Magnapull

I have a confession to make. I like motors, solving problems, breaking things, and building stuff. I have written about how much I hate motors and motorized recreation, I usually do not solve my issues and problems completely and leave them half finished (probably a result of attention span), I break things everyday, and I usually try to build things with little success do to my lack of skills and fear of tools. Now breaking things is really the only thing on this list that I am good at, but a recent event showed me that there may be some hope for improving the odds of pursuing these hobbies with relative success.

Several days ago, after many days inside feeling bad for myself, I went skiing with a close friend. While skiing, we decided it might be fun to take the snowmachine to one of the surrounding mountains (a pastime I have been enjoying more frequently). After arriving, we hiked up and skied down through perfect spring conditions in the warm sun. After reaching the ground, I began starting the snowmachine. On my second pull I yanked out the start chord!

This is what a working snowmachine is supposed to look like.

We had a little problem. We had a snowmachine that could not start high up in the mountains, and no idea how to fix it. I played calm to look like I knew what I was doing, but my mind was racing. All I could think about is how pissed off my mother would be that I broke my uncle’s machine, and how she would berate me constantly even if it was an easy fix.

Luckily we were with friends who could tow the machine down to the road. After reaching the road, I began calling everyone I knew who owned snowmachines. I knew that the problem was not large, and that I might be able to find someone who was willing to help a helpless stupid American. Ultimately I could not find anyone to help me and I shamefully went home.

The snowmachine getting towed, and one of us poor walkers who had to walk down.

That night I scoured the internet for solutions. It did not help that I had no idea what the part was called in either English or Swedish, so my search effort was rather generic. I ended up looking at pictures of two stroke lawn mowers that most likely used the same mechanism for starting. Despite all of my efforts to hate motors, I was beginning to get a little excited about fixing this machine.

The next day began early so that I could avoid any argument with my mother about borrowing things and then breaking them. The fix seemed easy, I was looking forward to getting dirty hands and looking tough, and I was excited to get to try and solve a problem on my own. At first, everything went smoothly. I took everything apart with relative ease, and documented where each screw would go, and where each part lived. After removing the piece that the start chord was connected to, I began figuring out how it worked. Eventually I replaced the string and put the part back onto the start motor. I gave the chord a good solid tug: nothing happened. I re-tied the chord and changed the direction in which it would be pulled from: nothing happened. Shit, an hours worth of work, and I have learned nothing about the problem.

Two pictures of the same broken snowmachine.

I took the piece to an old man on the side of the trail and he gave me some tips. The piece was called a magnapull, and they use a recoil spring to pull the chord back into the start motor. How I managed to understand all of this technical stuff and the associated Swedish blows my mind. The old man and I learned that this specific magnapull is a product of planned obsolescence: the production of things that are supposed to break so that consumers have to buy them again. Most magnapulls come apart so that you can reset and replace the recoil spring. This one however was not designed to come apart. If the spring came undone or broke, you would have to buy a new part for $200!

Two pictures of the same broken Magnapull. Boring proof of my obsession over fixing the thing.

As you can see, at this point my level of interest in this new hobby was beginning to rise, and the prescience of industry conspiracy made me even more excited. I called another mechanic to see if he could give me a hand, and after working on the part for a little while he became visibly frustrated. He passed it on to one of his colleagues who also failed at opening the part. In all, four mechanics looked at the part and were all equally frustrated. I thought back to the frustrated look on my mothers face when she found out that I broke the snowmachine: if these guys could not fix it, she was going to be mad at me.

Now it is an absolute miracle that my interest and skill went as far as bringing the part to a mechanic. Now it is even more impressive that I could understand what was going on both technically and linguistically. You see, up here in the North, the local Swedes speak a special dialect of Swedish that I have a hard time understanding. It makes it even more complicated when all of the mechanic type characters in the region speak the dialect consistently to one another. While I have a hard time understanding the dialect, I do use certain words of the dialect in my butchered Swedish, so I usually send some mixed signals about my understanding of the backwoods language. I learned that when dealing with the mechanics, you should stick to perfect Swedish, or else they will assume that you are a full-blown speaker of their tongue.

