geezer99

Well, I've made no progress in getting a locking differential for the Axis. But, I discovered drifting, and a solid axle works great for that. To park my buggy in the shed, I approach from the rear, make a 180, and enter the opening. I found that I can make the 180 much tighter by drifting the rear end around. Lots of fun, and I haven't destroyed the shed, yet. So far my wife hasn't noticed the grass out there is showing great signs of distress. tom

I've had pretty good luck with green slime. I know, I know. Half-as*. But in certain situations it has been quite useful: Riding my bicycle in a game refuge, it was impossible to avoid black berry vines on the trails. Green slime in the tires at least enabled a complete trail ride without having to repair leaks on the trail. My 1980 Case backhoe, with 17.5 - 24 ( I think) tires had a slow leak. Take a month or so to flat. Half a gallon of green slime and I only have to top it off about once a year. I'm an old fart, and definitely adverse to wrestling tires that weight twice what I do. I've also used it on riding mower and a small trailer. I would not use it for a high speed vehicle like my truck or car, but in applications where there isn't much to loose, I've been happy with it. tom

I'd run 'em, too. Unless you are riding by yourself way out in the sticks, too far to walk out. I had to ride a dirt bike with a flat rear tire 15 miles back to my truck. Not fun, real squirrely, but going fairly slow, I did not ruin the rim or the tire. Was a dirt road. I paid for school by driving heavy equipment for a gippo outfit. The scraper (earth mover) I drove had very old tires with cracks big enough to stick the first joint of my little finger into. I wouldn't bet on it, but those tires were rated something like 20 or 30 ply rating. The D-8 was always parked for the night on a hill for "coast to start" the next morning. Good times! Tom

Good points. I use mine (in order frequency of use) to get the mail, haul stuff to where ever on our 60 acres I have a project, to haul firewood to the firewood pile from where ever I am cutting firewood, and sometimes just for fun climbing some of our steep hills. These things are all able to be done slower and more tearing up of trails with my '88 pickup, so I'm sticking with the cheap seats with the Hisun. tom

I have no doubt that it could be expensive, so that will mean I'll probably be in "won't get it done" department. I will keep my eyes peeled for a scrapped out unit. As noted, my utv is not a quad, but many of them have much more power than my 450cc engine, so would probably be strong enough. With fully independent suspension, the weight I haul shouldn't be a problem. tom

I have an Axis 500 made by Hisun. I uses a solid rear gearbox with no differential action. I would like to convert this to a true differential with locking ability. I've searched all over trying to find a source with no luck. Has anyone done this before, or know of a source? Thanks, Tom

I had an old Yamaha 250 dirt bike that had the stator crap out. Dealer wanted $300 for it. I couldn't afford that, so I rewound it myself for about $20. I just bought a spool of the same diameter wire, made a jig to attach the part to my wife's sewing machine flywheel, began winding on wire to get the same fill. Worked fine. tom (cheap bastard)

When I was a kid, one of my chores was to polish my Dad's shoes. I always liked the picture of the Kiwi bird on the can of polish. tom

I can confirm that is was a flat six. Mine was the dual carbureted model. A friend had a fancier version with a turbo charger. That was a fast auto. It should be noted that to save $15 per car GM left out an anti-sway bar in the early days. This caused a tendency to roll over in aggressive turns. Ralph Nader wrote a whole book on the topic. GM finally made the required changes, but the car was soon dropped. My buddies car cornered very well. I guess it was an newer model. In my case, I guess it's better to be lucky than smart. tom Here's wikipedia article on the history of the song. https://americansongwriter.com/meaning-of-yankee-doodle-song-lyrics/ Apparently it was written by the British to insult the colonists, but was taken up by the Yanks as a taunt to the Brits. tom

Regarding changing to a higher quality oil after a life of lower quality: Back in 1970 (newly married, and little money) I traded an old farm truck for a early 60s Corvair. I was driving it on the freeway, and a huge bang sound and no drive power. Pulled over, popped the hood, and found a rod poking put of the crankcase. I had recently changed oil. My go to oil was Rotella T, a high detergentcy oil. I later found out that the previous owner had been using a very basic oil with few detergent additives. My take was the higher detergentcy oil loosed some chunks of deposits that then clogged up an oil passage to the failed rod. This is all anecdotal, and I could be way off base, but I would be wary of changing types of oil on an old vehicle. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. tom

I'm with you on testing one thing (connection) at a time. But, I'm impatient. So did 'em all. I figured if the symptom comes back, I'll use the systematic approach. I did examine each connector as I went, but did not see any obvious problem. If the saga continues, I'll update this post. Thanks for the reply, your advise is great. tom

Almost a year on the Lowes-Axis 500. It was dying at idle unless I gave it some throttle. That made shifting into gear result in a big lurching clunk. This problem was intermittent. I first checked the fuel injector. I removed it and let it spray into a coffee can. It made a nice even spray. I used a magnifying lens to examine the nozzle. It had no signs of contamination nor poor geometry. The coil measured a reasonable resistance, and banging it with a screwdriver handle made no difference in coil resistance. Neither did flexing the wires make any change. So I reinstalled the injector and unplgged and repluged every electrical connector in sight of the engine compartment. Yahoo. For over a month now it has been running fine. As an avid tinkerer and builder of electronic projects, I have noticed how many faults turn out to be poor electrical connections. I guess the moral of this story is that before replacing electrically driven parts, check all connections that are remotely related to the system under suspicion. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it. tom

Just did y first engine oil change. It was a messy pain in the as*. Access to oil drain is through a small opening in the belly pan. While I like the concept of underside protection, this pan has many holes of varying sizes. There is no way to avoid a gush of oil onto the hand or tool unscrewing the drain plug. Even if you use a really big oil drain pan, it runs out many holes and makes a big mess. The oil filter is even worse. It is located horizontally, near the top of the engine, in a valley. There is no good way to remove it without a mess to clean up. tom

I used to have a 1981 Honda 250 dirt bike. Instead of an oil filter, it had a centrifugal oil separator that caught particles in the oil. You had to remove one of the big case covers to do this. I did it when I first got the bike, (2000), and there was probably a table spoon of debris. It looked like the sludge was mostly clutch lining wear particles with a few metal flakes for decoration. I cleaned it, replaced the side cover, new oil, and rode it another 20 years before I sold it. I don't know if Honda still uses this technique on newer machines. That's why I always like to get the service manual for anything with an engine. tom