Enjoy this fine story of how I got to pay the idiot tax a couple times recently... So, I pick up this Katana 600 (motorcycle) for $1. Needs a little work, but I figure I can ride it enough to at least pay for it's keep in gas savings over the car. Possibly even save money if we have nice enough Summers.
Starts off well enough, got all the body repairs done (busted mirror, missing screws/washers/etc) for less than $100. This is the good part of the story. That was it, that one sentence. It now goes terribly wrong. :-)
On the trip over being delivered to me it had a caliper seize up. Rather than just fork over the $200+ for a new one like all the "normal" people around me said I should, I decided to rebuild it myself. I was very proud of myself, ordering the seals and doing all this work for only $36 in parts, plus $4 in fluid. Well, then I find out you can buy a rebuild *kit* instead of buying those seals individually. That's only $17. Doh. $19 idiot tax.
Now, I thought I'd like to start it for the first time since it arrived. Apparently 10 volts is NOT enough juice to even flicker a light on this thing. Battery was old, not unexpected for it to need replacement (it looked horrible, rust on the terminals, and one of the terminals was even twisted out of shape, and the previous owner had to charge it before he could ride it over). I felt really good about myself as I walked up to the local auto parts store, battery in hand, and got a replacement ($50 - my $8 core charge. Note at this point that stock replacement motorcycle batteries are typically old-skool "have to pour in electrolyte and water"). Given the Winter and the possible limited riding I decided to protect that investment by getting a $60 maintenance charger. So, I toddle back home all proud of myself. I'm not afraid of filling my own batteries (done it several times for club airplanes). Well, I hadn't realized how small motorcycle batteries are. It's nuts trying to get electrolyte in them without slopping it all over the place. Plus it's nigh impossible to actually see the level and get it right. 1 frustrating hour later and I start googling for help. Turns out I was an idiot for buying that battery. These bikes tend to overcharge them and blow them up every couple of years (plus they don't hold charge well at all and need to make frequent visits to the charger if not ridden all the time). I bought into a false economy. The real battery to get is the $150 Li-Fe, which can last a decade in normal use and only needs charged if sitting for a year. Ugh. Well, I decided to bite the bullet *now* and just get the Li-Fe rather than waste more of my life on this terrible battery I bought first. My new lead-acid one is headed directly back as a core already. Kind of sad to recycle something that's brand new, but nobody wants it. Now, to make it worse, I originally bought that nice maintenance charger. Nice, if you have lead acid batteries. Not compatible with anything else (auto desulfication circuit is for lead-acid only, big no-no on other batteries). It's an electrical part, so it's non-returnable. So now I also get to buy the proper charger ($80) for this other new battery. $130 more than I should have spent if I'd done it right the first time.
My only consolation from the above story of shame and comedy is that I probably saved at least a couple hours of $85/hr shop labor...