On Friday I took my car to the garage in the next town/village for its annual service and MOT. I made sure I left the service log and wheel-unlocker out, had a chat with the owner, then I left the keys with him, put some music into my ears, and walked a mile to the bus stop. I had a longish wait, but when the bus arrived it was almost empty. At the stop in our village I walked the mile to the house (it was a lovely sunny, warm day, thank goodness!).
Steve rang about 13.15 to say the car was ready so I wheeled the Ninja out of the garage, started up and oh-oh, something was not right. She turned over and started but wasn’t running smoothly. I switched off and restarted it and the result was the same. When she was up to temperature and I was kitted out, I got on and even pulling up the driveway she was not happy. It felt like one of the 4 cylinders was not pulling. I took her gently into the next town/village (look, I don’t know what it is, but there’s been so many building developments there I don’t think it’s a village any longer but I also don’t believe it’s officially made the transition to town). Steve doesn’t ‘do’ bikes (other than MOT them), so once I’d paid for and picked up the car’s documentation, I headed to SPR Racing in Ruddington (which is also a town/village) to let the extremely knowledgeable owner (Sam) check the Ninja over.
Sam listened to the engine and pulled a face, then he got on and, in first gear, rode around the place. His diagnosis on return was the problem was likely to be any one of these:
- blocked injector
- dicky sparkplug
- water in the tank
We arranged I’d drop it off about 08.30 the next morning (Saturday) which was the first of a full-on couple of weekend days for me, but I could just about squeeze it in.
Well, at 08.00 on Saturday I started her up and… no problems, no issues. I hopped on and rode to SPR in Ruddington and… no problems, no issues. When we had a natter, Sam’s diagnosis was water in the tank, probably condensation after standing in the garage for a couple of weeks during the heatwave. Mind you, he did check which type of petrol I used (the expensive stuff, obviously). He said there were so many problems with dirty fuel at the moment, it was the biggest issue he’s dealing with.
So, on the way home I topped up the tank with the good stuff and, yesterday, added some special fuel additive. Today there are no problems and no issues. So I’m going to run her up, let her go cold, then run her up again, several times during the day, to make sure the additive gets down to the bits it needs to get down to. I don’t know what the moral of this story is, other than maybe keep the tank full?
My old Thunderbird used to have similar issues and it was always down to the carbs. I’d strip them down and clean them each time, but the problem kept coming back. Eventually I replaced them and the problem went away.
Never had a water in the tank issue, myself, but luckily for you it got sorted out easily and cheaply.
I’ve certainly clocked up a few miles over the last couple of days and I will be out with the club, clocking up some more this morning… if this rain stops.
Gave the bike 3 cold-to-hot runs around the district yesterday and (obviously) I’m very pleased there has been no reoccurrence. Meanwhile, in the last 2 months I’ve done a couple of thousand miles across the bike/car combo. The only 2 things I can categorically state are a) people don’t know how to drive and, b) the roads are crumbling before our very eyes.
Amen to point a). The two biggest issues I see here are foremost a lack of reading the situation, closely followed by lack of vehicle control. In the latter case, the idiots who never seem to actually stop (including at stop signs). In the former, I should not be able to figure out that you will be changing lanes before you do it.