Went to start the bike this morning, however the key wouldn’t turn. I could turn it the opposite way and get the parking light on, however couldn’t the ignition on.
This is the first winter I am riding, and just couldn’t work out what was going wrong…
Decided I would do the old car window trick and pour boiling hot water over the lock mechanism (incase is was frozen), which did the trick.
Just wondered whether this is a normal occurance on bikes…will I have to pour hot water every morning now until the weather picks up again? I leave home at the crack of dawn, so there is not much chance of it thawing out before I leave.
bit late now… but it is a bad idea to pour boiling water down the ingnition. apart from the obvious that you might crack something important but also you risk rust.
i saw a suit pour hot water fresh out of the kettle onto his windscreen then saw the look of horror on his face as it shattered into a million pieces.
Do not ever do that rapid cooling or heating makes things go bang or crack like when my mum put a pyrex dish in cold water out of the oven same outcome.
Oh, and in the event that you ‘forget’ to do the wd40 thing and want to clear a frozen lock, the non-destructive way to do it is to heat the key gently in a flame (remember when most people carried a cigarette lighter?). Ideally you’re looking for nice and warm, most definitely not red hot and certainly no more than uncomfortable-to-hold - or you’ll start melting plastic bits and that, my friends, is wrong.
Press the key against the lock and apply gentle pressure. Reheat as necessary. Et voila!
WD40 isn’t kind to some plastics so spraying it around your display area isn’t a hot idea.
Spray WD 40 on the key and insert it…you don’t need much more than that…even liberally spraying it through the straw isn’t needed.
As the others said…hot water in a lock mechanism may work once or twice but what happens when it cools down on the ride to work and freezes in the mechanism again!!!
Sounds like your lock may not have been frozen, seeing as you could turn it in the other direction.
Might have been in need of some lubrication anyway, and the cold weather made it a lot worse.
As said before, a little WD40 will do the trick, as burmonkey says on the key,
Or if you prefer to spray it in as i do, make up a piece of card and cut a hole the size of the ignition, and that will stop any overspray.
once treated it should be good for a few months maybe a lot longer, my previous bikes i did it once a year, and i’ve now Had my my Blackbird two and a half years and never had to do it, and it’s left out in all weathers 24/7
next time check on LB first :D:P
