have a little better luck tomorrow AM.

Not starting--AGAIN!

I am very irritated and frustrated. The bloody scooter will not start. I got it running Saturday after a lot of trouble and tearing up my back, and I rode it several times Saturday and Sunday. Left it alone yesterday. Get up this morning, get the kids off to school then I was going to drive it the measley .5 miles down the road to the county clerk's office. Well, I cranked and it did not start. Gave it a little starting fluid and it started and idled for just a couple seconds. Then it would not even get going after that. I'm disappointed that after all I've been through (which compared to others is still probably not much) it will not run long enough just to get it registered. I DO have insurance starting today.

Allergic reaction

I turned around while riding my scooter--still not 100% used to it yet making turns. I got too close to the edge of the road and went off into mud. Both the scooter and I must have some sort of allergy to mud. I broke out in a rash on my knee, and the scooter's paint on one side got a little scuff. Hmmm....

It's Alive!!!

All other things aside, I'm doing better. I went to the immediate care center, and got some drugs for my back. I got the scooter running and I have been riding it around the neighborhood behind the apartments. It's not registered yet, so I'm keeping off the main streets, but I feel the need to run it a little every day. I wanted to register and title it tomorrow, but the clerk's office is closed for the holiday (President's day).

Good & Bad [back]

Well, I tore all the rear and side plastic body panels off my scooter in an effort to diagnose where the raw fuel was draining out of. It was (and I feel really stupid about this) the carburetor drain hose. Originally it was unhooked, and the first mechanic said that the internal drain tube was missing, so he routed it up above the level of the carburetor and zip-tied it. The mechanic #2 re-attached it, but failed to close the shutoff at the end. So yes, you guessed it, I took over 50% of the body panels off for basically sh*ts and giggles. When I saw that; i was irritated, but started putting all the (what is lovingly referred to as) tupperware back on. That's when my back 'snapped' and i knew it was my disk. Well since I worked so hard to get it done, I drove it around the bloody neighborhood a bit anyway.

Carb apart

Here's the carb after he took it all apart.

Carb repair & Starting

Well, I found this fellow--Tommy Miller who is right directly behind where I just moved. I'm talking less than a block away. He works on all sorts of cars, trucks, motorcycles, scooters, etc. For a small fee, he took my scooter apart, took out the carbureator and deduced that the main jet was loose. He said he thought this might be why the scooter would not start, plus earlier it would start, but only idle.

Now it still is not starting, but he suspects that since this loose main jet caused basically a flooding problem, the sparkplug has become fouled. He checked everything else out on the fuel delivery and it all seems to be working from the fuel pump to the automatic choke, to the carb itself--including all the lines and hoses. I'm getting a sparkplug for it today at lunch time, and he's coming over after work to put it in. We shall see how it goes from there. I think I would have to watch him take the carb out a couple more times to be able to do it myself, but once he shows me how to change out the sparkplug, I don't see a big problem with doing it.

Going Nowhere Fast...

I got my scooter back from Chuck. In the six days he kept it for me he managed to drop it once (TOLD him not to use the damn side stand!) and didn't go out to start it once. Now it will not run. I don't guess that matters because there is snow slush and ice on the streets...

My advice from friends (who I have only known online--and only less than six months but seem to care more about me getting riding than my 20+ year friend Chuck) say its carburetor related. Indeed, Chuck and I got it idling with the help of starting fluid in the airbox, but whenever you give it any throttle, it would die. Probably either a fuel line, vacuum hose, the carb itself is gummed up, auto choke malfunction, the fuel filter or the fuel pump. As soon as I can get 4 free hours of non-flesh-eating weather, I will take of the right panel and check all that out.

Well, the good news...

I got the MCO in the mail. Also, Linda called and said that they did get the price wrong, but she would credit the difference, so I did pay $1999 for the scooter. This is the good news.

As I said, I had to leave my scooter in my friend's garage for the week (Sunday until today--not quite a week). When I got there Saturday, different truck and fresh rental trailer, the scooter WOULD NOT START. We filled it with gasoline (there was not much there) and we shot some starting fluid into the airbox (my friend's idea). Finally we were able to get it to idle--roughly. The problem then was that anytime you would give it enough throttle (say over 2K RPMs) then
it would die. Thus, I had to load it onto the trailer by hand. I got it home and just on a fluke, tried again to start it. This time it would not even idle.

I had though having the mechanic supervise me, it would turn out alright. I have the battery inside charging on the battery tender jr.

Last night I thought it was gonna snow so I got out my scooter cover (which just fits) and covered 'er up. It's so bloody cold out right now that I hate to walk the 20 steps from car to door. I hope it warms up this weekend, but who am I kidding. I will be there in the lot on Saturday whether it is cold or not. I think snow or rain would keep me from it...

