Adjusting Idle Mixture

[OldVet66]

What rapidray said. Order your O-rings while you are soaking the carburetors.

[cowboyup3371]

You can not properly clean them if they are still ganged together.

[Badooka]

Make sure you use the proper size screw driver as mentioned in Nessism's tutorial.
Go slow and do it right. Put plenty of pressure on those brass jets when removing or you will strip them. Follow the steps and you will be fine. Take notes while doing it- because you will forget things. Stop working when you get fatigued.

[Chris P]

Ok so the carbs are back out, and ill begin to disassemble and soak them in carb cleaner this week. I took the boots off and these are what the gaskets look like, no visible cracks in the gaskets and NO cracks or wear in the boots themselves, ill probably order new gaskets anyways bc they are rather cheap. While I have all this apart, Is there anything else I should take care of while this area is open? I removed the air box in order to clean it up a bit, any suggestions on that?

[rapidray]

Just because there are no visible cracks doesn't mean there are no air leaks. If the manifolds are 30+ years old they can be hard & not sealing. Are they hard or still pliable? If it were MINE, it would be getting all new carb orings, new manifold orings & new manifolds. Ray.

[rapidray]

I would also replace the airbox to carb boots if they aren't soft. Ray.

[Chris P]

They are still pliable, when i bought the bike, the guy mentioned he had just changed the boots. Could you point me in a direction of a diagram of the carbs, Im just trying to associate the vocabulary you used earlier with some images of what those pieces look like.

[tom203]

Yeah, replace those boot o-rings- they probably no have longer a round crosssection, i.e. they won't seal well!

Look at this pic -lots of hiding places for goop.( note that the idle/air mixture screw on upper left is not marked.)
Nessism's tutorial spells out the specifics-

[Chris P]

hey ray, I know its been a little while but I finally got around to breaking down the carbs and soaking them and the parts for 24 hours. I pulled out all the "replacement kit" parts and i have installed the originals. I replaced the o-rings on the boots and im getting ready to gang the carbs back together. i have the air/mixture screws turned out 2 turns. I've inspected the air box and it seems pretty well sealed up. Before i put these carbs back into position, is there anything else I should take care of while this space is open? Any other suggestions to get this girl running would be appreciated as well. Starting to get warm in this area and Im getting antsy. Thanks in advance.

[eil]

I'm not Ray but it sounds to me like you're on the right track.

[Chris P]

Thanks eli, Im just sitting down to bench sync them right now. Doing a bit of reading on the forum on the appropriate steps. Have you done this before on yours? Thats probably a dumb question. Im wondering if this is right: Carbs 1,2,4 the butterfly valve is open just enough so I can see the first hole at the top of the inside of the carb. Carb 3, is completely closed. The throttle screw is backed off completely. Does this sound right?

[Ms Mitchell]

Thanks eli, Im just sitting down to bench sync them right now. Doing a bit of reading on the forum on the appropriate steps. Have you done this before on yours? Thats probably a dumb question. Im wondering if this is right: Carbs 1,2,4 the butterfly valve is open just enough so I can see the first hole at the top of the inside of the carb. Carb 3, is completely closed. The throttle screw is backed off completely. Does this sound right?

Did you get her running good? Im in the process myself of deep cleaning my carbs.

[Chris P]

Honestly, No. The carbs are clean as a whistle and soaking them each for 24hrs was without a doubt the way to go. Ive replaced the seals around the engine boots as well. Im starting to think the bike doesnt like me. She still will not start up right away. She eventually gets going and when I begin to do the adjustments she usually stalls out. I think the next thing im going to do is adjust the valve shims. If that doesnt work, you'll see another post on the forum for more help, and knowing the people that are on here, Im sure to get some. Good luck with your carb rebuild and I hope you have better like than I do.
Cheers

[JTGS850GL]

Adjust the valves first before you waste time trying to get it running right. GS's are very sensitive to valve adjustment and will not run correctly if any of the valves are too tight.

After that, you should have read this:

CV carb rebuild tutorial

If you didn't do it EXACTLY per the manual then rebuild the carbs again. Make sure you adjusted the float heights correctly without the float gaskets in place using an accurate gauge.

Second, you didn't do the bench sync correctly. You need to adjust carb #3 using the idle adjustment screw just enough that a paper clip will slide through with just a slight amount of drag. Then adjust carbs 1,2 and 4 to match #3.

Once started, you need to allow it to warm up. Once warmed up, you need to do a proper vacuum sync using a 4 carb sync tool. Adjust the idle to around 1500 to 2000 RPMs when doing the sync with the choke off. After the sync, adjust the idle to around 1100 RPMs.

All of this should be done with the air filter in place and the airbox all sealed up.

[Chris P]

Thanks for the to do list. Im looking into the valves shortly, was wondering if i should purchase the "real gasket" or the stock cardboard one, also do you think its a good idea to order new half moons (dont know the actually term for these but thats what they look like)?