Cylinders end up dry...

[mrbill5491]

I'm taking out the plugs and pouring gas into each cylinder individually. I'm currently running pods and I'm going to be rebuilding the carbs this winter along with rejetting. The choke works fine but there may be an air leak somewhere.

AAAAAAh no, don't do that, get too much fuel in there and you can hydraulic your motor and could crack a piston. Get a backfire and your bike is toast. If anything use a little spray starting fluid to fire your bike up. If your petcock is set to "prime" you have fuel running into the carbs all the time. Hence the smell of gas in your oil. Shut down and pull the petcock now. As for the compression test go ahead and do that, do a dry and a wet test. If that is inconclusive, you might want to do a leak down test as well. A wet test is a couple drops of oil in the cylinder to help seal the rings. Other then that, I wouldn't ride the bike until you got the carbs rebuilt and the petcock fixed.

[Homie]

That makes so much sense! How did you fix your issue?

Aaaaaah, actually I didn't. Here's why. To figure out where the compression problem was I did a Leakdown test on the cylinders. I was hoping that maybe it was the valves and that a valve job would cure the problem. It wasn't. The Leakdown test indicated that it was the rings. So as a minimum, the top-end would have to be disassembled, cylinders checked and honed, pistons checked, and new rings installed. After checking the cost to have that done, I decided that if I was going to tear the top-end apart I might as well put a Wiseco piston kit in it.

But then something happened that I wasn't expecting...

On my way to work I saw a red '83 GS1100E for sale. It had some kind of ugly aftermarket fairing on it, but the lines were unmistakeable and the price was irresistible. So I bought the 1100 and sold the 750 "as is" without fixing the problem. No help with your issue I know. But the symptoms are similar so I would check your compression and if the compression indicates a problem, have a Leakdown test done.

[tom203]

.......The choke works fine but there may be an air leak somewhere.

How do you know? at a cold start with "choke" fully applied, after some cranking, pull two spark plugs- any sign of fuel? I doubt your rings are bad ,but tight valve clearances can cause hard cold starting- have you checked valve clearances?