I guess that's ok. I just moved on Friday and got plenty of unpacking to do...

Pickup and MCO

Now Chuck says he can let me have the scooter on Saturday because he'll be home, but not on Sunday until 3pm. So I asked my friend Steve if I could use his truck Saturday instead, and he said "sure". Now the kids and I are going up Saturday instead. Not a big deal, but I had wanted to spend most of Saturday unpacking. I will probably get to do that anyway.

The MCO is "lost" for now. The USPS fiasco leaves me with mail in a "dead zone" for about the past week or more. I will get it EVENTUALLY. Linda at Valley Scooters sent me the special TC96-182 form that is required by the state of Kentucky to get the vehicle licensed. On it, she listed the sale price as $2199 instead of the $1999 John and I agreed on. I have not checked with the credit card company yet to see how much I actually paid. I told her it was not right, and to please re-fax with the correct amount. If the amount I paid is actually $2199, I'm not going to be very happy about it. That's $150 more--because I will have to pay extra tax on that $2199 too... I will report back with what happens.

Update on MCO--bad news of course...

Well, I spoke with Linda at Valley Scooters. They good news is that she filled out the paperwork and is going to fax it to me this evening sometime (here at work). The bad news is she already mailed the MCO and receipt, so it goes to figure that it is stuck in the USPS screwup. I am not happy about that, but I guess I'll live. I mean what else can I do???

Possible MCO Fiasco

Two weeks ago, I had the movers scheduled and I knew the date I was going to move--which incidentally happens to be this Friday. Well, I did the online thing for change of address. I noticed Wednesday and Thursday I got no mail. That's not extremely uncommon. I left Friday before mail came. When I got back on Sunday, still no mail. I called the post office and they started some sort of cluster-f*ck chain-of-events that may deprive me of my mail for a couple weeks. Cool. Well, I can live without Netflix, I pretty-much know when bills are due and where to send payments, but my bloody MCO is supposed to be coming!!! I can't register the scooter without it. Talk about going postal... When I get the scoot, I want to put my reflective pinstripe and decals on it. I guess I'll have plenty of time to do that...

End of day...no scooter

I guess it's not too bad. I don't have the MCO yet, so I could not register it anyway. It's too damn cold up north in central Indiana to put on the decals and pinstripe I bought. In the summer I'm going to change out all fluids again (except for oil which I'll change earlier at 300, 700, 1000, and then every 1000 after that. I'm going to replace all fluids once a year regardless. All in all, I have observed better quality on this scooter than what I am used to hearing about--especially for a Roketa. I don't know who was responsible for the manufacturing and assembly, but it really looked like they cared about quality. I am (so far) very fortunate. Looks like I might take a long lunch on the 11th...

The Dark Snow Queen

Since there was a small chance that we could find somebody who had a trailer hitch on Sunday, we left the scooter outside still lashed to the trailer. She was covered in frost when I left about 9am. I am going to have to return this weekend to get her.

Scooter Pictures

Had to leave her out last night. We had the scoot all ready for transport and the truck that we had to haul with died. I mean like wrecker towed it away died...

Gear Oil-easy access

I was thinking that I would have to remove a bolt to change add gear oil, but there was a nice threaded cap just about like the engine oil only with no dipstick. I did have to remove a threaded metal bolt with a copper washer to drain it. The black rubber tube is a overflow. I put the top cap back on and blew into the overflow. That forced out the gear oil which was still fairly cool and draining slowly. I don't know yet what the clear plastic tube that is capped is for.

Unexpected better quality / Carburetor

Usually the quality on the hoses and lines is poor, as well as the fluids and electrical connectors and wires. My scooter was an exception. The hoses were routed in such a way as to protect them...they had the wire spring-type housing around them where they might get damaged. The hose that is protruding upwards was done by my mechanic. He found that fuel freely drained out of the carburetor bowl when we tried to start it.He showed me on this motorcycle carb the tube on the inside that is supposed to keep the fuel from draining out.
My dealer, John, says that on my carburetor there is a screw that closes the flow so it will not drain out, and the hose is just to drain the carb if you need to pull it or something. I'm going to check this out asap.

Saturday

We went back over to the mechanic, and when we got there, the scooter was running. We still had the side body pieces we had to put back on, but that was just screws and a half an hour. The mechanic, whose name was Beau said that he had to make a “improvisation” on the carburetor. There was a piece missing inside the bowl of the carburetor. He had it all back together so he showed me on a motorcycle carb he had in his shop. He took the bowl off and pointed out this pipe that is an overflow for the fuel. With it missing, the gas was just pouring straight out the bottom.

