#&%* Stupid Kill Switch

[Iplayfarmer]

Actually the title of this thread should be #&%* stupid me. This thread is purely for the humorous enjoyment of the TBN crowd.

Back in February a friend borrowed my 4-wheeler to plow some snow. A few days after he returned it I went to move it and it wouldn't start. I did enough trouble shooting to find it had no spark, and left it at that for a while. I kept wondering what the problem was, and I kept looking for an opportunity to dig into it deeper.

Tonight I was shooting the bull and sat down on the 4-wheeler for a minute. Mid conversation I looked down an noticed that the kill switch was off. Sure enough, as soon as I switched it on, the thing fired up and ran great.

I never use the kill switch. I never even think of the kill switch. I agree with my wife. She said it's a good thing I never found the time to do more troubleshooting or I'd have had the thing in a hundred pieces in the garage before I'd noticed the kill switch was off.

Moral of the story (again)... Check the easy stuff first before you go to the more complicated stuff.

 

[terry.dinerman]

Brother, I FEEL your pain....

OK .... I admit it ... I have the seat-kill switch on my JD870 wired "ON" so I can run it while dismounted...

Wasted the best part of a morning scratching my head and taking parts off and on trying to figure out why the darn thing wouldnt start...till I sat down in the seat....

FOO!

I am right behind you with trying the simple stuff...

Terry

 

[irvingj]

Exactly the same thing happened to my XL250 motorcycle! I had it at school, a kid was looking it over closely (with permission)...when I went to leave, it wouldn't start. Mind you, this is kick-start ONLY, no electric.

After working up a good sweat in our parking lot, then rolling it down a hill and dumping the clutch, borrowing a pick-up to load it up and haul it home, going through.... well, you get the idea.

The next day I was whining to a friend, still scratching my head, as he went through the littany of possibilities. "Yep, did that. Yep, checked that. Nope, that's not the problem." Finally he says, "Kill switch?"

:ashamed::ashamed: Yep. Started up on the first kick after it was turned back on. First bike I ever had with a kill switch, never use it, never thought about it.

Learned that lesson well!:laughing::laughing:

 

[mrmikey]

Did something similar last year on my tractor while mowing.
I was mowing the far side of the yard furthest away from the garage and my cell rang, my daughter, so I shut the tractor off. Didn't want anything in particular so we shot the bull for a couple of minutes and then I went to start the rig...nuttin. Before this, the starter was giving me some grief so i thought it finally croaked.
Well crap the **** starter finally gave up the ghost. I got a stick and gave the starter a few well placed cracks thinking it'd start one more time so I could get back to the garage anyway but no luck.
Hoof my way up to the garage to grab me wrenches and get back and start to take the shrouds off to get at the starter. So I get the shrouds of and proceed to crack the starter a bit more vigously. while I'm doing this I think to myself "self, it's odd you can't even hear the solenoid clicking in". At which point I reach down and turn the mower drive clutch switch/ignition interlock off.....Mike

 

[Don87]

Did something similar last year on my tractor while mowing.
I was mowing the far side of the yard furthest away from the garage and my cell rang, my daughter, so I shut the tractor off. Didn't want anything in particular so we shot the bull for a couple of minutes and then I went to start the rig...nuttin. Before this, the starter was giving me some grief so i thought it finally croaked.
Well crap the **** starter finally gave up the ghost. I got a stick and gave the starter a few well placed cracks thinking it'd start one more time so I could get back to the garage anyway but no luck.
Hoof my way up to the garage to grab me wrenches and get back and start to take the shrouds off to get at the starter. So I get the shrouds of and proceed to crack the starter a bit more vigously. while I'm doing this I think to myself "self, it's odd you can't even hear the solenoid clicking in". At which point I reach down and turn the mower drive clutch switch/ignition interlock off.....Mike

I did that so many times with my old Cub Cadet, with that electric PTO..................:laughing::laughing:

 

[RandyT]

had a customer at my mower repair shop a few years back that started to mow his yard and the neighbor came over so he shut the mower off, went to restart it and it wouldn't start. had the neighbor try it with no avail. thought the battery had give up the ghost so went to walmart and got a new battery but didn't help. borrowed neighbors trailer to haul it 25 miles to my shop. i didn't even unstrap it, just jumped on and started mower. try mower several times and it always started. customer got on mower and tried it three times and on the third attempt figured out he forgot to push the clutch down to start the mower.

 

[crash325]

Much SAFER tractors and ATV's are on the way. With so many people getting hurt these things need to be a lot safer. Seat safety, neutral safety & brake safety just aren't doing the job.

Soon the Ignition Switch will be eliminated and your tractor or ATV will be much safer. :laughing:

 

[jinman]

When training new electronic technicians in the US Navy back in the '70s, one of my favorite troubleshooting tricks was to remove a light bulb to simulate a burned out indicator bulb. I'd say at least 75% of the trainees would see the light out and start troubleshooting the system instead of just reaching up and pressing the "press-to-test" feature of the indicator. By the time they left school, checking for burned out bulbs was the first thing they would all do. Today, I'd bet there aren't even 10% of the incandescent bulbs on equipment that there used to be. Most are probably LED/LCD displays that almost never fail.:thumbsup:

 

[wedge40]

Been there done that.
Cub Cadet with PTO switch. I had the snowblower in an old barn about 150' from the house. I'm a pretty good procrastinator so I never started getting the tractor ready for winter till we got good snow. Well it snowed about 8" and I put the wheel weights on then headed out to the barn to put the blower on. Lined the think up and when to move it forward to get things latched and the Cub wouldn't start. It was about 10 degrees outside and the barn provided cover at most. I played with that thing for two days, even ran extension cords out there to use a halogen lamp to try and warm things up. At one point I look down and FINALLY notice the PTO switch is on. Turn it off and Cub started right up. From that day on I put the key in the ignition and then always check to make sure the PTO is off. :laughing:

Wedge

 

[johnrex62]

In the early 80's I was working at a little computer store that built clone PCs. One weekend the sales floor was swamped and one of our technicians was helping us out on by answering the phones. After a long time on one call he interrupted us to ask for help with a customer.

It seemed that she had picked up her new computer a couple hours before and when she tried to set it up at home it would not work. Our technician had put her computer together personally and had tested it extensively before it left the store and felt he had a personal stake in getting it working for her now, but had gone over every test he could think of short of having her take it apart.

He asked us if we could think of anything else to have her do before she brought it back in for him to work on it.

We started our standard phone drill for him, Are there any lights on? No.
Is it plugged in? C'mon guys, she's not an idiot.
Ask her anyway, we said. Yes, it is plugged in.
Is it plugged into the wall or the outlet strip? The outlet strip.
Is the light on the outlet strip on? No.
Is the outlet strip plugged in? Yes.
Check the wall outlet the strip is plugged into to see if it has power. Uh, nevermind. She had the outlet strip plugged into itself.



Yes, NEVER overlook the simple stuff first.