I'd rather be riding

[James Keefover]

I don't have much to offer but I have been through this a couple of months
ago and I sympathize.  A couple things..  It's really hard to do with one
set of hands (my hands anyway), have someone help from the other side.  Put
a film of oil on the mating surfaces of the boots and carbs so they slide
into each other more easily (there's probably something better to use than
oil).  Don't slide the carbs down the boots on the engine side as far as
they will go, it's hard to get the airbox boot on after that.  Don't tighten
anything until everything is in place.  And finally if you have a tool to
reach down in between the middle carbs to "unfold" the boots where they flop
over it helps.  A long flat screwdriver with the end bent 90 degrees works.

James

-----Original Message-----
From: Bill M. [mailto:willm97 at znet.com] 
Sent: Monday, June 11, 2007 1:43 AM
To: GPzList
Subject: I'd rather be riding

Fellow Motorcycle Enthusiasts

I haven't been riding too much lately, but when I did the bike just refused 
to idle properly.
Well it got so bad that the bike would just die at idle. It ran really great

otherwise.

I figured that my lack of riding had let the gas clog up the passages in the

idle circuit.
Based on others accounts I got some of this Seafoam stuff to hopefully clean

them out.
Well, you can probably guess that since I am writing this it didn't work.

So I checked into cost of having someone other than me clean them. $300 
seemed way
more than reasonable. So right now I have on my bench what I hoped I would 
never see there-
all my carbs.

Prior to pulling them I drained the bowls into a jar. There were little 
silvery flakes in the gas.
I do have a filter in the line.
I pulled the top and bottom from one of the carbs and everything really 
looks pretty clean.
No sticky varnish like I expected. The vacuum diaphram looks OK. The pilot 
jet's tiny central
hole was a little dirty, but not plugged.

So here's the plan- I hope to not have to disassemble the whole assembly.
I am going to pull out the jets and diaphrams and blow carb cleaner through 
all of the passages
and make sure everything is clear. I think this will fix the problem.

Then the part I am dreading- putting the carbs back in. It was a royal pain 
getting them out.
Any advice before I start (and have to resort to saying bad words and 
stomping around)?
I'm most worried about getting the aircleaner boots back on properly.

SoCal Bill
95 not-so-fast at the moment GPZ