Cold Start The Movie

[GSLou]

OK,

I'm getting ready to rebuild the carbs and adjust the valves on my 1983 GS550E. I've studied all the on-line info (Thanks!).

The bike can be a little sluggish at low speed/rpm. Also, on a cold start I have to have the choke fully on. The engine will start to idle at something less than 1000 rpm and slowly rise over 45 second or a minute to 4000 rpm. Is this normal or can I expect better behavior after the carb cleaning?

Here's a link to a video of the cold start if you want to see/hear for yourself.

http://youtu.be/gUCP-gVfu0M

Thanks

[Bonehead]

How far out are your pilot air/fuel mixture screws? Also, you should rebuild the carbs and adjust the valves before trying to fix anything. If you are trying to dial in the idle before cleaning and adjusting, you may as well be chasing your tail.

Too much fuel and the mixture will be too rich. Characteristics of a rich condition are an inability to stay at the pre-set idle level, dropping off of idle level and dying at idle. If the bike starts to die at idle after a few miles, a too-rich idle mixture may be fouling the plugs. You may even be able to start the engine cold without using the choke.

[BigD_83]

Seems like a fairly normal startup, besides the stalling out. Maybe your main idle adjuster is set too low?

Does the idle improve if you nurse it through start with the throttle, and it warms up?

I also noticed your fuel gauge is really low. Do you have the petcock on RES? It sounds like it is running out of gas at the end...

[Steve]

LOVELY start-up.

Personally, I try to keep cold engine revs down below 2000, yours did that perfectly.

The "choke" control has more than two positions (ON and OFF). What happens if you slowly move the control toward OFF as the engine speed rises? It is common for the engine speed to rise as it starts to warm up, you need to follow that by removing some of the "choke" to keep the speed down.

One other problem is that your idle speed might be set too low. According to your service manual, it should be between 1000 and 1200 RPM.

Also, as BigD mentioned, it's possible that you are simply running out of gas.

Back to your original question, though, a cleaning might improve that a bit, although it already seems rather good. If you do a full "strip and dip" cleaning, which will include new o-rings and gaskets, you will at least KNOW that your carbs will be in the best-possible condition.

Have you adjusted the valves? Because the bike started very easily, I would not suspect them of being too tight, but you won't really know until you open it up and actually check them.

.

[tkent02]

That's about how they start. Reduce the choke as it warms up, when it's warm enough to take throttle without quitting, ride away gently. After you go a block or three, turn the choke all the way off. Once it's warmed up, wind the snot out of it, the 550 are not intended to have any low end grunt…

You have adjusted the valves and done all of the other routine maintenance?

[GSLou]

Thanks for listening/watching the video.

Yes the fuel cock was set to reserve. I was trying to empty the tank a little before doing any maintainance.

The PO had the carbs rebuilt, but I don't know if it was the full tear-down and dip. The aluminum plugs over the adjustment screws have been replaced with something that looks like dark gray caulking. So I assume these have been adjusted if not removed.

OK, botttom line is that my start up and idle sound fine to your much more experienced ears. I really appreciate your listening because I can keep riding while it's still warm and postpone the maintainence until the snow comes.

[chuck hahn]

Hope its something like grey RTV and not JB Weld