After battling with a machine part and some language, I left the machine shop defeated, but happy that the guys there did not want me to pay for their time. I took the piece home and admitted defeat. I was going to have to order the expensive piece. After ordering the new piece I decided to attempt at getting into the part through demolition just to see if it would work. I began sawing and drilling the piece apart in order to get to the damn spring on the inside. Eventually I got in, and saw that the spring was broken: if I put everything back together again and re-bend or replace the spring, I could avoid buying the new part.

The recoiling of the spring. This is the closest my thumb has ever been to amputation.

This is what a functioning Magnapull looks like.

Well… IT WORKED! I put the whole thing back together again, and it worked. I almost lost my toes, fingers, and eyes coiling the sharp and strong spring, but it would have been worth it just to get that evil beast back into its cage. The magnapull recoiled the string and showed no signs of breaking. All I had to do was scoot on down to the snowmachine, put the part back on, and fire her up. Remarkably everything worked and the two-stroke daemon fired up with two pulls! After a full day of struggle and perseverance through a language barrier and my inherent technical barrier, I managed to foster a passion for a new hobby. Of course, if I succeeded in further breaking the snowmachine rather than repairing it, I am sure I would have a different perspective. I have however learned a lesson: have fun… take chances!

Mmmm. The fresh smell of success. Exhaust induced happiness!

The trip home.

The view after my success with starting the motor. Mount Helags (1796M)

Another view of Hamra Fjället.

More views than you can ask for. Almost home (Vigelskaffet NORWAY).

Tre daggar på Skarvarna

Three days on the Skarvarna

Day one:

Left the house with the intention of completing a long circuit of peaks. I punched through the warming snow with the goal of topping out on Lill Hamra, which happens to be just behind my backdoor. Not very far, or tall, but fun with the conditions, because I managed to choose a very windy day with bad snow: two steps and then I would posthole with my entire ski. Not only that, but the snow was sticky, and it would stick to the bottom of the ski.

Lill Hamra.

A flock of Fjäll Ripor (Ptarmigan) flying away from me.

After topping out on Lill Skarnven, I began the descent. It was so windy that I could point it the entire way down and not have to worry about turning! The downside to this was that the flat parts or the slightly downhill parts required extra effort to overcome the wind.

The cairn at the top of Lill Hamra (1081 M)

Backside of Lill Skarven.

When following the trails here, there are trail markers every 10 meters. Overkill? Growing up I thought so myself, but there have been times when I have not been able to see only one sign at a time.

The backside of Lill Hamra.

The South End of Stor Skarven.

Rather then using climbing skins, I have begun using a technique that maximizes the amount of snow that fastens to the bottom of the ski.

Funäsdalen from the top of Lill Sarven (1224 M).

Storr Hamra and Lill Hamra from the top of Lill Skarven.

Day 2

The second day on Skarven was a reconnaissance trip for an extreme skiing competition that would be held over the weekend. This time I got to hop on the back of a snow machine to get there. The snow was great, due to the immense amount of wind that was blowing snow into all of the bowls on the peak.

The potential boundary for the next day's competition.

Rasmus and David getting lost in the wind on Lill Skarven.

Skiing down in the recycled powder was the closest I have been to experiencing at least a little bit of snow. In the West we are so used to having at least one day during the season where the snowfall is deeper than your boots.

From the bottom there does not seem to be a lot of potential for competition, but everything is much larger than it seems.

The easy way to and from the base of Lill Skarven.

Now I deviate from the story. Mom and I went out on a snowmachine tour the same day to make sure the afternoon snow woud hold the machine.

Judging by moms crawling in the spring snow, you would be able to see a couple of things. One, the snow in the afternoon does not hold a snowmachine or a person. Two, mom maybe fell off of the snowmachine into a dramatic faceplant. Three, moms abs hurt the next day because she was laughing so hard.

