[sonosam]

Bench sync? No vacuum sync? Vacuum sync them before you try much else.

It is my understanding that in order to vacuum sync them, the rpms have to idle at 1750. My idle is 5k and climbs to 6k. Gotta have that sorted first.

Badfaerie mentioned a while back in another thread somewhere that the o-rings on the intake boots (cylinder side, not airbox) tend to go bad. Would this be a good place to start checking for the vacuum leak?

[Balindir]

It is my understanding that in order to vacuum sync them, the rpms have to idle at 1750. My idle is 5k and climbs to 6k. Gotta have that sorted first.

Badfaerie mentioned a while back in another thread somewhere that the o-rings on the intake boots (cylinder side, not airbox) tend to go bad. Would this be a good place to start checking for the vacuum leak?

I had a problem with my o-rings, if you pull on off and the o-rings is flatened and looks as if its part of the boot, it probably needs replaced.

[05RedKat600]

It is my understanding that in order to vacuum sync them, the rpms have to idle at 1750. My idle is 5k and climbs to 6k. Gotta have that sorted first.

Badfaerie mentioned a while back in another thread somewhere that the o-rings on the intake boots (cylinder side, not airbox) tend to go bad. Would this be a good place to start checking for the vacuum leak?

Ideally, yes. But you may find as you adjust the sync, you can get the bike to idle properly. COuld be the boot o-rings too, had that issue with my bike. Use something like starting fluid or Brakleen and spray around the boots. Idle goes up, you have a leak. Doesn't change, they are good.

[Wild-Bill]

Another test agent that seems to work well is a propane torch. Same deal; rpms go up you've found a leak.

The whole point of raising the idle to 1750+ is to steady out the vacuum and provide a healthy enough vacuum to read on the sync gauges. Higher rpms should sync just fine although you may get some ungodly high readings.

[Badfaerie]

SoS- missed you love!

Here's the test to find an air leak. Get a can of starter fluid with the straw so you can be reasonably accurate with where it sprays. Use an alternate fuel source so you have as much access to the carbs as possible. With the bike on, spray a bit of starter fluid around any and all of the spots the carbs connect to ... anything. I usually start with where the intake boots meet the motor. Spray the top of boot 1, wait 2 seconds, if the RPMs rise you have a leak, if not move on. If I get RPM rise I usually will spray from the bottom, sides and try to narrow down and eliminate any other source. You very well may have multiple leaks. Make sure the engine is warm too, sometimes the leaks are hard to locate until things get nice and warm.

Any place but where those intake boots meet the motor can usually be solved by reseating the carbs correctly. The intake boot o-rings are about $4/ea.

While you are at it, make sure that all the sync port caps are on, that the vacuum line for the petcock is blocked off if you don't have the tank on, and that you have your hoses connected correctly. Everyone overlooks the obvious sometimes, that's why Tim and I usually like to do this kinda thing together so we can double check each other.

One other note- Like Red said, you might need to start your vacuum sync with the rpms high. Any cylinder pair that won't go into/hold the sync has a vacuum/air leak some where.

[sonosam]

What an ordeal!

Finally got around to actually setting some time aside for the bike. Also, finally finished (with a few exceptions) and got her running properly. Here is what I found to be wrong:

- Symptom was that she was idling at 6k (was told to sync them)
- Sounded horrible (decided to do a valve adjustment)
- Oil looked off (did an oil change)

That is what I started with. I drained the oil and dug into the valves. Lo and behold I found all of them out of spec (by quite a margin) and one was missing the adjuster altogether (it was sitting in the tray(?) just chilling). Scared me a bit at first. Adjusted everything to spec and moved on. Buttoned her back up and put new oil in. Started her and she idled at 3k (quite an improvement to me) and sounded like she used to. Started in on a carb sync with my homemade manometer ala Kreylyn. Synced 1 and 2 and she idled at 2500, 3 and 4 brought the idle to 2k, and 2 and 3 brought it down to 1k. Did an idle adjustment to 1500ish and she held true for 10 mins.

Now I can start in on the final things like throttle cables, brake fluid, etc. Man what a feeling. And only 3 months (off and on of course [and definitely more off than on]) later even!

TL;DR I got her to run normal and now I just have to button up the final things. I am ecstatic.

*Jump for Joy*

[arsenic]

So, nothing was wrong with the carbs? Can I just say that I told all you ****ers that

*Jump for joy*

[sonosam]

For the record, I never doubted that the carbs were fine. The sound was what worried me the most, but other than me thinking that it sounded horrible, I had no measurable symptom to present here for diagnosis (why does it sound like I am talking to a doctor?). The 6k was measureable, so that is what I brought up here.

[Kreylyn]

For the record, I never doubted that the carbs were fine. The sound was what worried me the most, but other than me thinking that it sounded horrible, I had no measurable symptom to present here for diagnosis (why does it sound like I am talking to a doctor?). The 6k was measureable, so that is what I brought up here.

