my handlebar mounted enrichener lever

[mechanizeinc]

About a year ago I cut my choke cable and sheath at the carb end. Shortened the cable to about 9" and the sheath to about 8 or so. Turned down and drilled a hole thru a small brass slug to fit the choke lever and soldered it to the cable. Made an anti-rotation mounting strip (like the boss on the bar mount) out of heavy gauge stainless steel and mounted it and the factory choke lever to the side stand safety switch cover (where I also have the main and headlamp blade fuses located). It comes out of the carb and makes a tight S in a slick, sexy fashion. It's trick. I am bragging. The original, spring tensioned lever acts proportionally as per OEM so you don't have to hold it. Moving it off the fork and bars not only cleaned up the bars aesthetically but afforded clearance of adjustment for other cables, braking and electrical. Peace of mind comes from knowing there is zero potential of binding in the twist at the stem causing inadvertent enrichment circuit interference. In the event of a minor crash the bars can be tweaked and the bike ride-able with no concerns of effects on carburetion. Two problems with this set up. First, I forget to turn off. Out of sight, out of mind. I could see the factory set up because I scan the cluster and controls often. The biggest issue is terminating the cable. My super-sexy-slick set-up is currently broken. Again. I said I soldered the brass end termination to the cable I had cut. Not so fast. I tried that. The cable I used was a yard part. The full cable looked like trash. Sheath rough, gouged, abraded down to the exposed steel winding in one area. Obviously kinked in another. As a matter of fact the only, good usable part of the thing was about 10" of the end I cut off. Only white oxidation and/or old lube on an old, extremely dirty but otherwise perfectly good cable. After carefully wrapping everything in tape and slowly, patiently cutting with a high speed rotary cut-off wheel, I separated each strand of the braid knowing I may well never be able to condense the volume of the wrap and render it usable again. But I knew if the steel wasn't clean I'd never get solder to adhere. So I sanded each wire. Dipped the frayed end in acid. After washed, dried and painstakingly re-wrapped into a tight cable, I threaded the cable thru a small hole I drilled across my brass pellet. The hole is bigger on the cable end side of the pellet. I pulled thru a small amount of cable and heated it all with a propane torch, dipped the cable end in flux, tinned everything with solder and pulled it together. It looked good. Real good. I let it cool. I gave it a 'lil tug and I smiled. I gave it a more strenuous pull and I had what my neighbor's believe to be a minor episode of Tourette's syndrome. I repeated same. This time I applied more flux. The sharp corners of the cable-stay holes drilled thru the brass slug melted away. It looked OK. Not really good but serviceable. I let it cool. I gave it a conservative tug. I had what my neighbor's believe to be a minor episode of Tourette's syndrome. Accompanied with seizure. I repeated same. This time I applied MORE flux and MORE heat. I was barely recognizable as a black sooted and bubbled up slug. I let it cool. I flicked it with my middle finger and was elated it didn't fly across the garage. I tugged sternly and it remained stead fast. I pulled with respectable effort. I again smiled. I filed the ugly 'lil thing into a multi colored shape closely resembling that of the slug barrel originally intended to rotate within the choke lever. I filed square corners into the cable access hole of the choke lever housing and pushed my nub through. Assembled everything by inserting the greased nub into the lever and sandwiching my mounting pad between the screws and the lever and housing. I slowly actuated the lever with very little spring tension on the lever screw. It felt tighter than I expected. Releasing the lever with too little tension and the spring at the carb end of the enrichment plunger pulled the lever closed. I gave it a bit more tension and apprehensively actuated the lever again, this time pulling it to the middle of stroke. It barely held. I started the cold engine. It didn't have enough and it died. I slowly and with much trepidation adjusted the lever to 3/4" of its full arc. Without holding it there it returned to the middle, maybe closer to 1/4 travel. I again slowly positioned it to heavy enrichment and hit the starter. The engine acquired the 1600 to 1800 rpm it likes at initial start and after a few seconds I released the lever and the rpms dropped to about 12 to 1400 and I admired my work as the engine warmed for a few more seconds. I reached down, moved the lever to fully off and the bike sat running at low idle were I like it at about 900 rpm. I smiled. I tightened the screw for lever tension just a tad more to hold it at any position. I actuated it slowly but assertively twice. Not going past the 3/4 travel mark that had allowed perfectly acceptable results. Finally I forcefully moved the lever towards full on. Tension increased significantly. Right up before end of travel and then it got VERY easy to move the lever as the solder joint on the slug and cable let go. And so did I. The tirade stirred forest animals to evacuate the area in similar fashion to their reaction to pending natural disaster. Sailors blushed. Salvage wrecker drivers and oilfield roughnecks were stunned. I repeated the process. This time the slug melted down to an unrecognizable booger. I made another. This time I drilled the backside of the cable hole even larger, knowing that the reduced material thickness would make it that much more difficult to braze without destroying it. Once painstakingly threaded thru the hole in the brass brass bead I bent individual strands out: purposefully flaring the end. I gave a slight test tug without solder and was surprised how firmly the end of the cable held in the little nub pinched in my other hand. With satisfaction I tugged slightly harder. I grumbled to myself as I straightened the individual wires so that I would be able to get the end I just pulled out back into the brass slug. Once mushroom flared I heated, dipped, affixed, tugged, assembled and tested the choke lever again. It worked as intended. I did not smile. It worked for awhile. After a few days I'd smile in the morning as I pulled my choke lever and the bike started easily on every first attempt. I smiled again when I reached down to shut it off. It got warm enough over the summer I didn't need to use it unless the bike sat for more than day. We had about two weeks of fall this season. Went from real hot to real cold. Heck right now it's fall riding weather in central Texas. One day in October as I used the choke the cable pulled out again. I didn't let go. I knew it was coming. Someday. I pulled it apart and put a drop of JB weld in there after I cleaned it up. Let it cure for a day. It worked for better'n a month. It's cold now and it takes a bit to get it started without the choke. I'm probably going to pull it apart and put JB weld on it again. This time when I pull it apart I'm going to measure the lengths and start looking for another cheap cable. And some steel rod. I don't give a rat's patooty if (as I originally intended) the brass has a lower coefficient of friction on the plastic lever housing interface or not. This time the effer is getting tack/spot welded together. I had to clean 'em up with a file anyway. Mech