Subject: RE: NOW we're cookin' !(Lannis' Carbs)
Author: Lannis
Date: Mar 27, 2004, 8:24 PM
Post ID: 1716415857
Joe, and all who offered advice - Turns out it was ME and attention to detail and my own sloppy shop practice that was the problem, > |
| I got the following advice from the list: 1) Clean the float bowls. 2) Clean the pilot jets and pilot circuits. 3) Clean the accelerator pump 4) Make sure the accelerator pump is in the right way. 5) Make sure the floats are floating and sealing. 6) Make sure there's slack in the choke cables. 7) Make sure it's got the right jets in it. 8) Make sure the needles are in the right slots 9) Make sure the gas is fresh. 10) Make sure the tank is vented and fuel is flowing. 11) Check the battery for 12.7 volts. 12) Check to be sure the points have 12.7 volts and ground. 13) Make sure the ignition timing is right. 14) Make sure it's got good compression. 15) Make sure the valve clearances are right. 16) Make sure there's no vacuum leak at the carb mounts 17) Make sure the plugs are clean. 18) Make sure of the .016 point gap 19) Check the plug wires and caps and make sure they're right. 20) Check the points for arcing and the distributor cap for arcing. 21) Make sure the spark is hot and white. Anybody want to guess which one it was? Lannis |
When I got the bike, it had half a tank of gas in it, left over from
whenever the last owner put it in lo these many years ago.
I drained it out immediately, being intelligent and knowledgable about
the possible effect of old gasoline on an engine.
The dumb part was that when I drained it out (checking the reserve
capacity at the same time), I drained it into a regular gas can.
Several weeks later, after I'd done a few housekeeping things on the
bike, I was looking to fire it up, realized the tank was empty, found a
can of gas that had just the right amount of gas in it, and (you guessed
it) poured the old gas right back into the tank. "Yes officer, of
COURSE it's got fresh gas in it. I just poured it in last week".
So of course when the engine tried to burn this stuff, it acted like it
didn't have enough fuel to burn (which it didn't since most of the
burnable part of the liquid running through the jets had evaporated away
in the past months).
Drained the tank and float bowls this A.M., filled it with gas straight
from the pump, and put 100 lovely miles on it this evening. It runs
very well and the folks who told me last year, after hearing me describe
my riding style, that I would like an Eldorado were exactly right.
I need to make a pair of rear footpeg mounts (no such thing on the
Police model with rear crashbar), and need to find a pair of baffles for
the Police mufflers (probably have to adapt something from a Jap bike),
and some general fooling around with it, but it's going to be on the
road on a regular basis now.
Thanks for the help, all. It wasn't completely wasted; I learned a lot
about my carbs, how to set the timing, how the distributor works, etc.
And my case can be a word of warning to those who haven't thought about
how long that gas has been in the tank or what you do with it when it
gets old.....
Where do you dispose of old gas, anyway? I dump old engine oil by the
5-gallon can every other month into the disposal tank at my auto parts
store, but I'll be they won't take gas. And which can did I put that in
this time.....?
Lannis