Skip to main content

How to change throttle cable in a Bullet

For the uninformed (you can't be if you are on Facebook), I bought a Royal Enfield Standard 350cc motorcycle on 25th Novemeber 2009. This has been the fulfilment of a long (8 years!) cherished dream.
Here we are...




After exactly three months I faced my first breakdown on my way to work on a Friday. The throttle cable snapped. Thankfully I had a spare at home and I was pretty confident I could replace it myself. Having lived with a 1984 model Bajaj Chetak for 5 years, I was in the habit of applying first aid myself. This wasn't as easy as seemed though. I manage to get the handle side of the throttle cable out. But had issues with the engine (carb side). I checked with fellow biker Aravind (who also owns a Standard 350 that is as old as him). He said it was a pretty simple process and promised to join me in 30 mins. But once he came, we realised, RE had done some changes that had lead to this problem. Here is the issue -







If you refer to the picture above, I was supposed to unscrew 'A' and get the other end of the cable out from the carburetor. But the design was modified in these newer models, such that the nut 'B' and a part of the tank didn't let me unscrew part 'A'. They interrupted in the yellow area marked. This meant there was no way we could replace the cable without removing the fuel tank. Sad enough, I had topped up just the previous evening! We dragged the bike to a mechanic nearby who said he could fix it without removing the fuel tank. But when he started using his inhumane techniques on my bike, I called up RE service centre to confirm that we HAD to remove the fuel tank. I requested one of their mechanic to come and do the honours. He came and did this to the bike...



Unscrewing the bolt B in the picture needs a different kind of tool. That will be my next buy now.

Comments

vj said…
Hello Brother,

Lucky you to face this problem, and above it so nice of you to post it as a blog. i am in the same situation. tomorrow i have a book a schedule for this replacement of throttle cable. i tried 2 days back and realised that the carb top had the tank nut as an obstacle. but wanted to confirm if there is any other way.

Thanks bro and ride safe.

Vijay.
thelaukik said…
Glad I could help!
amardeep said…
There is no need to remove the fuel tank . it can be done by loosening the carburetor a bit.

Popular posts from this blog

The oscar for dilemmas

As I was travelling from Goa to Pune in a Bus, I overheard some conversation and could see a lot of dilemma on the face of a fellow passenger. As the story evolved, I could connect with him. Thus it went: They were a couple, he was with his fiance/wife/girlfriend (a non-ma/behen relationship). There was another girl (pretty) who wanted to a lady's seat. She could get it only if this gentleman would give up the company of his travel mate as there were no other female passengers on the bus. I have been through similar situation and have said no and felt guilty about it till the society at large did something equally unjust to me. But this incident in the bus the other day, sparked off some more such dilemmas that I have come across quite often. I thought of having a golden globe of dilemmas; put them on the blog and see which is the most common dilemma. First being the one above, the second dilemma that comes to my mind is of cheating in exams. No No. Me cheating is taboo enough! It ...

The business of all that is complex

Very recently I have been following Jason Fried's posts on 37signals.com. I am impressed by his minimalist thoughts and the whole idea of customers 'growing out of' and 'growing into' your product. Per Jason, there are just a certain simple features that customers really want and a product company should strive to be the best at those features. But beyond these features, your customers will always have some desires and will keep asking for more features. One should learn to say no to such demands and crowd the Product with features that only a few of your customers will actually use. These frills not only hamper the performance of the product technically, but also make the Product manufacturer waste a lot of effort in the form of product support and other allied activities. This seems to have been working for folks at 37signals.com and many more such companies (SFDC, Flip Video recorders etc.) I then started thinking of this philosophy in the context of Indian IT co...

RSS - an answer to the caste discrimination

One of my old post on Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh drew a comment today. It posed a few question about the stand RSS takes on the issues of caste system in our contry. The reader also asked if RSS could be a possible solution. And this, my dear readers in the fuel for this post. Let me put forth some facts about the organisation called RSS right at the beginning. RSS is a social organisation. There is no formal registration and participation is completely voluntary. It is not a political, religious or profit making orgnisation. There are no posts, there are only responsibilities (in fact that what they are called). These facts make it clear that this is a place where entry and exit is pretty easy. There are no costs involved with either. Which means there is no-one who can tell you that he will get you registered with the RSS and do you a favour. RSS is for everyone. In my opinion it is a perfect place where caste ism cannot exist. There are no reservations for a certain community. T...