Roadtrip Day 22: The day of finally getting the engine work done at Rajkot [March 30, 2021]

Rode from Junagadh to Rajkot & spent entire day with Manu Bhai & his team of Rana Auto Garage

In my previous post, I had mentioned how I decided to camp (put the tent) in the open space of Bharati Ashram where I was staying at Junagadh. Inspired by the impomptu sleeping over which pilgrims who climb the Girnar mountain wherever they find place, I was all inspired to put my tenting capabilities to practice. Plus, the room was superhot. So why not.

I had not taken permission to camp & deep down somewhere, I had the fear that someone from the ashram might come & ask me to remove the tent. The property is huge & the part where I was provided accommodation, was around 200m away from the admin building. So I took my chances, put the tent late in the night (by 11 PM) & had decided to get up early, wind up the tent & leave for Rajkot. The plan was to reach Rajkot by 9 AM & meet a mechanic as my engine noise had been deteriorating & I was concerned that it may lead to a breakdown. I admit, I have been conservative wrt my bike offlate.

I was up at 5:30 AM. Winded up the tent, went back to the room & slept again. I had done some serious hiking the previous day (climbing down 10k odd steps & hiking to the diverging trails) & I realized that my calf muscles are badly aching, specially when I climbing up or down stairs. So I decided to give my body some more rest.

I was up at 7 AM. By 8 AM, I had loaded my bike & was ready to depart. A lot more students from the hostel where I was staying, had gathered this time around my bike. Before I could take a pic with them, one of their seniors (that is my guess), came to the site & that made most folks get back to their hostels. I got reminded of my Sainik School days & the authority seniors possessed in a residential school.

While I handed over keys in the admin block, the person there asked me that I have overstayed (I had booked only for a day). I knew that it is an Ashram & I can take my chances & I was right. He let me go without any additional payment. I guess he had also looked at my loaded bike & that would have helped my case.

I stopped by at Reliance Petrol pump on the way. Got enough petrol filled to reach Rajkot as I knew that the tank had to be taken off during engine repair. As per map, it was a 100 km ride. The roads were decent. It became a formal highway as soon as I exited the city. There was a shop with the name Kanhaiya Naashta something, where a lot of folks had stopped by. I thought of having breakfast there but apparently they only had tea at that point of time of the day. I had tea & resumed my ride. I crossed a bridge & the view reminded me of similar bridge that comes on Bangalore Pondicherry road.

Before Gondal, I saw this really long (must be a couple of kms or more) queue of trucks parked next to the road. It was also hampering traffic. The queue ended at Gondal APMC .

I reached Rajkot by 10. I mistakingly got onto the Ahmedadbad road & had to turn back to enter Rajkot. The plan was to reach Anand (my friend) place, unload my luggage & then head to a mechanic. Anand stays at Aykar Gruha Vatika & it is one nice green colony.

Post unloading & after having breakfast at Anand’s place, I spoke to Munna bhai who does crank job in Rajkot on phone. I had got his contact from Manish bhai of Dwarka. He gave me contact of Manu bhai who according to him is a great mechanic of old bullet. I called Manu bhai & figured his garage is not too far on Harihar chowk. So I decided to head to his place.

I had also heard that Rajasthan govt is enforcing covid negative report to enter their border. Anand arranged for a drop at a nearby health center for the covid test. I decided to drop my sample before mechanic visit as it would take 24-48 hours for report to come in. At the center, they told that they are doing rapid antigen test only. I decided to have that done only, thanked them for the report & headed to meet Manu bhai. It was 11 AM by then.

Manu bhai had been waiting for me. On listening to the engine noise, he was quick to quote that there is definitely some damage but they will get to know only after opening the head. He quoted a cost of Rs 5k & I requested to him if it can be done for cheaper & he seem accommodating about the request. His team quickly started to work on the bike. Later I got to know that his team consist of his own sons & a few other employees.

Manu bhai is the guy on the left.

