Bolens Diablo Rouge and Hus Ski Discussion Forums

In 1962 Maurice Cyr took Apollinaire Lapointe our super mechanic and two 200-A machines to Mont St. Anne, Quebec for a special press demo.
They left very very early and made the five-hour trip.
Maurice was the salesman who could sell fridges to the Eskimos. He was my sales idol at that time . He was in his 30’s.
Apolinaire was in his fifties and a very serious worker. He was my favourite mechanic on a road trip. Everything he did was cold and calculated. He workrd all day to make sure the machines were running.
At the end of the demo’s and testing by the press the two machines sat at the back of the tilt trailer.

Apolinaire was invited to the bar with the group, but chose to have a coffee and went to load the machines
.
These machines had a throttle cable called a bowden cable which was like a brake cable on a bicycle and they went under the engine.
They often froze and since Maurice had driven one of the machines to the trailer the cables were in the wide-open throttle position.
Apolinaire stood beside the machine, pulled the starter cord and the machine fired and took off.
The throttle was wide open and the machine shot up the tilt trailer, without him, hit the trunk, broke the back window and slid back and forth on the trunk while the cleats chewed the top of the rear seat, parcel shelf etc. Appolinaire managed to run to the machine and kill the engine.
Then they had to drive five hours back to Pt.Claire without a rear window in sub zero weather.

Ed

Its funny that you mention that. I am sure alot of people have had that happen once or twice hopefully without that sort of outcome. We had a couple of close calls last winter with the carb sticking wide open and that can sure catch you off gaurd. On most of the Hus Skis we play around with now we have a tension spring working both ways off of the throttle arm on the carb which reasures you (most of the time) that the carb will close after each ride. Seems to work great so far. Thanks for sharing Ed!