Plug #4 carbon fouled

[Ktoups]

My 82 xj1100's #4 plug is carbon fouled and it has an an annoying
noise coming from behind me. Think its the exhaust and not SWMBO. At 4000 rpm it has a persistent pop, I can throttle up and it will stop or down to 3500 rpm and it will stop. Pulled the carb apart to change the setting on the needle and noticed it is a fixed needle. Is there anyway to lean this carb at the midrange setting, seems to be allright at idle and WOT. Could a weak spark cause this. Thanks for any help..

[steelcat]

Check the float level, all 4 need to be very close. Half a milimeter makes a difference. Weak spark could also cause this type of problem. I'd also run a compression test & adjust the valve clearance. Also make sure that the carb boots are good & sealing properly. If you still have a problem, you are getting into jetting issues. Stay away from off brands of carb jets! Many off brands are not marked correctly. The noise (pop) you are hearing is the #4 not firing right. My bike was doing the same thing, it took a bit of work to get it to run right. It's biggest problems were dirty carbs (trible clean +), carb boots & valve shims. Runs good now.

[randy]

Ktoups,

The outboard plug caps are notorious for corrosion from water. The caps screw onto the wire ends. Unscrew the plug cap from #4 and clip about 1/4 inch off the wire. Then screw the cap back on. Make sure the screw terminal bites into the metal wire in the center of the plug wire.

HTH

Randy

[chevy45412001]

ktoups

Abike mech gave me theese really samall (did i say REALLY SMALL) lock washers. They fit the needel perfectly. Hadd to flatten them with pliers first. Then installed them under the needel and put every thing back together. They helped quite a bit in the mid range.Sorry i do not know the exact size they are by number. But they were very tiny. Like less then a 6,probly like a 1 or 0 if 0 is small. (i'm using the 8x32, or 10x32 measureing system here, ok i'll shut up now)

[randy]

To lean out the midrange mixture you'll have to LOWER the needle, not raise it. Fouling is a symptom of too- rich or misfiring.

Randy

[Ktoups]

Thanks for the help. The #4 plug wire was loose. Cleaned the carbs, cut the wire and reinstalled the plug cap, and replaced the exhaust gaskets. One of the three did the trick. I have got a lot of info from this site while rebuilding the XJ, got it running great now and with a little more polishing time I'll be finished. This is what I have so far.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4.../XJ1100/zg.jpg

[mitch]

Very nice XJ

Hey Koups nice job , What are the bars off of, and the fenders look good, did u do the paint. Ed Conley put a brushed aluminum cover he cut to fit over that triangle where your rear master cyl is and it looked really nice if you want to cover that up . It will match your side cover. Glad you eound your trouble great looking XJ .............MITCH

[Ktoups]

The bars and the fenders are off a VSTAR. The controls were off a Harley....it hurt to put a harley part on this bike ,,but I like the chrome look. I like the idea of covering up the rear brake cylinder.

Yes I did the paint myself, used house of Kolor paints. Thinking about putting pod filters instead of the stock air box. I like Ebay....
if you search long enough you can find stuff cheap.

All opions and suggestions welcome ...good or bad..
Here is another pic....I'm new at this posting pic stuff

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v485/ktoups/zh.jpg

[pathfinder]

Very nice looking ride. I'm doing a complete restore on a 78E right now but I just started.

[prometheus578]

I don't think that you had a problem with your bike at all. You just needed an excuse to post photos of your bike! Did you paint your carbs? Looks sharp.

[TopCatGr58]

Hey there Ktoups,

Very nice looking XJ, a bit retro on the fenders, especially the rear, that older Indian style, but great custom paint job!!

You've almost got the photo thing right, but instead of putting in in the message as an HTML link, use the IMG button, for Image, and then paste the link inside the popup window, and it should then display directly in the message, like this one of your last picture!! Recommend you resize your pictures to around 640x480, otherwise, when they're displayed, it causes US to side scroll to see the whole picture as well as any text, cause the message window gets formatted to the size of the picture, and the text then wraps to that size, a bit of a pain! And once 1 picture is oversized, it affects ALL the messages that come after it, even if there isn't any pictures posted in them!!

[Ktoups]

Thanks TopCatGr58...knew there was a better way to post pics, just didn't know how to do it.

Yes I painted the carbs and valve cover. Hope it holds up to the high temps, didn't have high temp paint in that color. Put about 300 miles on it since painting...so far so good.

Next problem is to find aftermarket fork oil seals that actually seal

[randy]

I got my fork seals from parts n more. Good price, good fit. No problems.

Randy