‘When Dad doesn’t always know best’
Some parents wrap kids in cotton wool, others wrap their bearings in tin cans
Once a youngster gets on two wheels, it can be difficult to get them to stop. However one dad’s desire to keep his lad on the road inadvertently put him in peril. “We had a lad come in on his Aprilia SX50,” says Steve Powell of Stevelin Motorcycles, Ramsey. “It’s a cool-looking two-stroke supermoto and goes really well, but its 16-yearold owner was struggling with a chain that kept coming loose.” The youngster had been riding around with a failed bearing which then created another, more costly
‘His dad wrapped the bearing in a Kronenbourg can’
problem. Steve continues: “The rear wheel was really wobbly and the bearing had actually worn out the inner hub of the wheel.”
Steve showed the damaged hub to the young rider’s dad and advised he purchased a new hub to fix the problem. “It’s about £90 to buy the part from Aprilia, but he wasn’t interested in that option. He asked whether the damage could be welded and I said no, not only because it’s aluminium but also because it’s not wise to attempt repairs on such an important part.” Steve’s advice went in one ear and out the other, as the dad took the wheel away saying he’d take it to his mate in an engineering shop. The wheel returned to Stevelin Motorcycles to be refitted to the bike, but it didn’t take Steve long to discover all was not well. “We had a look and discovered that his dad had actually wrapped the bearing in a piece of Kronenbourg can!
“I called him straight away and said, ‘look you can’t do this. You cannot let your lad ride the bike,’ but the lad came in and pushed the bike away,” said Steve. The bike was back a couple of days later to have its brake lights fixed after its young rider had been pulled by the police. “I was flabbergasted that the bike was still being ridden,” said Steve. “I called the guy again and asked him what he was doing about the rear wheel. He told me it was OK for now. He’d just shoved the bearings back in and the back wheel wobbles like you wouldn’t believe.”