what did you wrench on today??

[themess]

Seems to me that tall pickups are usually that way for style. If it clears the pavement/ground, and suspension doesn't bottom out, it is high enough.

[Sandy]

Spent a bunch of hours today working on my POS Ford Windstar. Needed upper and lower intake manifold gaskets replaced because of a lean code it's been throwing of and on for the last year or so. Hope that fixed it, what a PITA. Then the fun stuff, replaced chain, sprockets and rear wheel bearing on the 750. I don't spend much time in the shop these days but today was a big one. Feels good to get a couple of deferred jobs out of the way. Next up is the needle that fell off the oil temp gauge on my last ride. I have a spare gauge but it's a bit of chore to get at. Pull the fairing, pull the gauges and completely disassemble them, guess I shouldn't be so picky.

[steve murdoch]

Changing points plate, coils and condenser on the SuperHawk...again.
Electrics are my Kryptonite.
The inconsistent stumbling WILL be solved.

[Burque73]

Changing points plate, coils and condenser on the SuperHawk...again.
Electrics are my Kryptonite.
The inconsistent stumbling WILL be solved.

What a cool bike!

Your work space reminds me of my previous vocation. I refinished hardwood floors for years. One floor was trashed from a mechanic who built bikes in the living room, seemingly dragging heavy parts around leaving deep gouges in the floor and oil stains everywhere. It actually sanded out! A 12" Clark drum sander with 16 grit paper got rid of the mess. Three more cuts with progressively finer paper and three coats of oil modified polyurethane made the floor good as new!

Looks like each of your babies are snug as a bug on a rug though!

[cowboyup3371]

Adjusted the rear brake pedal and light switch on Charmayne's bike tonight

[Guest]

Just posted this same info on a thread that I started a few weeks ago about the high idle on my '81 GS850G. I had spent a lot of time and money trying to get my carbs to act right, and nothing helped. I was getting pretty frustrated. With that in mind.....

Woo hoo!!!!! I found the problem! Apparently, all four of the throttle butterflies have to be perfectly flat. After a vintage bike mechanic in Austin, TX ("Chris" at Limey Bikes) told me that before you bench sync your carbs, you need to make sure all four are able to make a perfect seal around their perimeter - at the same time. When Charles (from Ypsilanti) was here a few weeks ago and we were inspecting the carbs, we noticed the the #3 had a few dings on the edge, so I filed those down gently and made the edge as smooth as I could, but I did not remove the valve from the carb so that I could inspect it closely. So a few nights ago I pulled the carbs - again - and did a really close inspection to see how well they valves were able to seal; #1, #2 and #4 were perfect, but the bottom of #3 showed a fair amount of light through it. So I removed the valve from the shaft so I could see it from the edge, and sure enough, it was a bit "potato ship-y" around the edge, and there was evidence of having been mistreated by a PO. Luckily I had another one on the way from Ebay and installed it tonight. Eureka! Charles has graciously loaned me his CarbTune Pro, and I've got the four cylinders close, but I suspect there's still room for improvement.

I'm convinced that this is a really unusual situation. I mean, how many people run across a warped butterfly valve? So along with all the great advice about checking for vacuum leaks, too-tight throttle and choke cables, etc, be sure to check your butterfly valves for flatness! Hope this helps someone.....

[Redman]

J.............
Woo hoo!!!!! I found the problem! .....

Good. Great.

.

[jjbmxer]

I took luggage and a vetter windjamer with lowers off my gs1000.

[steve murdoch]

I took luggage and a vetter windjamer with lowers off my gs1000.

Just for fun you should put all that stuff on a scale.
Hopefully the p.o. install beefier fork internals.

[wymple]

Put fork seals in an XS1100, cleaned & reassembled one caliper that was sticky. Put a rear tire on my GS850G, and pulled the rear wheel off the XS so we can put a tire on it. Put timing belts on the 77 Goldwing. Enough for awhile.

[Guest]

I've been learning a LOT about the finer details of the carbs on my 850. Last week I resolved the high idle issue by installing a new un-bent throttle butterfly on the #3 carb (apparently these bikes don't like potato chip-shaped butterfly valves). Then the #3 cylinder wouldn't fire for the first 3 or 4 minutes after I started the bike. After studying an animated graphic on Youtube, I realized that at low RPMs, the engine is running solely on the pilot circuit, so I checked everything in that circuit and low and behold, discovered the choke pickup tube was clogged. Several good blasts from both ends with carb cleaner got it cleaned out nicely (I cleaned the other three while I had the carbs off as well - just in case). After my first improperly performed bench sync yielded horrible results, I redid it, then used another member's Carbtune Pro to balance them, and have finally gotten the bike to idle reliably at 1100 RPM. So right now, the bike still sputters and backfires a bit, so I'll install new plugs next and see if that fixes the problem.

Also, after comparing the brass adapter tubes for the Carbtune (which have rubber o-rings) to the hex screws in the vacuum ports on the intake boots (which did NOT have o-rings), I realized that may have been a source of a vacuum leak. After consulting the parts fiche online, I learned that there is indeed supposed to be a gasket on those screws, so I added them.

For those who may be interested in the Youtube video mentioned above, here is the link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wyspAHrMbb8

[chuck hahn]

A timing light on the #1 and #2 plug wires will also show if there is continuous uninterupted spark. I do this all the time just to visually see the sparking pattern the coil is sending out. Nice and steady then fine. But if it stammers a bit its time to look for loose or bad connections and on bikes with points its time to check their conditions and the gaps.

[jjbmxer]

I polished some chrome and stuck some off the electrical stuff back on her as some po had removed it.

[Carter Turk]

Went to the local Restore to find some metal light fixtures, to see if I could fabiricate some sort of convex collector inside the can of a Yosh Series I.
It was just a large outlet baffle inside can with nothing leading to baffle and super loud.
Amazingly, the narrow part of collar on the light fixture was a perfect snug fit around the baffle.
Cut two metal light fixtures with tin snips to fit inside and send gases thru the baffle and support it from the front end.
Pipe is still too loud, but may have quelled the noise a tad.
Went for a 100 mile ride and the low rpm hesistation/burble seemed minimized.

[Sandy]

Starting to work through the remaining parts I have for the 750 and got around to swapping in a new set of black covered stainless steel brake lines and did the caliper seals at the same time. Brakes feel real good now, now to do the GS1000.