Day 3 began early as we had decided to leave from Yercaud at 7 AM so that we had more than enough time to ride back to Cochin before it was sunset. As I started the bike, it looked like the cold weather had caused condensation inside the dials once again but fortunately, it was only on the outside and was wiped off easily. Phew! Somewhere after Salem, while riding on top of a large flyover, I felt something momentarily but I couldnt place what had happened. As I quickly did a systems check while riding the bike, the rider who was behind me pulled up to my side and said that the spring of the side stand had gone flying off the bike. It must have been quite the sight for the riders behind me, sigh! All part of the Royal Enfield ownership experience. The spring failing is a well known issue with the Continental GT 535 and this is the second time that is has happened on my bike. Fortunately, experience has taught me well and I went back to my trusted solution. I pulled out an old pair of 3M earplugs and tied the side stand in place. Talk about a quick 2 minute fix.
Minor scare before realizing it could be wiped off!
Fixed in less time that it takes you to make a packet of Maggi noodles
Only one bike needs to be on the center stand, sigh!
Now, onto the most interesting part of the whole (
mis?)adventure. Before we move further, I should mention here that on day 1, the fellow riders had noticed that the tail light was not working when my bike was switched on. The brake light worked perfectly fine but the tail light didn't come on. So that was something that I needed to get checked after returning. When we were less than 40 kilometers from Cochin, I was at the tail of the group thanks to the ever increasing traffic when all of a sudden, the bike suddenly went dead. I had enough momentum and there was no traffic behind me so I could easily pull over to the side safely. The dials were stuck and when turning the bike on nothing was happening which meant that it was probably some wiring issue.
Not the speed that I was doing when the bike went D.E.A.D
Since everything else was fine, we checked the fuse box and found that the main fuse (
the second one from the left) had blown. We replaced the fuse with the spare and the bike started off without a hitch and ran for 200 metres before it went dead again. Fortunately we were right by a petrol pump and I pushed it in so we could check the bike safely. I suspected that the connection for the mobile holder that I installed a week back may have been responsible for the blown fuse, so I disconnected it. We tried a spare fuse from another bike and this time, the fuse blew without the bike even starting.
I must mention that it is very difficult to pull the fuses out, and I have big fingers, which really didn't help matters much. I later learnt that the way to pull it out correctly is with pliers, so that is one lesson learnt the very hard way. Since all this diagnostics and experimentation was holding up the rest of the group, we called for a pickup van and loaded the bike onto it so that the others could continue home before the heavy thunderstorms hit.
Nice and sunny at the loading time ....
... and heavy thundershowers at the unloading time
I took the bike to the Royal Enfield company service centre at Edapally, which is where Ive been servicing the bike for some time now and fortunately we reached 10 minutes before the closing time. Hence, we were able to easily unload the bike and roll it in safely. The service advisor and security team were very helpful and accommodating despite it almost being time for them to close for the day. In fact, the lone service advisor present kept insisting that I drink enough water (
they have small bottles for customers) and even suggested that I take a few bottles with me to re-hydrate in the cab, since I had been riding since 7 AM and it was past 6 PM by then. Small, thoughtful gestures like this go a long way in making an unfortunate situation quite pleasant.
Below are the things that I had written to be done for the bike and I requested for my usual service advisor Sanju to look into it as I have a good rapport with him and he is a genuinely good guy.
- Fix the wiring issue that was causing the blown fuse
- Replace the side stand spring that had gone flying off like Superman
- Replace the tail light bulb
- Replace the right side footpeg
A few days before the ride, I was putting the bike on the center stand on what turned out to be less than firm soil (
thanks to the rains) and the bike gently toppled over to the right side and fell rather ingloriously. The only damage that I noticed was that the end of the right footpeg had broken off. So that explains the last item on the checklist.
In 17 years of riding, this is the first time that my motorcycle has given up on me, even if it was down to a small wiring related issue. In hindsight, I should not have postponed getting the Road Side Assist (
RSA) from Royal Enfield earlier in the year. But on the plus side, I managed to get my hands dirty (
those boringly reliable Japanese bikes dont give you the chance to learn such things, hmmph!) and had to isolate which fuse had conked out and replace it. Since I covered the last 40 kilometers to Cochin in the mini van, I escaped the terrible thundershowers that hammered down on Cochin at that time, which in turn made it a proper wet chaddi ride for the rest of the group! For almost 3 whole days and nearly 800 kilometers, we had escaped the rains but thanks to the delay caused by the Continental GT 535's wiring issue, most of the group got soaked to the bone. What is life without a little drama, eh?
At the end of all this, the home minister said that it is time to sell the GT 535 and buy one of the 650 twins. Is it food for thought or sacrilege instead?