Tweet
Before I started this project, I thought I was fairly mechanically inclined. My bike has fought me the whole way through. Please bear with me while I vent and ask a few questions...
I set out over the winter to do a valve adjustment. I figured while I had everything apart, that I would perform a few upgrades. Aside from noisy valves, the bike ran 100%. Only had 3k on it when I bought it and got put away with about 10k on it.
I adjusted the valves to the best of my ability and replaced the valve cover gasket. I'm confident the valves are correctly adjusted, as I went through the procedure twice, being a bit nervous as a first timer. I pulled the carbs, cleaned them and jetted them with an Ivan's kit. I got everything back together and spent a week trying to get the bike to start. I had spark, I was pretty sure I had fuel...so one night I just decided f***k it, I'll spray some carb cleaner in the air filter and see if that gets her going. Sure enough, it fired, idled and ran steady.
It was at this point that I noticed some gas leaking out of carb 1's bowl. Seeing as how I had never disassembled carbs and set float height, I figured this was the culprit of my problem. Things went downhill fast. While draining the tank to get the carbs off, I ran inside to check a tutorial on float height, and much to my dismay, returned to find the tank on the ground dented. Fine. I can deal. Paintless dent repair here I come.
In my haste and excitement emptying out the carb bowls, I managed to "superman" (use a ratchet and allen wrench type socket) the plug back into the bowl, splitting it. I located a new bowl and had it shipped to me.
This brings us up to this week. I disassembled the bottom ends of the carbs, again, to reset float height. The gasket on bowl 1 was the culprit of the fuel leak problem, but i felt it couldn't hurt to check my height. I've got everything back together and I can't get the bike to start. It's been 3 days of frustration.
There is spark, I'm pretty sure there is fuel. I hit the air cleaner twice with carb cleaner and it ran for a few seconds before it died. I pulled the fuel filter off with the hose still connected to the tank and got fuel coming out in the PRI position. reconnect and it'll just barely fire but won't catch.
I know there's a trick with the vaccum system to the first startup. What am I missing? Should I pull everything and adjust valve clearance again? It ran with the carb leak prior, so I don't think this is necessary. Any help, suggestions or a check list of things I could be missing would be great... I'm really wishing I bought a fuel injected bike at this point...
I set out over the winter to do a valve adjustment. I figured while I had everything apart, that I would perform a few upgrades. Aside from noisy valves, the bike ran 100%. Only had 3k on it when I bought it and got put away with about 10k on it.
I adjusted the valves to the best of my ability and replaced the valve cover gasket. I'm confident the valves are correctly adjusted, as I went through the procedure twice, being a bit nervous as a first timer. I pulled the carbs, cleaned them and jetted them with an Ivan's kit. I got everything back together and spent a week trying to get the bike to start. I had spark, I was pretty sure I had fuel...so one night I just decided f***k it, I'll spray some carb cleaner in the air filter and see if that gets her going. Sure enough, it fired, idled and ran steady.
It was at this point that I noticed some gas leaking out of carb 1's bowl. Seeing as how I had never disassembled carbs and set float height, I figured this was the culprit of my problem. Things went downhill fast. While draining the tank to get the carbs off, I ran inside to check a tutorial on float height, and much to my dismay, returned to find the tank on the ground dented. Fine. I can deal. Paintless dent repair here I come.
In my haste and excitement emptying out the carb bowls, I managed to "superman" (use a ratchet and allen wrench type socket) the plug back into the bowl, splitting it. I located a new bowl and had it shipped to me.
This brings us up to this week. I disassembled the bottom ends of the carbs, again, to reset float height. The gasket on bowl 1 was the culprit of the fuel leak problem, but i felt it couldn't hurt to check my height. I've got everything back together and I can't get the bike to start. It's been 3 days of frustration.
There is spark, I'm pretty sure there is fuel. I hit the air cleaner twice with carb cleaner and it ran for a few seconds before it died. I pulled the fuel filter off with the hose still connected to the tank and got fuel coming out in the PRI position. reconnect and it'll just barely fire but won't catch.
I know there's a trick with the vaccum system to the first startup. What am I missing? Should I pull everything and adjust valve clearance again? It ran with the carb leak prior, so I don't think this is necessary. Any help, suggestions or a check list of things I could be missing would be great... I'm really wishing I bought a fuel injected bike at this point...
Comment