Manu bhai’s team working on my bike. From left - Rakesh, Paras & Yasin. Rakesh & Paras are Manu bhai’s sons

An hour later, we saw the piston & it was broken. The bike was actually running with broken piston for some time. I was being told that old bullets are the only known bike that can run in the condition. The broken parts of the piston has falled into the engine & the engine need to be opened too. This is going to take 2 days - is what Manu bhai said & I nodded in agreement. I messaged my friend Anand that I gonna be him for a few more days :).

Manu bhai also mentioned that the crank rod has a bit of dug & it need to be fixed too. For the first time, I saw how Royal Enfield crank looks like. Till now, I only have read that my bike is called Bullet Standard with heavy crank. I saw another bike’s crank lying & it was easily a 10 kg or more heavy crank

It was lunch time & I was hungry. I looked up ‘restaurants in Rajkot’ & saw Sangam Restaurant which was nearby & had good rating. On reaching the place, I asked the person on counter for food suggestion & he recommended Dabeli & Ragda. I chose Samosa Ragda. Both the items were reasonably tasty. I also had chaas. The total bill was Rs 100.

Post lunch, I thought of roaming around a bit. I was also thinking of buying a hat as it is pretty sunny & hot at most places in North India. I looked up the map & figured Gandhi Museum is closeby. While I was walking to the place, I got a call from Manu bhai asking me to come to the garage. On reaching garage, I figured that the engine is also now opened completely & the broken piston parts are there too.

My bike’s crank with broken parts of the piston removed from engine

Manu bhai then took me to nearby places to rebore the piston block & fixing the dug of crank rod. I paid Rs 2k to the crank rod fixing guy on Manu bhai suggestion. At this point, I asked Manu bhai how much total cost this is going to incur & he mentioned since engine is opened & there is a good amount of work - it would easily cost upward of 10k. The number seemed large & with the budget I am intending to do this trip, I thought of finding ways to reduce the cost. Manu bhai suggested that cost can be reduced by replacing some parts with used ones, specially the crank. After some deliberation, I agreed. The cost would be Rs 5k now.

Manu bhai then asked one of his team guys to get all items like bearing, gaskets etc. He asked me to give Rs 3k to them which I did. Their team including Manu bhai started to work on my bike. Manu bhai soon figured that the piston block had a crack & it was because of the crank rod dug. We decided to replace the piston block with another (used one). I insisted on getting a new piston which they did. By 9 PM, the bike engine was pretty much assembled. We decided to call it a day & reassemble at 9:30 AM tomorrow. I left for Anand’s place around that time.

During afternoon, while I watched my bike getting worked on, I also thought of planning my Rajasthan route. I had asked for suggestion for road & temperature from folks in Road Trip India Facebook group. Multiple folks suggested that Radhanpur - Barmer - Jaisalmer road will be too hot to ride. I also sought input on Desert Safari in Jaisalmer & it seems they are still happening. But then I decided to shelve the plan of visiting Jaisalmer primarily due to heat & the route being longer. Thanks to Sunil Jain, Anshul Bansal & Devilal who reached out to their contacts in Jaisalmer to figure out if the road is rideable & if the Desert Safari/Camping is on.

I did not want to take the major Gujrat - Rajasthan route as it would mean a lot of lorry traffic. As of now, I am thinking of taking straight route from Rajkot to Chandigarh via Palanpur, Pali, Jaipur & Badli (Harayana).

I had planned to go to Chandigarh directly but then I got a call from Vijendra ji (a friend from Badli whom I had met during my Chadar trek in Jan 2021). Vijendra ji wanted to help with stay in Rajkot but then I told him that I have it sorted already. He had also asked me earlier if I would be passing by Delhi during my trip. I figured that a halt at Badli would not be a bad idea as it would help me break my journey at 300km marks as well.

Plan for today is to go back to Manu bhai’s shop, get the bike ready & do a ride to & fro Gondal which would be around 70km total. That would help in testing the bike. If everything goes well, I will start for Palanpur tomorrow.