Mariko is a project at times...

 A bit of a stressful day in terms of issues that arose with Mariko.

First, everything was fine as I drove the 30 miles or so to Safford, AZ where the nearest NAPA store was located.  Well, almost everything was fine, she seemed to be idling at around 1100 rpms where normally it would be between 800-900 rpm.  Hmm.

I got there just fine and purchased antifreeze (50/50 mix) and another 5 quart bottle of 10W30 oil.  It didn't take very much to fill up the radiator to the top so being low on coolant is probably not the issue in the ongoing heavy oil usage by the engine.  While I had the hood up I manually moved the throttle lever on the carburetor, checking for binding, trying to figure out the higher idle.

I also noticed, as I put antifreeze in, that the nut that held down the lid for the air cleaner that mates to the carburetor was missing!  Must have vibrated off or I forgot to put it back on.  Regardless, it was time to head on over to the Ace hardware to get an appropriate wingnut.

Trouble was, on the way, Mariko would not stay on when coming to a stop....forcing me to restart her via the ignition each time.  Quite worrisome.  Best I can figure out, my manually actuating the throttle lever caused the adjustment screw to "back out" and so the light pressure it should have been applying when at idle wasn't being applied and the engine would die.

My continuing thanks to RichardM who figured out what the issue was.  I would have thought the tension spring would keep the screw from moving but hey.  I turned the screw clockwise till the idle settled out and the engine ran smooth at idle.

Tried getting 5 gallons of water at a vending machine but all it did was swallow my $5 and not only didn't give me water, didn't give me change or return my $5!  

Quitting while I was behind, I headed on back to the campsite.  I've had to back off the idle screw twice since then, 1/4 turn each time or less, to try and get rid of the dieseling behavior.  Annoying mostly, but I'll figure it out.  Oh, also changed out the air filter with a new one I got at the NAPA store.

On one of the test rides, I drove Mariko into the sandy dunes, heading towards nearby rock formations:

After the above pic, I got slightly misoriented....OK I got lost trying to make it back to camp.  A whole bunch of wandering back and forth later, finally stopped at this other rock formation and looked at google maps to get a sense of direction.

Got pointed in the right direction finally and slowly made my way back to the access road leading into the BLM campground.

Spent part of the afternoon sewing velcro strips to the failed zipper area in the back window of the soft top but it failed during the next test ride, didn't hold up.  Oh well.

As the golden hour came around, I headed out once again into the dunes, this time spotting what looked like a cross atop a small ridge line.  I headed in that direction and managed to find the right sandy trail to climb up onto the ridge:

I believe the cross is just a memorial marker, not an actual grave.  Still, not something one expects to find on BLM land.  

Coming back down the ridge, it was sandy four-wheeling all the way back to this spot:

Finally found the name for this mountain: Javelina Peak

Got back to camp, still some minor dieseling going on so I backed off the idle screw 1/8 of a turn and will see tomorrow how she behaves.  RichardM did mention that the warmer temperatures could also cause the dieseling in combination to my ham fisted efforts at resetting the idle screw.  I'll figure it out.