Well I'm kicking myself for not taking a pic, because today I drove over to the other side of Melbourne in my little truck to collect a Moto Guzzi California 3 (1988 model) to give a little love to help out a work mate.
Moto Guzzi California 20 January 2023 by
Terry Prendergast, on Flickr
I haven't had a "Full size" bike in the back of my little truck before today so was interested to see how easy (or otherwise) it is to put a big bike on the back, and how much room would be left if I mount my winch centrally at the front of the tub. Good news is that we didn't damage the bike or the truck when we manually pushed it up the ramps, but we had a scary moment when the ramp (that was tethered to the truck at the front) slipped sideways with the bike's front wheel almost up on the tub, and the back wheel completely off the ramp and on the ground. We managed to roll the bike back down, fix the ramp and roll it back up, then take it off at my place with no further issues. Unfortunately my workmate and his friend were a bit over-eager.
No biggie, the old "Guz", that they couldn't get running to show me what the problem was, started for me on the first push of the button tonight, and seemed to run fine. Their "diagnosis" was that it felt like fuel wasn't getting to the carbs, so tomorrow I'll clean the fuel filters, which is supposed to be done every 5000 miles or apparently it's cause "fuel starvation", according to the owners manual, which I'm assuming they haven't read? I'll also check the valve clearances and the points ignition, and the carb's mixture screws, in case they've been fiddling with them, these are nice guys but don't know sh1t about bikes.
I also think the fuel is probably going bad, so I'll add some fuel system cleaner and add fresh fuel and do a 100+ mile "Pie Run" to see if it's sorted, because my wife is looking at me suspiciously, so I want to give it back to him next week.