Carb help, please.

[Tal/IL]

I got an '82 GS300L for my son's first bike. The PO said he had been riding it the day before, but we couldn't get it to start. He offered to get it going if we wanted to pick it up later, but I offered to take it "as is" for less cash, and we did. After getting it home, we tinkered with it and it would fire and run (not race) for a couple of seconds then die.

I'm not much on carb work, so my neighbor pulled the carbs off and cleaned them for me. After re-installing, we rode it around and decided all it needed was some minor adjustment and we'd be good to go. The next day it would fire right up, but the engine would race for a couple of seconds and. We couldn't keep it running. After a second cleaning of the carbs - dipped and soaked this time - the same thing. It seemed good when reassebled, but engine races and dies the next day.

Any suggestions? We are taking the carbs off for the 3rd time now.

[rapidray]

Is the gas in the tank, you are using to refill the carbs each time, OLD gas? If so, start there. Ray.

[Tal/IL]

Tank and lines have been drained and are clean.

[rapidray]

Time to pull the carbs & go through them! It is EASY to do & you will find LOTS of info here if you do a search. If you want help over the phone PM me & I'll call you back to help you. I actually LOVE working on carbs as there aren't any mechanics being trained on anything but fuel injection anymore! Good luck, Ray.

[salty_monk]

Have you replaced the intake boot o rings & the o rings in the carbs & set to spec on floats etc?

https://www.cycleorings.com

[Fishman]

Well to state the obvious, something's happening between the day you finish the carbs and start it up and the next time you try and start the bike. I am not an expert by any means and am cobbling through my gs550 rebuild as best I can. Have you replaced or rebuilt the petcock? You aren't accidentally leaving it on prime, are you? My old petcock was bad and literally dumped a half a tank of gas into the crankcase. If you drain the oil and it smells like gas and there's too much of it, you may have found your problem.

It wouldn't make sense that it would be cracked orings or electrical stuff because that is a constant in all of this. That is not to say you shouldn't take care of all that stuff, just that it doesn't make sense that it would be the cause of a problem one day and not another.