ZUMZUMZUM- from Romania to Thailand on a bike

first it happened after the pakistani-indian border, we were doing 100 km/h on a b road and suddenly the engine stalled. I stopped on the left side of the road (we are in india after all), pushed the starter button, and the engine started again. I blamed the pakistani fuel and continued to armitsar.  Although I felt the distinctive signs of fuel starvation I was afraid to consider what could have caused it. 

the second day it happened 100km after we left armitsar. First a cylinder stopped and then the second one. I couldn’t ignore this anymore. I disconnected the fuel line just after the fuel pump and asked Ioana to press the starter button.  The engine came to life immediately. I hoped that the fuel filter is clogged up and decided to investigate the problem in dharamsala.

10 kilometers before dharamsala the engine stopped again, this time for good. For the first time since we left bucharest, I experience the weird feeling of being stranded on the side of the road. There is no fuel going to the carburetors and the fuel pump is so hot I can’t keep my hand on it. All signs point to the dreaded fuel pump failure, but how could this happen ? I’ve added an additional relay to prevent such a failure!

As a last resort, I bypass the relay.  The engine starts. We manage to arrive at McLeod Ganj. I check the relay, and to my joy it doesn’t work anymore. This is a Tyco automotive relay rated for 40A and 10^7 cycles. I’ve used it for 4A and it only lasted for 500.000 cycles. Luckily I have a spare relay. I replace it, and all seems to work smoothly again.

Here are the pictures of the damaged relay:

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 18th, 2007 at 12:53 pm and is filed under india, moto. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.