Walk of shame & breakdown stories

[oldgeek]

Since I had to do the walk of shame today, I thought I would start a thread for riders to post their shame story if they wish.

It's been a couple of years since I had to push it, but today it happened.This one was an out of gas issue. I put the last of my premix from the gas can in my scoot yesterday evening, and threw the empty gas cans in my van for a refill. I forgot to fill them up, so I was not able to top my scoot off before my ride today. I looked In the tank and said to myself that should be good! Famous last words I guess because I ran out of gas about as far as I can get from a gas station around here lol! I pushed it past a big scooter rental place and asked a lady there if I could buy a splash of gas. She took one look at neked Kymco and said they didn't have any. 🙄 While I pushed it the other 3/4 of a mile in the 85 degree heat on the sidewalk next to a busy roadway, some tourist yelled looser or something to that effect. As I cut through a beachwear store parking lot a lady walking her dog asked "run out of gas?" I replied yup, she then said "how much does it hold about a cup?" I said actually it holds just over a gallon. I made it to the gas station and there was a tourist couple gassing up their rental maddog scoots. Before they could say anything I said "ain't got no gas in it" in the spirit of Billy Bob Thornton from the movie Sling Blade. They laughed a bit and he asked me about my scoot. The End

[jmkjr72]

Well I didn’t do the walk around f shame I did the sit on the side of the road shame. It was about 5 miles back to the gas station or 10 miles the direction I was going. I called the wife and told her to bring gas. Mine was the manual. Have says 2.7 gallons and I had been adding no more then 1.4 gallons every other day so hell I should be able to make 3 days. Turns out it is 2.1 when i did the conversion instead of just reading that’s what I got

[viaqua]

Mine was frustrating mainly because it happened on a day when the heat index was around 104.

I work 3 miles from home and when I got halfway between the belt broke.

Fortunately there's a sidewalk all the way along the water so I pushed it 1 1/2 miles back home.

[mrkswthwrth]

I've had to walk the scoot home twice, and to work once.. the worst was when my chinabbk failed on me. I live on a mountain and i took it for a ride down to the valley. Well lucky me i get to the bottom of my road, about 8 miles, and the bike dies. Wont start. I had to push it 8 miles back home all uphill on the side of a 55mph back road. Just to get home and tear the topend apart and reinstall my stock topend.. that was a bad day

[PIG]

I’ve pushed twice and this last one I got the wife to come get me. It’s a part of wanting to go fast, shit breaks lol. Here’s a pic of my recent ride home

[2stroked]

Not very recent, but it counts.

A couple years ago, my Cyprus 250 was having an issue where it would run fine then just die and refuse to start for hours. I replaced about everything I could think of. It had gas, would spark, and great compression. So I took it the 20+ miles to town. Made it to town and about 14 miles back toward home before it sputtered out.

Its July about 2:30 in the afternoon, I'm wearing steel toe boots jeans and decently heavy riding shirt. Kentucky is all built in the aide of an endless curvy hilly narrow road. I pushed it the six miles home, and about the time I could see the house the b%#$@ decides to start. Piseed me off to no end.

Wound up being the battery. I don't know how. I replaced the battery as a last ditch effort, and have had no more problems.


Another time I had to push the beast home, I made it about eight or nine miles from the house, and the water pump decided to crap the bed. Didn't want it to over heat, so I left the fans on and pushed a while, rode a while, pushed a while, you get the picture.


A couple years ago, I decide to take the Helix for a test drive before the sky could open with what looked like a decent storm. Made it a couple miles, went to turn around and it died. Pushed it home, of course it started pouring rain like urine from a cow about five minutes into my push....


Those are just some of the worst. I've got a handful of times Junior has stranded me, but he's small and not 400 pounds, so I can't complain too much about him. I better go knock on some wood, or else the next bike I ride will die at the furthest point from anything it can....

[90GTVert]

I have broken down WAY too many times.

I've only ran out of gas twice, because I'm generally very conscious of how much fuel I have. Even on scoots with a good gas gauge, I rely on known MPG and tank capacity a lot. I broke down in the middle of the night on my old 150 a couple of miles from a gas station. That was because I thought it had the same 1.4 gallon tank that my Tritons had since it looked very similar. Wrong. it had a 1.0 gallon tank. I did have a guy in a truck stop to ask me if I wanted help to get gas. I said thanks, but I'll push and I pushed it the other mile or so from that point.

Other time I ran out of gas was after I welded a nipple onto a gas tank. It broke off and poured gas and oil mix onto the rear tire so I drifted around a turn as it happened. Wish I wore a GoPro all of the time then because it was kinda badass, but I have no desire to do it again. Luckily that was about a mile from home.

Most of my breakdowns are mechanical failures. Belts breaking, holes in pistons, flat tires, and that sort of thing. I've had odd electrical issues where a scoot just died out of nowhere and wouldn't restart. Changed belts on the road on numerous occasions. I've broken down 50+ miles from home more than I'd like. I pushed one 90+ humid day (wearing all black as I do most of the time) for 8-10 miles to make it easier for a ride to find me so I'd only be about 50 miles from home at that point. Another day I pushed for 7 miles on the 4th of July to get home when it was about 100 degrees. Pushed it home for 3-4 miles when I destroyed my gearbox from lack of gear oil. Had a guy offer to load it into his van, but by then I was about a 1/2 mile from home.

