Topic: The Cursed Side Cover

[C317414]

There's a recent thread here about the best way to prep and repaint a side cover.  This reminded me of something that happened to me many years ago.

When I was in college, I lived in a rented townhouse.  Each unit had it's own garage on the ground level, but the garages did not have dividing walls between each other.

My girlfriend's 69 Bonneville has some scratches on the left side cover/toolbox, so I decided to repaint it.  I prepped it as well as I could, sprayed primer, sanded, and sprayed the black topcoat.  As I set it on the workbench to dry, I bumped my elbow on a bike mirror, and dropped the cover, paint side down on a shop rag.  After a few choice words I stripped the paint and started all over again.  This time I was extra careful when setting the cover down. 

The following day I went to the garage to look at the cover, to my horror it had a textured surface.  It turned out that the next door neighbor had sanded some furniture, and sawdust landed on my new paint job.  Once again, I stripped and repainted the cover. 

Once the paint was dry, I installed the cover and took the bike for a ride.  As I was riding, something in the rear view mirror caught my eye; it was the side cover sliding down the road, paint side down.  These covers use a threaded fastener with a knob to secure them.  A spring clip bears against a flat on the knob and keeps it from turning.   In this case, the spring clip had broken off and the fastener worked its way out. 

I gave up on repainting the side cover, and installed a NOS one I found at a shop.

[70CB750]

There's a recent thread here about the best way to prep and repaint a side cover.  This reminded me of something that happened to me many years ago.

When I was in college, I lived in a rented townhouse.  Each unit had it's own garage on the ground level, but the garages did not have dividing walls between each other.

My girlfriend's 69 Bonneville has some scratches on the left side cover/toolbox, so I decided to repaint it.  I prepped it as well as I could, sprayed primer, sanded, and sprayed the black topcoat.  As I set it on the workbench to dry, I bumped my elbow on a bike mirror, and dropped the cover, paint side down on a shop rag.  After a few choice words I stripped the paint and started all over again.  This time I was extra careful when setting the cover down. 

The following day I went to the garage to look at the cover, to my horror it had a textured surface.  It turned out that the next door neighbor had sanded some furniture, and sawdust landed on my new paint job.  Once again, I stripped and repainted the cover. 

Once the paint was dry, I installed the cover and took the bike for a ride.  As I was riding, something in the rear view mirror caught my eye; it was the side cover sliding down the road, paint side down.  These covers use a threaded fastener with a knob to secure them.  A spring clip bears against a flat on the knob and keeps it from turning.   In this case, the spring clip had broken off and the fastener worked its way out. 

I gave up on repainting the side cover, and installed a NOS one I found at a shop.

Nice story.  When I worked in tool and die factory - my first job as an engineer after college - there were some jinxed products.   We manufactured forms for aluminum pressure casting.  Some form would get messed up in design and the bad luck would follow it all the way to the end of the production.

I lost left side cover from Red once.  The funny thing was I was dead sure "it was there this morning" but following my route to work and back I could not find it.

I found it on the median of a parkway where it flew like two days before.

[C317414]

Nice story.  When I worked in tool and die factory - my first job as an engineer after college - there were some jinxed products.   We manufactured forms for aluminum pressure casting.  Some form would get messed up in design and the bad luck would follow it all the way to the end of the production.

I lost left side cover from Red once.  The funny thing was I was dead sure "it was there this morning" but following my route to work and back I could not find it.

I found it on the median of a parkway where it flew like two days before.

I know al about jinxed parts in production.  For a few years I was a liaison engineer at the fabrication facility of an aerospace company.

[HondaMan]

Some years ago I was the Controls Engineer on a machine that loads special 'squibs' for hi-tech guided missile in-flight steering systems. It was one of those "eyes only" sort of project machines, so I didn't even get to meet the team of people who added their 2 cents' worth to the control program after I got the machine working, that sort of thing.

Well, about 3 months later an earthquake in the area rendered the extreme precision of this machine inoperable, as my programming recognized that something wasn't as it should be with the machine, and making correct parts had become impossible, so I got called out to rework it. Another week, and I got it back "up" again, so I went home.

Another month: I get called back up, the machine stopped working, complaining that the parts could not be made correctly. Upon arrival I found out that another Group at the company decided to add remote data logging to a building 40 miles away, and their program was too big, so they just overwrote mine to get some memory space. Good thing it stopped working. I called them up, told their Group Manager to leave it alone of it won't run, unless they get a larger PLC controller for it, since they had overloaded the memory with their new toys. They agreed to do so, and I went home again after explaining how to reload it from scratch.

Two months later: the machine stopped working. Could I talk with whomever 'installed' the new controller? No, I am not authorized to communicate with that branch of 'security' there. Hmmm.

So, I drove back out there again (this is 750 miles away from here), get permission to go onsite and "fix the damned thing" in the Supervisor's words. I then discover the other 'team' had no way to archive data to their server computers, so they just made it store data in the controller until all the memory was gone and overwrote the operating program's memory with data. Almost $17k worth of parts made were now worthless because of it. I walked back to their Director's office and butted in, explained all this to him and told him that if I fix it again and their software team continues to not talk with me, they will never get any further production from this machine with this dance. He called their President to explain it. I went back to my motel. About 2 hours later, hats in hand, their software manager and his programmers decided that maybe I COULD talk with them, so I could tell them HOW to do what they wanted to do, and still get product from the machine.

I haven't needed to go back there since that day...it's still running.

[C317414]

................Well, about 3 months later an earthquake in the area rendered the extreme precision of this machine inoperable.......

LOL, I remember the many rejection tags we would get on parts that were being machined when earthquakes hit (Southern California).  The newer, more sophisticated machines had accelerometers that would pull the cutters away from the surface if they sensed an earthquake, but even these did not react quickly enough, and some undercuts would still occur.