Indian Summer Sunday tour By grocerygetter (Read 938 times)

[grocerygetter]

125 mile fall tour today.
Not a long die-hard drive, stopped a lot for pictures.
Couldn't find a safe place to pull over for most of the best mountain shots.

My list is as big as it ever was, but with the forecast for today Sunday) the list had to go back in the drawer.
80F and clear blue sky in the northeast in early October isn’t something you stay in the garage and watch go by.

All in all it was a great inaugural tour for my wife and I.
I haven’t built up confidence in this scooter yet having problems with cold starting and idling no matter how much I play with the idle mixture screw.
So going out for a 100+ mile tour with a passenger may not be the best tryout but hey you gotta give it a shot some time.

Everything went well this morning until we tried to climb Mount Mansfield from the Smugglers Notch side:

Click image

I think that part of the road ascends approx. 1000ft in a short distance.
Grade isn’t indicated on a sign, but trucks are not allowed on that road.

We didn’t make it up. Unfortunately someone turned into a driveway right at the bottom of the first big hill, forcing us to start our ascent from a rolling start.
Got up to 35mph and that was it. Speed limit was only 40 there so I figured too bad for people behind us, if I could hold 35 that’s good enough for me.
Well after less than a minute she started slowing down.
No sound change. Throttle wasn’t responding differently in any position.
We slowed until we it died no matter what I tried.

Luckily we weren’t higher up where you hug the guardrail and I was able to pull off into the gravel and push it up about 50ft to a little side road.

Perfect.
"Have you got the AAA card?"
Well lets get out the thermos and cheese and crackers and fruit and try starting it in a while.

No problem, she fired right up like nothing happened.
My wife was convinced that we could probably carry on from there, but I would chance it.
There definitely isn’t enough power for 2 of us to climb a 4,000ft mountain on a scooter that I haven’t dialed in yet.
The farther we go the more narrow it gets and no where to break down.

So packed everything up and back down we went.
My guess is that new sliders with different weights might help it to “gear-down” in these types of situations?
I know our snowmobiles that have proper working clutches can actually be felt gearing down under constant throttle up long steep grades. You can see it in the tach.

What I witnessed on the scooter was the tach getting lower and lower with the speed, no attempt to help the engine gain some torque back with higher rpms.
That is probably something I’d like to dial in next. When you live in the mountains, you need to go up hills.

And for reference, when I started back down the hill that we didn't make it up, I only gave it throttle to about 25mph, then let gravity take its course – we were coasting at 50mph in a few hundred feet. That’s how steep it is.
As a matter of fact, with the tinyest bit of throttle we were doing approx. 65mph in a 40.

So I change course for the day and decided to tour around the lake instead of mountain riding.
Awesome views with deep blue sky. Not as many leaf colors in the lower elevations but still a great day for riding.
We filled up before the lake run just to see what I had been getting during the week and on the way up the mountain.
About 60mpg. Not what I had hoped for, and this was the first time I filled up at a pump to see the actual amount. But I guess climbing mountains isn’t going to get you great mpg’s.

Well after the 60 mile jaunt around the top end of the lake, we filled up at the station near home to see what flatter terrain yielded us.
YES. 70mpg right on the nose.
I realize its not rocket science tying to fill to the same spot in the neck by eye but its pretty darn close.
That gauge was almost down to 3/4 after about 60 miles and it took 0.85 gals to fill. I love this thing! Wish I had have been able to ride all summer dammit!
Now if I can just get that idle and the hill climbing better I’ll be all set for next season!
Enjoy the pictures from our area.

View complete album on Photobucket

[Alleyoop]

Very nice Grocerygetter, And yes going up hills you want the RPMS to stay the same only your MPH to be dropping some. Now to get it setup better you need LIGHTER WEIGHTS to raise your rpms. And then you can try it going up some smaller hills. Hit the hills say at 40 or 50 and notice your rpms and hold it there and see if it holds the RPMS till you get to the top. Once you get it to that point you cannot ask for more.
Alleyoop

[Bashan]

Very beautiful pictures, looks like you had a nice time in spite of the mechanical glitzches. I'm sure you'll get that scooter figured out yet and be a master mechanic when you do . Rich

[ce]

You have 16 gram rollers and a quart of schwarzgrasse in your variator now. That's too heavy to climb hills two up.

I managed to get to 11,000 feet up in Santa Fe, but it was pretty slow, and I was even solo on the B.

I invested in some Dr Pulley sliders and bought 12, 14, and 16 grams. After several attempts at incorrect installation, and different combinations of 12/14, 12/16/, and 14/16, I outfitted both my B's with 12/16 sliders after cleaning out the scwarzgrasse, and still have a complete set of 14s left over.