99.9% of the responses on running issues are going to be "clean the carbs". Why? Because it is definately the highest % cause of running issues. The problem comes in when it's not the carbs. Some people will give other options, alot of people simply can't let the "it's the carbs" issue go. This might be from personal experiance (thought it was right, turned out wasn't, so it's still the most likely cause for them) or simply they don't have another answer (don't know or don't understand how something else could be the issue).

I've got and dealt with alot of Katanas. Every day I learn something new. I find new issues or causes for issues I never knew of thought about before. Due to this I have a series of steps I take in my garage to reduce "hunting" for issues and just rule them out right off the bat.

I will pretty much pull a set of carbs, clean them fully, do a valve job, chang the oil, inspect all the rubber and orings, auto change some orings (like the engine boot orings) etc... on any kat that comes into my pesonal garage. That process generally has greatly reduced my frustration of trying to find a specific "problem" by just making everything "right" to start with. While each step has it's own very specific things to look for, I've found that many times new to me bikes show up with many more than just 1 or 2 issues. And sometimes they contribute to each other making it harder to really narrow down "just one".

Krey

[sonosam]

This was definitely a learning process. I had never done any work on a carb'd vehicle before, so the learning curve was pretty flat (steep curves mean it's easy, look it up). If I were to buy a bike from someone, I would most definitely give it an overhaul. This was my bike that I just put away for winter (deployment) and came back to find multiple things f'd up. Now that I have done this once, I am definitely more confident in my mechanic ability. It was also a pretty good feeling of accomplishment after 3 months and the wife nagging to get her car back.

[Wild-Bill]

...the learning curve was pretty flat (steep curves mean it's easy, look it up)...

A learning curve doesn't have anything to do with difficulty of learning. It has to do with time versus knowledge. A steep learning curve simply means that knowledge has increased in a short period of time. There's no indication of whether it was easy or difficult (which will depend on the student) although it's generally accepted that it's harder to learn a given amount of information in a short period of time than over a longer one.

Statements like what you apparently found on stackoverflow.com are what you get when a pretentious math major tries to show off how superior they are to a bunch of mere teachers. It's similar to my dad, the lawyer telling me how military members really talk.

Glad your baby's running again.

[sonosam]

I only use stackoverflow.com if I am having a problem with programming... A learning curve can have everything to do with difficulty if you look at it a certain way. Math has everything to do with it, so I would guess that math major to be somewhat correct. Looking at it having a horizontal asymptote of 0 (0 being a maximum in this case) a person would start in the negatives (with little or no knowledge) thus picking up the subject quickly as they gained new knowledge. As the curve approaches (but never touches) 0 the amount of new knowledge gained decreases and it is harder to learn new things about the subject (either they are already known or undiscovered, science can be a prime example here). The level of actual knowledge never decreases, but gradually slows evermore as you approach 0.

If your dad was a lawyer in the military, then he very well may know how military members really talk

I am glad my bike's running again too.

[Wild-Bill]

The problem is that the learning curve everyone likes talking about isn't a mathematical construct. It's a graphical illustration meant to describe progress of learning and how basic facts can take a long time to learn but eventually you reach a point where background information begins to form the basis for new concepts. It may look like math applies but it doesn't. It's not math.

...and here, if it makes you feel better:
It's similar to my dad, the lawyer who's never been in the military or I'd have referred to him as a legal officer and would also have never used as an example of someone who doesn't know much of anything about a subject but thinks they do telling me after I've spent 23 1/2 years in the freakin' military how military members really talk.

Happy?

[sonosam]

I am almost never happy, and I got what you were saying about your dad. I just like stirring the pot.

[sonosam]

Alright, so I don't want to make a new thread for the same bike so here goes. Started putting the throttle cables back on today because I got a half day at work (surprise). Read the manual first to make sure I was doing it properly. The opening cable is fine, 2-4mm of free play and no need to adjust at the bar. The closing cable is giving me problems.

If I tighten the cable to where it is somewhat taught at the carb, the throttle doesn't close. This doesn't seem right to me. If I loosen it to where there is some visible slack, the throttle snaps back like it is supposed to. Hook up the gas tank and get the bike started and warmed up, crack the throttle and the rpms do something that seems funny as well (I haven't ridden the bike in over a year now so it may just be bad memory here). When I let go of the throttle it snaps back, the butterfly actuator (couldn't think of a better name for the piece in the center of carb 2 and 3 that the cables work) seems to snap fully closed as well, but the rpms seem to drop rather slowly and sort of hang at 2k. I got it to where if I rev it above 7k it'll drop rpms quickly down to 2k and then hang for a fraction of a second before dropping to idle.

Is this just the cable needing to be lubed? (I did try to lube them, but I don't have a cable luber and couldn't get the hose to the lube down the tube. Sprayed some anyway, but it didn't come out the other end)

TL;DR Closing throttle cable seems to gum up for some reason and the rpms are somewhat funny. Any unique ways to lube the cables without a cable luber?