Where do I spray the ether?

[Guest]

1978 gs550
Hi where do I spray the ether? The air intake box doesn't seem to have any openings. It has always started in the past but hard to start when cold.
New user here and this looks like a great forum
thx

[bonanzadave]

Prepare to be scolded for owning a can of ether. Thats a band aide at best for a deeper issue. Check the voltage at your coils. Should be a solid 12vdc or better.

Oh....and welcome to the GSRs.

[tkent02]

Spray it in the garbage, use it as a cleaning solvent, kill bugs with it, make pipe bombs, start you old POS GM car, anesthetize your pets, or practice your homemade pyrotechnics, just don't use it to start a motorcycle.

[JEEPRUSTY]

Useless response that in no way helpful to the OP.
Is there no snorkel under the seat on this tear range of 550s? Ether is a fully acceptable tool to use when testing to see if an engine will fire.

[tkent02]

Sure there's a snorkel, which anyone with a 550 sees every time he opens the seat. Stupid question gets stupid answer.

[cowboyup3371]

Adjust your valves and you'll remove some of the starting problems

[eil]

OP, it seems you've stirred the hornet's nest a bit with your first post here. No biggie, let's see if we can get you pointed in the right direction.

Common wisdom around here is that if a bike doesn't start with fresh gas and some choke, then there's a problem. To fix the problem, you have to get caught up on your maintenance. If this bike is new to you, you need to assume it has had zero maintenance (because it probably has) since it was rolled off the showroom floor. This is a short list of just some of the things your bike probably needs:

* clean the carbs
* adjust the valves
* clean all electrical connections
* possibly a new battery
* check the charging system
* replace all fluids

And those are just what you need to get it to run right, if there are no other problems. To ride it safely, you also need to look into rebuilding the brake systems, mount some new tires, maybe swap some bearings, and so on. Yeah, there's a lot to do, but luckily you've joined the right forum and we have all the information you need to do all of these things yourself. See the link in my signature for BassCliff's mega-welcome which has links to factory service manuals, tutorial, and loads of other info.

Finally, don't hesitate to ask questions but in the future, you might consider searching the forum to make sure your question hasn't been asked already.

Welcome!