This was the weekend for building things and fixing things.
Glen and I spent the day Sunday building a belt guard for the electric drive on Golanth, our new recumbent bicycle. We can ride it anytime as a true bicycle, and we have ridden a total of 84 miles since I completed it. As my friend Ed would put it, that works out to a tad over $68 a mile just for the cost of all the parts. Or figuring it another way we need to ride 14,000 miles to get the cost down to the same as the fuel cost to drive the motor home a mile, (over 70,000 miles to beat the Honda.) Of course if you figure the original cost of the vehicle and the cost of fuel and maintenance then our break even comes about 4,000 miles. I think we can make that.

On the website you will be able to see Glen testing the finished part against the bicycle. We used the Wings-of-History’s sheet metal brake to form the part from 0.025 inch thick anodized aluminum. It came out looking real nice. In the photograph you can see the motor and gearbox in the background behind Glen’s right hand. That part rides up high under the stoker’s seat to be out of the rain and the splatter. The belt guard is to protect the stoker’s legs.
I have now gathered all of the parts to actually test run the electric motor. That will happen as soon as I get the batteries charged up and assemble some signal circuit connectors. Since all of this part of the bicycle is all new design and has never been tested, I expect to have lots of exciting adventures to write about as we test out the new equipment.
The other exciting adventure we had this morning was replacing the window regulator buttons in the driver’s door of the 2001 Honda. What an interesting age we live in. I did a search on the internet for “Replace Honda Civic power window buttons” and came up with a video from 1AAuto on YouTube with the step by step instructions. (See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M6vRSualv68) We ordered the part and it arrived Saturday. Judy and I watched the video one more time and then assembled the tools and started tearing our door apart.
We watched a couple minutes of video and then went out and removed a few screws. Then we watched a few more minutes and popped the panel off. That was the most difficult part. We did discover that it got easier if you did this several times… We replaced the switches and put it all back together. Only the door lock seemed to be binding. We took it apart three more times troubleshooting this malady, when we started developing the suspicion that perhaps that was the way it was supposed to work. We closed the door and the lock performed flawlessly. Now we remember! The Honda has an accidental lockout prevention latch on the driver’s door only. It mechanically blocks the lock plunger until the door is closed. As my father used to say, “Ah vell, ve getten too late schmart and too soon oldt.”
Side note: A couple years ago I watched the video on how to replace the timing belt on our Honda. When they got to the part where you remove the left front fender, I promptly took the car to Rick Eaton’s shop and had them do the job.
Good bye for now. We will see those of you in Oregon and Washington in late May and June
Gary and Judy, Riders of the Bronze Dragon named Gloanth.