What did you do on or to your other bike part 2

[Gone in 60]

I can vouch for this.  We lived in AZ for our son's first 3 and half years.  Probably when he was around 2 he noticed the recycle trash truck with it's big arm that would swing out, grap the container and deposit the contents n the back.  He was hooked.  From then on we'd try to plan Tuesday mornings so that he could watch the process.

- Ha! Yes, our neighbors bring their son out when they hear the trash truck coming. In our case, it's emptying four large dumpsters out in our parking area, so there's lots of mechanical theater, banging and howling from the truck, and little Mateo seems to love it. When the truck goes past him he waves and the driver honks.

pdedse

That's cool that he let's you work on the bike, but a little surprising--not that anyone is doubting your skills to do so.  It just seems that companies are so liability-focused.  In reality, you as the rider, are the one who is most interested in having that bike in tip-top shape, and would likely take the most care in that everything is done well.

- I very much appreciate the level of trust the owner has put in me regarding my riding and mechanical skills, as well as having me train the new riders. Our plan when I started was to have me be the first full-time rider, then train new guys, then become our "Chief Rider", in charge of the fleet of bikes and supervising the riders. Since we've had some down time, I offered to do some much-needed work on the bike I'm riding, and his response was "that's not in your original job description but I'd love it if you did it". Basically if I'm being paid a salary and we have down time, I can either twiddle my thumbs or work on the bikes. 

This trust is 180 out from my last job. He's basically telling me "Hey, you've got this, I'm going to go grow the business." I've spent the last year being micro-managed, second-guessed, and afraid to blow my nose without an approved work order. I'm finding this very refreshing.  

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This brought back nightmares of my BMW ownership and the fun of my 1960 Anglia. I had that Anglia for ten years and had so many left-over screws, I could have built another car. Every time I'd fix something, I'd have screws left over and it never seemed to make any difference - still ran and worked fine. I decided they were just built with extra screws or something. I had two BMWs over the last ten years, and I swear they each had thirty thousand teeny-tiny screws that had to be removed just to get to anything. They were obviously not made for the person who likes to change his own oil or anything that might involve getting his or her hands dirty. Gone, you are obviously a man who loves a challenge.
The bell is a beautiful touch and a nice reminder that someone loves you and wants you home for supper.

Ha! I was thinking about having my last BMW worked on for warranty or recall repairs. I went to two different dealerships for these, and no matter which it was, when I got my bike back, I'd have holes with missing screws, and have to go get the service manager to count up how many were missing, put them in my hand and I'd say "thanks, but I'll put them in myself."

As I put each piece of the RTP back together, I stared intently at every location where I removed a screw, and for the life of me, I swear I didn't miss any holes. But, yeah, two screws left over. I just came back from the daily runs and nothing was rattling or loose, so she must be OK. Plus, being a used police bike, she had been taken apart and put back together more than a few times, probably by the same dealers I used to use, so despite BMW using three different types of body mounting screws, which I'm sure are supposed to be used in very specific locations, when I pulled them out, they were pretty random.

I did gamble and lose, however. I reused the old valve cover gaskets when I checked the valves yesterday, and before I left my last stop, I gave the cylinders a wipe with a clean paper towel and they're seeping oil. So, stopped back at the dealer on the way home, picked up some new valve cover gaskets, and drooled on that orange R12 again...