March 11, 2016
Before I could allow myself to do any serious sight-seeing in this city, I needed to get to work: I had a list of items to be done on the bike before taking it to the airport for it’s first flight.
First things first: get all the mud, dirt, and grime off so I can work on it. It’s nice to have car washes that will actually wash bikes too. These guys did a great job: they used degreaser, soap, and not too much pressure. Cost: about $7.
The Butterfly Effect: lots of white butterflies on Ruta 3 heading north. Many of them were kamikazes, turning my helmet into a sticky mess.
Meet Paolo. This guy is awesome. He runs Moto Avenida, a little one-man independent parts, accessory and service shop just around the corner from my apartment on Avenida Cordoba in Buenos Aires. I stopped in and asked him if he would let me use his shop to change my oil & filter and chain & sprockets. He gladly allowed me to use his space. I bought a few small items and my oil from him. As usual, not a word of English, but incredibly nice and helpful. I had to remove the swingarm to install the endless chain, but everything I did took about an hour and a half at his shop. Just coincidence that he was wearing a Yamaha t-shirt when I showed up.
Back at the apartment, I removed the fuel tank and swapped out the fuel pump and fuel filter. As noted earlier, there’s nothing wrong with the fuel pump, but unfortunately the in-tank fuel filter is part of the fuel pump and only comes as an assembly.
One of these things is not like the other: old fuel filter/pump on the left. Filter is just a wee bit black compared to the new one. I’ll clean it again and keep it as a spare just in case.
I also replaced the mirror that was broken when the bike was dropped off the worklift in Punta Arenas. I removed my GPS, its’ mounting dock and associated wiring for shipping, and installed a new air filter.
At this point, the bike is ready to ship. I’ll cover those details Tuesday when it goes to the shipper.
Hi Pat:- I have been following your travels with much interest; not least because I also own an EFI XT250 like yours. A much under-estimated bike…
Could the black deposits on the old fuel filter/pump assembly be from a bio-film due to the water retaining properties of the ethanol-laced fuel that I gather is prevalent in South America? I’d be interested to know whether a diluted bleach mixture i.e. ‘Spray & Wipe’ or similar removes it? The filter material is certainly very fine & could be readily blocked that way. Isn’t that a known issue with some KTM’s?
Not a problem in my home country of Australia, where you can choose to stay away from the horrid ethanol stuff.
Hi Mike. Thanks for following along. Good to have another XT250 rider in the mix.
Good observations on the fuel filter residue. I can’t say for sure what the black contaminant is, but there is no doubt that I picked it up in northern Argentina and it definitely causes fuel restriction. Along the way, I took the pump out and cleaned it each time the bike started losing power. The last time I used Simple Green spray cleaner on it, and a bandana (handkerchief) to squeeze the filter dry; then I used about ten Q-tip cotton swabs and rubbed them over the filter screen one at a time, which immediately turned the swabs a dark black. I did this until the swabs no longer turned black, and after that I had no further problems. I intend to clean the old pump/filter again and carry it along as a spare (I have a feeling Argentina is not the last of the bad gas I will encounter…still have Africa and Russia/Mongolia to go).