I have a 97 Katana gsx600f with about 18K miles on it. There has been some issues with my bike that I have come to deal with, but it's so damn annoying after a few hours of riding around and I'm sick of it.
One of the issues is the god awful vibration. It's completely RPM related, not speed. It's more noticeable around 5,000-7,000rpm. Not as apparent for the first few hundred RPM or top end. The whole bike will rattle and hum from it. It's a very high pitched vibration like those arcade games that you hold onto the handles it vibrates extremely fast and stings your hands. That's what it feels like driving all the time.
The clutch is also annoying. It's really tight and hard to fully disengage the clutch. I've adjusted it from the handlebar adjuster a few times. Untreading the adjustment out makes it tight it's whole travel. And when its threaded in just makes it loose (and not even engage the clutch) half the travel and tight the rest of it's travel. It's tight enough tire my hand out by third gear so sometimes I'll just shift without using the clutch. I haven't rode another Katana before so I can't compare. I've only rode newer bikes like 2005+ Kawasaki's, Triumph's, and Yamaha's. I can pull those clutches with practically my pinkey finger, but those are also new bikes with new technology.
Lastly, it doesn't like to run good. It takes quite a while to fully warm up enough to not die on me from a stop. Once it fully warms up after about 10 minutes of driving it will idle and accelerate fine. For instance, I would stop somewhere for no more than 10-15 minutes and it will die on me unless I give it some RPM"S to warm it up again. I have it idling at 1,000rpm right now. I've messed with the idle screw so many times trying to get it to about 1,400rpm. I would make an adjustment (fully warm) and then go drive it for a little while and it would be off again. So I have just left it where it's at now.
I'm thinking of just having my local bike shop clean and tune the carburetor, replace the plugs and wires, do a valve adjustment, look at the clutch, and pinpoint the vibration. I could probably do most of the work myself considering I work on cars for a living, but I'm not very familiar with bikes or carburetors. Sorry for the really long post. I'm just hoping you guys could let me know if anything of this is normal for these bikes or typical issues. Any advice would be helpful, thanks.
One of the issues is the god awful vibration. It's completely RPM related, not speed. It's more noticeable around 5,000-7,000rpm. Not as apparent for the first few hundred RPM or top end. The whole bike will rattle and hum from it. It's a very high pitched vibration like those arcade games that you hold onto the handles it vibrates extremely fast and stings your hands. That's what it feels like driving all the time.
The clutch is also annoying. It's really tight and hard to fully disengage the clutch. I've adjusted it from the handlebar adjuster a few times. Untreading the adjustment out makes it tight it's whole travel. And when its threaded in just makes it loose (and not even engage the clutch) half the travel and tight the rest of it's travel. It's tight enough tire my hand out by third gear so sometimes I'll just shift without using the clutch. I haven't rode another Katana before so I can't compare. I've only rode newer bikes like 2005+ Kawasaki's, Triumph's, and Yamaha's. I can pull those clutches with practically my pinkey finger, but those are also new bikes with new technology.
Lastly, it doesn't like to run good. It takes quite a while to fully warm up enough to not die on me from a stop. Once it fully warms up after about 10 minutes of driving it will idle and accelerate fine. For instance, I would stop somewhere for no more than 10-15 minutes and it will die on me unless I give it some RPM"S to warm it up again. I have it idling at 1,000rpm right now. I've messed with the idle screw so many times trying to get it to about 1,400rpm. I would make an adjustment (fully warm) and then go drive it for a little while and it would be off again. So I have just left it where it's at now.
I'm thinking of just having my local bike shop clean and tune the carburetor, replace the plugs and wires, do a valve adjustment, look at the clutch, and pinpoint the vibration. I could probably do most of the work myself considering I work on cars for a living, but I'm not very familiar with bikes or carburetors. Sorry for the really long post. I'm just hoping you guys could let me know if anything of this is normal for these bikes or typical issues. Any advice would be helpful, thanks.
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