Hard to start, poor idle?

[Dennyz]

My 'F' has always been very easy to start and smooth idler. After a long ride, that all changed. It was a real pain to start and ran rough until warmed up. It got so bad, I would wear the battery down, cranking,

I did the carb tear down (a couple of time), but nothing seemed to help. In the mean time all the cranking took the battery out. It would no longer take a charge.

With a big ride coming up, I desided to take another stab at the carbs. Before I could do anything I had to pick up a new battery. Installed the new battery and Surprise! the problem was gone.

The whole time I was fussing with carbs, a bad battery was the problem. In hind sight it makes sense. The charging system does not start putting out until around 2k RPM. Until, then the battery has to be able to support the motors electronics.

A bad battery will drive you nut!

[webbcraft2150]

You might want to check this out. I have had one on my bike for a couple of years now. Actually saved my butt a few weeks ago when my battery quit taking a charge. I mounted mine to the front master cylinder. Kuryakyn Led Battery Gauge, chase it down on the web.

[Ken Talbot]

Good observation there, Denny. Sometimes the obvious answer is not so obvious....

[Czekus21]

Good info. Makes sense. With the symptoms, I too would have guessed the carbs.

[prometheus578]

"Denny'z gettin' cranky!"

I run into this quite often.

. It got so bad, I would wear the battery down, cranking,

When crankin', it's got to spin fast enough to move a good volume of air through the carbs at sufficient speed to draw fuel. It may sound like it's spinnin' fast enough... but hook a booster battery to it and it fires right up.

[Geezer]

The starter jet has a brass tube that extends down into a hole in the floatbowl. There is a little hole in the floatbow that feeds gas to the starter jet. This hole in the floatbowl is often over looked when cleaning carbs.

I don't know if this is your problem but it doesn't hurt to check.

Geezer