After riding the bik for a week, I discovered that the battery issue and electrical problems generally resulted in the bike dying before I made it to my destination. After numerous sweat inducing roll starts around the hills of SF, I decided it was time to get into this monster and fix it. On my way to Tech Shop to start my project, the bike died halfway up Gough and I rolled to a stop on a side street. Stepping off, I began running next to the bike to roll start it. Next to the busy street, I was rushing and let the bike lean a little too far past it's balance point. Unable to right the teetering moto, I let it drop for the first time. Standing there looking at the overturned bike was like looking down at a dead beloved pet; I was starting to get attached to this ugly monster. On my way to the shop I realized that the bikes inability to make a successful trip was like Icarus, getting too close to the sun, and never making it to his destination, and thus my ride had it's new name.
My first mission was to remove the fairing and excess plastic. Shortly after, I soon found myself disassembling the entire beast, to get things down to where I could actually fix this mysterious stator, that I now understood as the electrical heart of Icarus. Having unbolted the engine, I turned to brute strength to get it off it's mounts where it had faithfully hung for 30 years. It didn't come easily, but eventually separated, and the remainder of the bike sat gutted on it's center stand. In 5 hours I had taken my running bike and created a mess of parts and bolts, that with luck, would go back together.
I jokingly climbed under my bike where the engine was and simulated a 1 Noah power bike. With the engine out, I began reading up on the steps I needed to take to get down to the stator.
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