Belt vs. chain

May 5, 2008 - Monday

I know, I've been awfully, horribly, very badly lax in keeping my journal up to date lately. There would have been plenty to talk about too, but work at the office has been nuts. I've been renting out apartments left and right, and there wasn't much time left over for a record of my free time. As usual, this entry is in the Atomotive category. The dad gum Beastie went and played another trick on me. Every time I think I've seen it all, the bugger comes up with something else. We finished church early yesterday because Kris and Florian wanted to get gone to see a car rally in Hoch-Ybrig. It was an absolutely gorgeous day, and I of course was going to go driving. I donned all my gear, went outside, started the engine and rolled out of the garage. I put the bike in gear and wanted to drive up the hill... And it wouldn't pull. It just kept rolling back. And I realized the drive belt was lying on the ground. I stared at it for a moment, then turned off the engine and let the Buell roll down to the platform in front of the goat barn. The belt had torn between two teeth. Strands of Kevlar stuck out of the ends. I hung the belt over the bike's handle, glared at the Beastie and wet inside to peel off my gear again and give Kevin a call that I couldn't go driving today. Half an hour later his Duke - eight years old and never a major problem - pulled up. I was sitting on the ground in the shadow of the Beastie, petting Retta and studying the Hillbilly Motors catalog. In there, a belt costs between one and two hundred Euros. I wonder what my mech is going to charge for mine... Kevin looked at the belt and said, "50,000 km, huh?" I snorted. "That's what I thought." The belt is supposed to hold for fifty thousand kilometers. Mine lasted a bit over fifteen thousand. But Kevin said it didn't weaken and get run down, or the teeth would have flattened and coming off. To him, it looked like a rock had gotten in between the belt and the cog's teeth, and the belt, being under strain, had broken. That happened a lot on Roy's bike, but then again, he'd be better off with a chain set, as much as he throws that poor thing around... And now my mech just called back and I found out that the new belt costs 350.- Be still, my beating heart, and debit card, don't let me hear a beep out of you. Urg. Kevin suggested yesterday that I put a chain conversion kit on the Beastie. A chain wouldn't break if a rock got in it, and I could squeeze a little more power out of the bike by shortening the Übersetzung - whatever that is in English. I thought it sounded like a good idea, until Florian said you couldn't vary the power that much just because of the chain system the Buell would have. In the end, it comes down to asking the mech about practicality again. The answering machine just went in, so I'm off to pick up the new belt. The 350.- ticks me off, but it would tick me off even more if I had to pay in cash. Plastic money is so easy to spend. Is there any good side to this? Yeah. It happened when I could have the car this morning, and it happened before I left home, not out in the boondocks of Aargau somewhere on a Sunday. This was the first belt rip of three to date. They don't care for all-weather driving.