Morning Break - Pawnee, Ne

We traveled from Lincoln to the fair city of Pawnee for our morning break.  Even though we had only traveled about 72 miles, most of us took the opportunity to fill up with gas, as the next stop was 150 miles away and that would be pushing it for many of these old "gas guzzlers".

Stopping for gas is where things started to go bad.  Actually, things started going bad even before we got to Lincoln the day before the tour, we just didn't realize it.   There are always cars breaking down on the tour, that's why the tour has several tow vehicles that follow along with the cars.  This was my third tour and Maych had never given me a minute's trouble and I didn't expect any trouble this time either, but I guess it was my turn.

The trouble actually started when Josh and I rolled into Lincoln on the Friday before the tour.   Maych  ran like a top from Grand Island to Lincoln (about 90 miles) but when when we hit the city and the traffic slowed to a crawl, Maych suddenly decided to die -- right in the middle of one of the busiest streets in town (O street) at rush hour.  I managed to get him pulled over into a bus turnout (which is not exactly legal).  I tried starting him a few times with no luck and that's when I noticed my electric fuel pump was making some rather exotic noises.  I decided that the electric fuel pump must not be working properly, so I crawled under the dash and disconnected it from the fuss box.  I know what your thinking -- if the electric fuel pump wasn't working before, it will surely not be working after the juice is yanked.  Normally, that would be the case but when we installed the electric fuel pump we didn't by-pass the original mechanical fuel pump.  We just routed the gas through the original mechanical fuel pump.  There's a long story behind why we did it that way and I'll chronicle that sad tale in another episode.  Anyway, after disconnecting the electric fuel pump Maych started right up and we didn't have any more trouble until we pulled in for gas at Pawnee.

As soon as we pulled up to the gas pump Maych died.  I filled him up with gas and with Josh's help we managed to pushed him away from the pumps.  I went in and paid for the gas and by the time I got back he started right up.  So now I'm thinking maybe it's a vapor lock problem.  The new engine we put in Maych (another sad story) runs a little hotter than the original engine and I'm thinking that when we get into town the extra heat is causing Maych to vapor lock and then after a few minutes of cooling off he's good to go.  I figured I could live with that for the rest of the tour.  So after a potty break, a few doughnuts, and a gas fill-up (in that order) we headed back out on the road.