He adjusted the hose coming out to be above the level of the carb. He explained this would allow the fuel to still vent if necessary, but would keep it from simply running out. He said the dealer should be able to get me the bowl or a whole new carb, and this would hold me for a while (probably a good while) until I get the part. So I got the rest of the Tupperware back on the scoot and it was time to ride it from the shop to my friend Chuck’s house. The plan was to use his truck (Ford F250) and his car dolly to bring the scooter back to Louisville. It sort of sucked because he did not want to follow me, so I was going to drive his truck with my scooter back to Louisville (about 3-4 hour drive) and then return the truck and trailer. Then pick up my car and drive back to Louisville again. That’s 10-12 hours of driving—easy. Well, the car dolly was not going to work due to the long wheel base of the MC-54B. So we went to Uhaul and rented a trailer. I put $60 worth of gas in his truck and a spare 5 gallon can.

We got the scooter loaded and I headed out. This was about 6pm. Well, I got about 15 miles down the road and a hose blew. I called Chuck and he brought coolant and we cut the blown piece of the hose off and re-attached it. This put me at about 7pm leaving. I got another 15-20 miles down the road—carefully monitoring the heat gauge and then *boom* smoke starts rolling out from under the hood again. I pull over to the breakdown lane, but before I can get stopped, a very nasty metal-against metal banging noise was happening. Chuck gets there about half and hour later with hoses and when we fill the radiator with a couple gallons of water—just to see where the leak is, he hears the noise and says the engine is blown. That’s sort of what I figured, but I was hoping for better. So now it’s around 8pm, the truck is broke down, and the trailer hauling the scooter is attached. I was worried about his truck and the scooter and trailer—what if it got stolen. It would be easy because all you would have to do was hook it up and run with it. Chuck fortunately had triple A.

Unique Industrial & Trading Co!

This is the VIN plate off my scooter.

Friday--assembly

I received the scooter today at about 130pm. I examined the carton and there was no damage at all. I removed the cardboard and I took off the bubble-wrap before I signed. Scooter was in good visible condition with not a scratch.

I tore down the front, and sides, and looked at the wiring. There were a couple of wires that were loose, but they look like they may have been for the non-existant radio. The ends had been sealed with the shrink type insulation. All connectors that I could see were in what appeared to be good shape, I had to remove some of them when I took off the front, and I made sure to plug them back in. All electrics that I saw checked out--again--except for the non-existant radio. I did not try to arm the scooter.

I removed the bottom panel, which was a real bitch until I figured out it was held in place by four screws on the front and side--no screws on the actual bottom. I did this in order to inspect and to drain the coolant. There was no nasty debris, but the liquid was a light blue with a slightly sweet taste--I just tasted a bare drop--I did not chug the stuff. I removed the cap and drained out the bottom hose. I did not get a whole lot of coolant which bothered me, but I replaced everything and put back in 100% undiluted coolant--figuring that I may not have gotten out all the old stuff. It looked clean, but I will change again in a couple months when there is warmer weather. The panels are not what I would call hard to get off, but for one person it was time consuming. The windshield was a fairly easy install. I have not at this point put the mirrors on. After the coolant, I drained the oil which looked more like canola than anything else. When you think about it--veg oil would be better for the Chinese purposes. It might run alright for a while, and it would not make them have to jump through any haz-mat shipping hoops. Replaced with 10w30 non-synth. Now the gear oil was curious. I alwasy heard that there was a top bolt and a bottom bolt. You take both off to drain. It took me a bit because I found out the top "bolt" was a plastic screw-in similar to the engine oil dipstick without the indicator. The bottom was the traditional bolt with the copper washer. It took a while to get that to drain--it's been cold here. This is something again I will change soon probably. I used good synth gear oil. While that was draining I inspected the hoses. What I found was that they seemed to be in good shape, well connected, and what surprised me is that most of the hoses have a protective wire "spring" around them. I thought that was pretty cool. Never heard anybody else talk about that. I think I will leave the hoses as is until they seem like they need replaced.

Battery tender jr. finished at this point. I put the battery in the scoot and (still not having the bottom side panels on) tried to get it to start. I did this for a bit and then my mechanic friend came over and inspected. He said there was gas pouring out the bottom from an overflow and it looked like the carb needle might be stuck. I was careful not to crank it for too long at a time. At this point it was late, and he needed to shut up the shop, so we packed it in for the night. The scoot is an awesome looking bike. I can't wait to get it going. Hopefully that will be tomorrow.

Snowing on the way up

It was snowing like mad Friday when I got up to Chuck's place. I was thinking "Oh crap!" They canceled the bus I was taking so I had to drive. I called UPS Freight and they said they would deliver no matter what. I got up to Brazil, IN about 11:30am.