I think the worst actual breakdowns for me have been belt breaks when the rear tire locked up. Just a surprise when the rear tire locks. Luckily I've only had it really lock up and smoke the tire till I stopped one time. That was on my old 96cc Venus and I was doing about 50MPH. Did it not even 1/4 mile before I made it home, so a short push at least.

It's really fun when you break down in some spots around here in the middle of the night when the moon is hardly there or there's a lot of cloud cover. The night my old 80cc 4T killed the rod it was 1AM and I couldn't see anything. Just hear wind blowing and animals moving around in the woods while waiting for a ride. Broke down at 3AM over 50 miles from home from a head gasket failure.

Now you see why I do enjoy my TMAX so much. I love my little scoots, but it's nice to hop on go wherever I please and expect to make it home. I don't think I've ever taken a longer trip on a scooter without at least some expectation of a chance of a breakdown. That's not to say I haven't made a bunch of long rides without issue, but I am always aware that it's a real possibility. Any day I come home from a long ride on the small Chinese scoots, it feels like I've accomplished something. lol


Here are some breakdowns on video...

Multiple issues in just 1 ride in this vid :



2 belt breaks in this vid, plus changing a belt on the side of the road :

UPDATE TO THAT VID IN CASE OF INTEREST


Spark plug got me this time :



Engine failure far from home :



150 odd breakdown :



Still unexplained breakdown on the TaoTao :



Killed a piston at the end of this one :



Those are just ones that I posted vids of from the last few years. If you've only broken down once or twice, try harder.

[jstich]

I came out of Walmart and promptly broke the key off in the ignition. Pushed it back home 4 miles and was so pissed.

[Lucass2T]

Man I've had breakdown so many times is lost count. But I do remember some.

Like 10 years ago i broke down with an old beater of a puch maxi i bought the day before for 50 euros. The front sprocket flew off just 1 km after i put a full tank of gas. It was the day of new years eve and i had to park it somewhere and take the bus to the NYE party i was heading for. The next day the fire department called that my maxi had burned to the ground. Someone put a fire cracker in the tank. Didnt really bother, it was only 50 bucks. Didn't have to do the walk of shame with this one. The bus stop was like across the street, 10 meters from the place the sprocket flew off.

I had a breakdown on my Germany roadtrip in 2016. It was with the axis with the stock motor. My buddy and me found a really nice curvy road down a valley and I decided i wanted to do a top speed run, down hill, WOT. It got so hot the piston melted. Had to walk about 1km.

Another time i broke down with the axis with the 70mph engine. It was with the 10pin crank. The needle bearing decided to fail on a random moment. Engine lost compression. That time i had to walk for about 5km. Cursing all the way home...

And then there's my pre scooter era (pre 2008). When I rode nothing but Puch Maxi's which were all in questionable technical state because of my even so questionable wrenching skills. Man, i had countless breakdowns. Those mopeds were so unreliable haha.

[FrankenMech]

I have had a few. Probably the worst was when my carb ran out of gas (fuel pump issue) right in front of a Harley bar. It took about 15 minutes to figure out the problem and get it going again in a nearby parking lot while being heckled by drunk Harley riders. None of them came over to 'help' in the spirit of 'cycling'. Of course when I helped a Harley rider get his Harley going when it would not start in a McDonald's parking lot he was grateful.

KC is a big HD town and I get heckled a lot.

Fuel tanks below the carb like on a Ruckus are a real PITA. Vacuum fuel pumps are a PITA.
Chinese toggle switches suck

I carry extra fuel in a stainless steel water bottle under the seat.

I had a variator nut fall off but the scoot got me home at the cost of my kickstart pawl.

[oldgeek]

Jun 17, 2018 21:06:10 GMT -5 PIG said:

I’ve pushed twice and this last one I got the wife to come get me. It’s a part of wanting to go fast, shit breaks lol. Here’s a pic of my recent ride home

Even in the back of a truck your scoot looks bad assed!

[viaqua]

Jun 18, 2018 15:28:08 GMT -5 jstich said:

I came out of Walmart and promptly broke the key off in the ignition. Pushed it back home 4 miles and was so pissed.

Man that's terrible, I would have wanted to cry..

[jstich]

I would've cried if it woulda got me home. I was still so pissed after my 4 mile walk home.

[geoffh]

I,ve had a few epic walks mostly I,m on my way to or from work,going to is a problem, I just park the scoot and call a cab,from work is now solved by using my day job truck with it,s tail lift(not sure what you yanks call them) to wizz it home.But before that and long before I found this forum I fitted a BBK straight out of the box got three miles and blew a con rod,pushed it 3 miles that day.Last one was a soft sieze on a baking hot day just a mile from home, oil pump failure.Inbetween I,ve had 6 no start issues that technically I could take the scoot and shoot it at dawn for refusing to scoot ,but they have been all down to sloppy spannering(wrenching) by myself.

geoff

[chacham]

Just a couple days ago i realized i needed gas but decided to run an errand first and get it on the way home, and of course i did not make it. I lucked out though, it was across the street from the gas station. Being a freeway runs down that street, it was two crossings, but just a couple minutes of walking.