Travelling home from hols last night, 250 miles to go and the vans loses power and won,t get above 50 mph on the flat and about 35 on the hills. It was like owning a standard 1600 We struggled on for 9 miles using the hard shoulder and slow lane, until we made the next services. We called the AA and they said it could be 2 hours and it was already 11pm, so we decided to have a look ourselves and the problem was quite an obvious one. The throttle linkage on the RH carb had snapped in half and resulted in us running for 9 miles on 1 carb. We had a look for something to do a temporary repair, but all we had was a couple of tools and no spares. Then my wife suggest trying to scavenge something off another part of the van or our bikes. This is what we come up with A donor part from the wife's bike...the holes were almost the right centers and by twisting a flat screwdriver through one of the holes I managed to open it enough to get it over the throttle spindle. The finished repair. The hole centers were not spot on, so it just needed a minor adjustment to sort that. The van got us all the way home and this repair is staying put until I can order a replacement on Tuesday. The AA turned up just as we were finishing....only 25mins after we called them Another narrowly avoided trip home on big yellow ;D
Well down you. Is that a motorway service area if so and you stayed over the 2hrs expect a letter with a 'fine' . they are trying to get money out of me due to breakdown and being on the services for well over the 2hrs.
Barney...your not wrong...we got home at 4.00a.m, the kids slept through the whole trip and were up at 7.30 this morning. I feel like marmite.
K + for an excellent bodge, I was however a little dissapointed. From the title I thought I was going to read that you lost a wheel, and fortunately your wife is only 3 feet tall so you managed to scavange one of the 16" wheels from her bike as a temporary fix!
Prrrooooooooopeeeerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr job! ;D Glad you made it home ok despite the little problem - you see it takes a woman to think of these things Well done Mrs S and glad the kids slept and behaved - makes a journey a lot less stressful even if they were up at 7.00. Early night tonight and you will feel right as rain tomorrow!
well done, k+ for 'bush mechanics'. wouldn't bother buying a new bracket, just make 3 new ones from something a bit thicker, then swap and keep 1 spare. obviously not up to the job
