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