Day 3

The day of the competition. I decided to compete in the day’s competition since the area did not seem too challenging. I would have to say I was more coerced into the event rather then skiing due to my own free will. The competition was a fun little get-together with the local ski school. Most of the skiers were excellent skiers, and if there was anyone who was at the bottom of the skill list, it would have been me.

Clear skies for competition day.

Going up was the easiest part, but weird. Swedish snow travel does not really match the type of snow travel we do in the West. Here, everyone seems to prefer walking up the line they want to ski in a large group. To compound the danger of the situation, nobody wears an avalanche transceiver, and if they do, it’s in their pocket or their backpack and they do not turn it on until they go down. The competitors did not seem to want pristine snow for riding. They all preferred walking up to the base of the cliffs to deem if it was possible to throw themselves off of them. I had to be the poor bystander watching as hordes of people destroyed perfect snow!

"This cliff looks good. Take it with speed here. The landing is soft!?"

Not the best model for safe travel: everyone moving up the same gulley. Granted it was spring and the snow is safe, but this is not a habit one should develop.

I did not feel intimidated going up, but everything changed once I saw the first skiers go. They all skied hard and aggressively, which can be attributed to both their skill and alpine skis. I chose to ski with my Telemark setup, mostly because that is what I know how to do.

Endless possibilities...

Competitors were everywhere on the way up.

At the end of the day the group went to a local pub to watch the movie of all of the riders and to judge a winner. I happened to win! Of course, I was the only person who skied in the Telemark group, hence winning both first and last place. It was however, more embarrassing receiving recognition than it was gratifying.

One of the cliff bands in the bowl.

Three days were gone rather quickly and I had gotten some good skiing out of it. The backcountry culture here is not the same to what I am used to, but I still get to lay down a couple of turns so why complain?

Lill Skarven from afar. The parting shot for three days on one mountain.

The results of the competition can be found here:

http://www.tillfjalls.se

Pimpla Dag

Goals for Sweden

1. Re-establish roots in Sweden
2. Ski too much
3. Parooze the talent
4. Learn how to ice-fish

Thus far, I have not accomplished much on this list, except for the inherent goal of having fun. I have however learned how to fish. It is actually a complicated process considering the amount of stress I had to go through to operate a snowmachine to get out on the ice.

The word for ice-fishing in Swedish is pimpla, and is most commonly associated with the phrase 'pimpla öl.' Translation: (used as either a statement or a question) Fishing for Beer(!,?)

This is how the day starts: overalls that keep you far too warm combined with a machine and little experience using it, equals stress, although I do not look it.

This is how stress starts: me trying to put the snowmachine into gear.

This is how most Swedes behave out on the ice: Mangus after falling into the lake trying to find out why there was no ice in the middle of it.

Not the worst place to be on a sunny day in March.

Making holes in the ice, and hoping the fish just hop right on out.

The Pimpla Stuga: a step up from the squatter cabin some Fort Collins skiers have been getting used to.

The man who makes it all happen: my boss and pal, Karl Arne.

Swedish grill hotdogs are wonderful. When you eat a hotdog here, it is called 'hotdog with bread.' Here, we eat them in tortilla-like wraps, with sweet and strong mustard.

My homie Alfred (also known as Popeye to the few Americans who know him) doing what he does best.

While waiting for the fish to bite, this is how we spend our time.

Can you belive it! We actually caught a fish! This fish was pulled up by a guy who had not even stepped on the ice that day. He was helping me pull in the lines, and he pulled this fish up at the first hole he went to. Right after he took the fish off of the hook, he caught another fish that was too small to keep.

Cooking the fish over the fire.

Fighting for the meat!

The stressfull ride home. We weighed the thing down a little.

The day was a success despite the unhealthy levels of stress I had trying to drive the snowmachine to and from. We actually tipped the thing three times, and I did not even know that they could flip! Not a bad start to getting the things on my list checked off.