Did you pull the plug and try spinning the flywheel before you bought it, or did you just trust the guy when he said it needed a battery? That trick takes like thirty seconds and it would've saved you the two weekends of parts swapping. I've learned the hard way to bring a socket and a breaker bar to any sale, even if the seller swears up and down the motor turns free. What got you to stop throwing parts at it instead of chasing the carb or the coil like most people would?

Tbh that near miss in Tacoma sounds like the kind of thing that sticks with you. But here's what I'm curious about, do you still run those smaller lifts with just hand signals if the weather is clear and the site is dead quiet? Or has that one close call basically killed any trust you had in line of sight, period? Because I've seen guys who switch to radios for big loads but go right back to hand signals for the small stuff, and that's where the accidents usually happen. Also, when you do use the radio, are you the one giving the commands or are you still relying on the oiler to call the moves?