Do all mc's ever made have carb issues?

[gundi]

It seems carb problems affect many owners on this forum. Are these issues common to other makes of motorcycles? The first ten years I owned my XJ1100 I never did anything for winter storage. Around 1995 southeastern Wisconsin changed to a different blend of gasoline to reduce pollution. Since then I have trouble every spring. My use of this bike been reduced to less that 100 miles a year which does not help. All four carbs were cleaned in 2004 or 2005 by a Yamaha dealer who stated that the gasoline was part of the problem. Yesterday I started my bike, but I don't give it much hope for use this year. Motorcycles should not be this much trouble. I cannot believe that all the Harley owners in town here have problems like this. Maybe they have fuel injection. Anyway, could someone answer my question at the top of this post. Thanks.

[Lunatic]

You pretty much figured it out. First the fuel has gotten very unstable and goes bad fast, second, it doesn't get the chance to go bad if you ride the bike enough to keep the fuel flowing through it. BUt if for whaever reason you can't burn the fuel through the engine, then you can at least slow the 'stanking' of the fuel by adding Sta-Bil. or another brand of fuel stabilizer. Best thing for your bike though is to ride the darned thing,. It keeps ALL sorts of parts from going bad, not just the carbs.
For the record, all brands of bikes have this issue, not jsut yamaha, or HD or any other. (Except Bultaco, they're exempt of course)

[TopCatGr58]

Carb TuneUp in a can!!

Hey Gundi,

Welcome to Carb Hell!

Carbs in general are a little more prone to problems, but EFI can have problems with clogged injectors and such, hence the need to put in Injector Cleaner every so often!!!

SO....get ye to the local WALMART, yeap, they NOW carry SeaFoam, in the auto section. Suggested method is to run the bike very low on fuel, or EMPTY out the old fuel, and then put 1/2 a can of SeaFoam in tank, add just 1 gallon of FRESH fuel, and start it up, run it for 5-10 minutes, then turn it off, let it sit over night. Start it up again, run it out, then put the 1/2 can of SeaFoam in, with a full tank, and run that thru, and you should notice a considerable improvement in performance, throttle response, etc!!!

BTW, gas...if you are using REGULAR, looses about 1 octane point a month when stored, so if 87 regular, after 6-8 months storage can drop to below 80...which I believe IIRC reading that it was below usable/burnable octane level! Putting in Seafoam before storing, or other aforementioned fuel stabilizer will help prevent the octane drop, and keep the varnish and gum from forming inside the carbs, so that it will run properly the next spring!
T.C.

[TADracer]

Yep, carbs can be trouble and yep, FI can be trouble also. The trouble just manifests itself in different manners, thats all. Stale gasoline is a problem for any fuel delivery system. You must keep fresh fuel in your tank somehow. The HD guys may be able to get away with less tuning and maintenance because their two-lung machines share one carb. We have to deal with four but the level of performance is worth it.

Down here in southern Louisiana I do not have the need to winterize. But during the colder months when I ride less than normal (or not at all) I keep the battery on a maintainer and a full tank without any stabilizer. Keeping the tank full makes moisture less prone to enter the tank and gives less surface area for air to degrade the fuel. I do go out once a week and start the machine and get it up to operating temp, put it in gear on the center stand and let everything rotate for awhile. I know this may not be very easy to do in the more northern climates.

In Spring each year I break out a can of Gunk engine cleaner and a bucket with some car wash and remove the winters crud. The I change fluids (including the brake fluid), do a normal tune-up that includes carb sync, timing, checking cam chain, plugs, air cleaners and all those other little checks and adjustments you should do normally and a bit of wax and polish too.

But the net result is that my bike always starts, runs well, pretty much stays in tune and I rarely have to take my carbs off of the bike for cleaning. On the average I would say I remove the carb rack maybe once every three years or so and only have to spray everything out with a can or two of carb celaner. When I do I never, never change an adjustment while doing a cleaning.

Works for me....OK, I ready for my scolding from all the triple clean guys.

[fredintoon]

Hi Gundi,
yes they do. The XS11 has 8 times the carb troubles of my BSA because it's got four carbs instead of one and the CV carbs are twice as complicated as an Amal.
That said, it's the low mileage plus the crap modern gas that's doing it. You can either run the bike a lot more frequently to keep it in fresh gas all the time or completely drain the tank & carbs between runs. Or, of course, keep cleaning the carbs.

[planedick]

FI

Driving a GMC now and Chev before and because I drive a lot I found that GMC and Chev wants to change the injectors at 100,000 mi because the new fuel additives destroy them. They are doing it for free even...

[Crazcnuk]

I've had a dozen or so bikes, and as many cars and the XS is the first one that had any carb problems at all.

Although, after 10 years, the Holley 850 on my Monte is getting close to needing a look at.

[egsols]

I think a lot of the problems stem from intermittent use. The carbs usually don't present problems until they have sat for a while. I have also noticed a lot of people fiddling with carbs, on all sorts of machines, before doing a proper trouble shoot.

One of my neighbours had a snow blower that was having trouble starting and when it did it was running rough. The first thing he did was to fiddle with the screws on the carb. I asked him if he had checked the air cleaner. I stood there for about five minutes watching him search for a non-existent air cleaner. (BTW he needed to replace the 10 year old spark plug)

If a guy doesn't know anything about a machine why would he even attempt to play with the carb?

I think that's where many problems begin!

[Yamanatic]

Welcome to YamaHell! In the early 1980's, ALL Yamaha's had carb problems right from the factory. The engineers, in all their wisdom, came up with a new preservative that went into the new bikes before crating & shipment; it was green, and turned into glue almost instantly. As a tech at a busy Yamadealer at the time, I cleaned 100's of carbs plagued by this issue.

The yamasnot coated the insides of every passage and jet, and it was a fully warranteed repair, but was almost impossible to remove entirely. It was trichlor resistant, and normal soaking was mostly ineffective. Yamaha even developed their own chemical remover which worked fairly well, but still necessitated each and every nozzle, needle, jet and passage to be manually scraped, poked, and scrubbed. I went through at least 10 sets of jet drills and pulled apart the same number of wire brushes to make tools to poke out passages.

Sadly, the cleaner Yamaha came up with was extremely caustic, and destroyed skin slowly, but effectively. The skin on my thumb and index fingertips started falling off several weeks into the use of the new solvent, and to this day the damage has never completely resolved. I have spoken to a few other nechanics from this era with similar experiences.

The preservative was used during the 1982/1983 manufacture, and to this day these seem to be the years most plagued with crap idling and jetting issues. I avoid side jobs involving these particular years, and found the problems especially chronic with the 550/650/750 engines due to the dimunitive dimensions of the passage ways and unaccessable orifices.

If you ever see a light grass green varnish coating floats, bowls, and sundries on these years, it is the preservative that has endured 25 years of cleaning and use. It was very hush-hush at the time, and made for a lot of unhappy customers and mechanics alike. Anyone else been there?

Cheers,
Yamanatic

[Axel]

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