[Bilgemaster]

Just occasionally I would find something in H's accessory catalogue which, when I turned to the fitment guide, had a "no" listed against all the models. 

A.

Well, to be honest, NOBODY should have those little rainbow spangly streamer things on their handlebar ends, Adrian. C'mon!

[hortoncode3]

More pics...no progress on rehabilitation..we just got 8" of snow. I did order a new horn and left handle bar control. Some corrosion in the old one made the turn signals iffy at best and the horn button sticks..Hitchcocks had both. New k70's in the shed..

[Bilgemaster]

Just out of curiosity, where are you that you're "enjoying" over a foot of snow in mid-March, closing in on April? Also, would you mind disclosing what you paid for it? I'm just wondering what a 2005 "Military" fixer-upper goes for in winter nowadays. I got mine "with issues" for $1,200 back in November 2017.

[Adrian II]

Well, to be honest, NOBODY should have those little rainbow spangly streamer things on their handlebar ends, Adrian. C'mon!

Aw... 

I do sort of enjoy fitting things that don't belong. Excuse the workbench chaos in this shot.

A.

[hortoncode3]

Just out of curiosity, where are you that you're "enjoying" over a foot of snow in mid-March, closing in on April? Also, would you mind disclosing what you paid for it? I'm just wondering what a 2005 "Military" fixer-upper goes for in winter nowadays. I got mine "with issues" for $1,200 back in November 2017.

I'm in Vermont. And yeah..$1200 is in the ballpark..

[Bilgemaster]

I'm in Vermont. And yeah..$1200 is in the ballpark..

I adore Vermont. My vacations back in the '90s often used to consist of hopping on my ratty old Norton 750 N15CS "Desert Sled" in DC, and going the long way round through rural PA's Amish country, upstate NY, with a long zig-zag through Vermont, dropping in with an old buddy who taught History at Bennington, through NH to my Dad's place in Boothbay Harbor, ME, and then back to DC, often in one long charmless make-it-home-by-Monday iron butt slog down the Eastern seaboard.

Vermont was always my favorite leg of those trips, though I have fond memories of a poignantly romantic encounter with an Amish or maybe Mennonite lass around the book tables of an antique and junk shop somewhere near Intercourse, PA. Had things worked out differently, road not traveled and all that, my Forum avatar might have resembled that Quaker Oats guy.

Seriously though, while I might not want to winter over up there, it's hard to think of a finer place to have a proper old thumping Enfield Bullet than Vermont in Summer, though Fall must be AMAZING. Hang in there, man. Spring'll be a-bloomin' soon.

[DavidGraves]

Bilge

You REALLY really shouldn't have been an English major...see where it has gotten you......quaker wild oats indeed.

We also spent too much time in Vermont and Maine but finally ORegon won the prize.

Did a farm sit in Vermont last February.

We attended a contra dance in an old Grange hall and they had all the windows open with fans blowing in....it was minus 1 when we left the dance...apparently Toyota thermometers do register minus,

[hortoncode3]

Success! Dumped out the old rusty and probably waterlogged gas, cleaned the screen and fuel shutoff, reassembled and it fired right up. Noisily I might add, some backfiring and fussing, tweaked the pilot and idle a bit to smooth that business out and drove it up the road a bit after warm-up. Tends to choke and buck at quarter throttle but if you plod along at 5-10 mph it pulls hard in 4 gears. Obviously someone mucked up the adjustments. I need some guidance in an initial set of these two screws and how to adjust them properly. I can say the carb is amazingly clean considering it sat for 18 months. And it's a free breather since someone took out the air cleaner and tossed it. I'm going to pick up a K and N slip on at some point. I'm super pleased with this bike...I miswed my 2009 too much. Feels great to have the torque again!

[Bilgemaster]

That's superb news! Typically, whatever the carb, those idle air mixture screws generally like it 1¼ to 1¾ turns counter-clockwise back from fully closed. Try 1½ as a rough adjustment, warm it up well, adjust the idle with that throttle stop screw to a slightly fast tickover, then commence fiddling with that air mixture screw just a tad in and out until the idle just sounds "best", then adjust the idle speed down to suit (some, particularly our Indian "Bulleteer" cousins, like it beating slower than a brontosaurus' or Melania Trump's heart when "The Donald" hoves into view, others, like me, don't want to stall at the light so often), and off you go for a springtime jaunt...to gather essential supplies and medications, naturally.

If that jaunt happens to bring you by a Wallyworld or auto parts joint, you might do well to grab a can of that SeaFoam and give her a healthy slug of that stuff, say 3 or 4 ounces to start, then maybe 2 per tankful of fuel later until the can's gone. That'll help gently ease out any remaining cruds or cobwebs from the nooks and crannies. The "SeaFoam Shock Treatment" (half or more of a can) is a popular curative for bikes that run poorly after a long winter's storage. Ethanol's truly the Devil's Spew. To find REAL fuel up your way, click here.

[hortoncode3]

Yep I have hi-test right down the hill, booze free. A little leery of if it might to too high octane for a bike designed to run on much crappier gas though.

[Bilgemaster]

Yep I have hi-test right down the hill, booze free. A little leery of if it might to too high octane for a bike designed to run on much crappier gas though.

"Hi-test", huh? Say that to most kids, and they'll just cock their heads like a confused mutt. There are lots of old "octane" threads in this Forum to peruse, similar to those dreaded motor oil threads, with owner preferences all over the spectrum. Yet in this case it basically comes down to the advantages of running an ethanol-free fuel. While these old low compression beasts might run well enough on say, the 87 octane "Regular" with 10% ethanol found in most pumps, that ethanol may well have several well-documented bad consequences, especially for vehicles used more infrequently. That 91 octane ethanol-free fuel most commonly found throughout your home state of Vermont won't do your Bullet any harm. In fact, according to many previous user comments to these Forums, it might give your Bullet a bit of an easier ping-free and cooler-running climb while lugging up some of those grades. You ARE in the "Green Mountain State", after all.

In short, if it were mine, I'd go for that corn-free 91 octane at less than a buck extra per tankful (mine's on a steady diet of 89 ethanol-free, the only grade available nearby, with an ounce or so of Marvel Mystery Oil per tankful).

If you're concerned about that slower-burning higher octane, just keep an eye on your spark plug. If it's noticeably sooting up on the 91, then perhaps a minor timing adjustment could be in order.