The blue B ran a little slow on the takeoff with good midrange response and a top end of 75 chinese. Hill climbing was improved, but not stellar. The boss in the variator developed a crusty cheese around the axle and slowed performance, so after cleaning the sliders were replaced with 14/16 rollers, but by now it had 9,000 miles on it and developed another limp.
It is now awaiting termination after a wreck.

The red B has been cruising fine with the 12/16 sliders, I rode it to work this morning, and I'm still toying with changing back to all 14 rollers, or the all 14 sliders, but with the colder air these days, and 742 idle mixture adjustments, it's running pretty good, and I'm confident I can hit 80 on a straightaway, and hold 60 on a hill.

I did mount the Dragon Custom Double Shot exhaust, which is awesome, and opened the airbox to remove the stock filter and replace it with a 42mm free flow, it fits just stuck in there, and have 40 pilot and 125 main jets.

It starts and idles pretty good after 9 valve adjustments and 6,000 miles, so you'll reach an equilibrium pretty soon once you get broken in, even if you don't go all mod happy.

You won't, will you?

It would cost about $300, and you'd be spending countless dreary winter hours wrenching and cussing and breaking and fixing and trying and finding and hoping and wishing, and then it'll be springtime and you can see daylight again.

ON A CUSTOM HARD CHARGING LINHAI 257!!!

Of course, you have the 244 but I don't know anything about those, you'll have to work it over and let us know what you get, but since it's such a smoothie, I'd rather see you abuse the Linhai, they're tough, they can take it.

[trancebear]

Oct 10, 2011 14:30:54 GMT -6 ce said:

You have 16 gram rollers and a quart of schwarzgrasse in your variator now. That's too heavy to climb hills two up.

I managed to get to 11,000 feet up in Santa Fe, but it was pretty slow, and I was even solo on the B.

I invested in some Dr Pulley sliders and bought 12, 14, and 16 grams. After several attempts at incorrect installation, and different combinations of 12/14, 12/16/, and 14/16, I outfitted both my B's with 12/16 sliders after cleaning out the scwarzgrasse, and still have a complete set of 14s left over.

The blue B ran a little slow on the takeoff with good midrange response and a top end of 75 chinese. Hill climbing was improved, but not stellar. The boss in the variator developed a crusty cheese around the axle and slowed performance, so after cleaning the sliders were replaced with 14/16 rollers, but by now it had 9,000 miles on it and developed another limp.
It is now awaiting termination after a wreck.

The red B has been cruising fine with the 12/16 sliders, I rode it to work this morning, and I'm still toying with changing back to all 14 rollers, or the all 14 sliders, but with the colder air these days, and 742 idle mixture adjustments, it's running pretty good, and I'm confident I can hit 80 on a straightaway, and hold 60 on a hill.

I did mount the Dragon Custom Double Shot exhaust, which is awesome, and opened the airbox to remove the stock filter and replace it with a 42mm free flow, it fits just stuck in there, and have 40 pilot and 125 main jets.

It starts and idles pretty good after 9 valve adjustments and 6,000 miles, so you'll reach an equilibrium pretty soon once you get broken in, even if you don't go all mod happy.

You won't, will you?

It would cost about $300, and you'd be spending countless dreary winter hours wrenching and cussing and breaking and fixing and trying and finding and hoping and wishing, and then it'll be springtime and you can see daylight again.

ON A CUSTOM HARD CHARGING LINHAI 257!!!

Of course, you have the 244 but I don't know anything about those, you'll have to work it over and let us know what you get, but since it's such a smoothie, I'd rather see you abuse the Linhai, they're tough, they can take it.

What engine is in your scooter ce?

[ce]

The 257, pretty much the exact same scooter. And grocerygetter also has another scooter with the 244, which is interesting, because I'd like to know if that could conquer the mountain.

[BigCheeseStick]

GREAT pics! And it still sounds like a great day out even with the issues. ;D

If I were to throw my hat into the ring, I'd say get the jetting right before you touch the CVT at all! Your loosing power because the jetting is off. And WILL notice the power improvement when you get the carb. dialed in right. With the engine pulling harder the rollers you've got may be exactly what your looking for.

Changing the rollers, then dialing in the carb. will have you chasing your tail trying to balance the two.

Good luck with the new scoot. Keep the shiny side up!

[89newbie]

Looks to me like it was a good trip, your pictures are breath taking. Makes me feel sorry for cars etc. that just can not see what we do. The hillclimb, just a little fly in the ointment. You got out on a beautiful day, took your lady with you and had lunch like no restaurant can serve. Once the jets and variator are dialed in it will be fine. From the looks of the weather forecast that's going to be a challenge now.