Walmart wants like $130 for this, I got it for $20 at the local annual block sale.
Just wanted its tyres pumped up and its brakes fiddled with a bit.
Now this is Dan Fixes Coin-Ops, not Dan Fixes Bikes, but I had some fun with those brakes. It uses side-pull caliper brakes on the front and V-brakes on the back.
So I note the back brakes are being a bit finicky in their adjustments and not returning to their neutral positions cleanly, so I do the silly thing and give them a couple drops of oil. It works. Later on I get the manual and find out oh, that's actually what the manual recommends. Then I adjust the handlebars for her and that throws the back brake alignment all to bollocks again so I figure alright, it's good enough, let's let her do some more riding (not really riding, still learning, but we're having fun) and I'll have a better look when she's in bed.
So we put her to bed, I pull these calipers off, and what do I see? Remembering that the manual recommended lubing these things?
Nylon pawl wrapped around a brass bushing with a steel washer underneath.
Aye. They wanted me to put oil on that. 😑
So I give them a damn good scrub and take off all the nasty gunky grease the factory put in there, along with the oil I added, get it all clean and put it together dry and of course now it's smooth as butter, I guess the moral is ignore the manual ㄟ(ツ)ㄏ
I'll have to get a better picture of this thing, it's called TEMPEST and my daughter refers to it by name, as in "I'm gonna have some quality time with Tempest, she wants to go fast"
Anyway if something doesn't work, take it all apart, give it a damn good clean, look at it really hard, put it all back together and after all that if it nearly works then fiddle with the adjustments and if it doesn't work then take it all apart again and look at it again but HARDER this time until you go "oh, THERE you are you little bollocks, such a tiny thing causing all these problems." This works for any problem, good night
If you're scared to take things apart, if you think you won't be able to put them back together again or whatever, it's alright, just take lots of pictures with your phone while you're taking the thing apart. Video is even better.
If the thing you're taking apart was designed by people who put some thought and effort into it, you won't need the pictures because you'll find it's not physically possible to put it back together wrong. Those are good machines. But do take lots of pictures anyway because there aren't all that many good machines in this world
@ifixcoinops if its broke you have to take it part. Sometimes the problem is obvious and so you fix it and put it back together and use it. If any step fails then it was scrap anyway.
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