Lets hope its starts *(it did!)

ok so today i installed all new shims, aligned the cams, put in a new valve cover gasket, new YICS port gasket, put the exhaust back on also with new crush gaskets, put the carbs back on, installed new gaskets for the carb intake boots, hooked up the spark plug wires, and basically reconnected just about everything that goes along with having the head and carbs off the bike! tomorrow i put the tank back on and rehook up the battery and see if i can get it started!

is there anything else that i might want to take note of / check? this is the first time that the bike has been this 'complete' since i first brought it home almost 2 months ago....

 

Re: Lets hope its starts

Wow! Great news man. I'm sure you've been following the steps in the manual right? You might quickly give a brief summary of all that's been done to this point so the advice is accurate w/o having to go back through your old thread.

But a few general things to keep in mind. You want oil up in the head the first time it turns over NEVER totally dry-so you should coat everything up top with fresh oil prior to ever turning it over. Also I would pull the plugs and let the motor spin a bit to prime the pump before attempting a fire up, but only a little as you don't want the valve train turning over a lot before it has a chance to get 'up to temp.' Be sure and prime your fuel good, battery FULLY charged, and hopefully it will start quickly. If so run it only a few moments first and make sure it's pulling oil (the site glass will empty) before letting it get up to temp. Also listen VERY carefully for any strange sounds initially as you can shut down and prevent any more major issues usually.

And this is going to sound CRAZY but after SO much work on a motor I always give it a little verbal encouragement and say what amounts to a little prayer prior to first fire off. Maybe it just makes me feel better about the whole deal.

 

Re: Lets hope its starts

ok so what i have done to the bike (mechanically) to this current point in time...
Cleaned carbs
replaced shims and checked clearences
replaced head (lapped valves and valve seals replaced)
repalced numerous gaskets (head, valve cover, YICS port, o-rings under the head, exhaust, chain tensioner, intake boots)
2 Oil changes and filter
resoldered starter button
new battery
new solenoid
New spark plugs (gapped)
re-alinged cams (according to manual for timing specs)
tested petcock (works)

i put a good coat of oil under the vavle cover on the cams and buckets, and did rotate it a few times to make sure everything still lined up correctly. battery is charged, but might put it on the charger just to make sure. MY bUddy is coming next weekend with his victory and we are really hoping to be able to go for a ride together.

 

Re: Lets hope its starts

Hi Josh; I don't see:

Wet-set float levels.
Bench sync.

You did check the valve clearances AFTER lapping the valves, I hope? Lapping the valves removes metal and will significantly tighten your clearances.

Once it DOES fire up, you'll need to do a running vacuum sync (with YICS blocked) before it will idle down and run right.

Congrats on the progress thus far. Don't rush now that you're almost there.

 

Re: Lets hope its starts

i knew there was more i forgot, yes bench synce and wet set ( i guess i included that in the cleaning in my mind). and yes i checked the clearences after lapping and installing the head and cams

 

Re: Lets hope its starts

Good man. Sounds like we're all up ON this now. The 550s really reward a precision tune, and Mikunis can provide it if you're on your game.

Remember when adjusting henceforth: SMALL adjustments; just tweaks not giant (1/4 turn is HUGE) adjustments. If your bench sync was anywhere near decent, you shouldn't have much touching up to do.

Do your sync with a common "house" fan blowing across the motor and the bike fully warmed up (struggle though a 10-mile ride) and if it starts totally misbehaving after a few minutes it's getting hot. Shut it down, wait a few, go for a ride then repeat.

Oh, and set all your pilots at 3 turns out until it's sync'ed up.

 

Re: Lets hope its starts

hey everyone quick question on the exhaust, the header pipes and brackets should sit tightly against the head correct? Cant quite seem to get them down all the way, is it because of the new gaskets? Dont remember how they were when I took it off

 

Re: Lets hope its starts

The pipes sit tightly against the gaskets; the "collars" will have a bit of a gap to the engine even when tight.

 

Re: Lets hope its starts

ok thanks fitz, then they are on there correctly.

however after getting everything together it still did not turn over, not even a little bit. it did crank but no sings of kicking over. i checked my spark plugs and they are getting spark but it doesnt seem to be the greatest spark, kinda jumpy not a solid arc. i got the battery on the charger now as it was starting to die a bit from the starting attempts and checking the plugs.

 

Re: Lets hope its starts

IT STARTED!!! i went back out after letting the battery charge up a bit and i turned the key not expecting much and it started right up!!!! YES!!!!!

i took a short video (will post it later once it loads), to have some expert ears listen to it, it did kinda strangely start to rev up on its own, i did not touch the throttle at all, you'll see it in the video. i stopped it before it really started going in fear of something going wrong. and is it normal for the back tire to spin a bit when up on the center stand?

 

Re: Lets hope its starts

NIIIIIICE DOOOOOOD!! :lol:

When the motor started revving did you have the "choke" on? As the motor starts to warm up you usually have to back off the choke as the RPMs go up.

 

Re: Lets hope its starts

i did have the choke out all the way, i will have to check that once i get home and have more time to play with it.

im having trouble loading the video to both youtube and photobucket... i guess a :19 second video is to much for my phone to handle, lol. im not sure if it will work because of my settings but here is the link to the video on facebook https://www.facebook.com/#!/photo.php?v ... tif_t=like

 

Re: Lets hope its starts

Yes it is, especially when cold. It's just internal drag in the transmission that causes that and it's perfectly normal.

You may need to back the main idle knob off a tad; when you did the bench sync you did ensure all 4 butterflies could fully close, right?

Congrats. You're getting close now.

 

ok so i just went and started it up again to see if playing with the choke would help it at all. and when i started it up at first it seemed fine ideling right around 12-1500 and i let it do that for a bit just to get the engine used to being run again especially with the new head, wanted to let everything find it "new groove" so to say, and let all the fluids start making their way to where the need to be and such. how ever my choke cable seems to be faulty when i move it to the right the cable just kinda pops out of the holder and doesnt really function because of it, so i put it back to the left. i then gave it a bit on the throttle and it reved fine, but then it started to rev really high (~4500) and stay right around there. i shut it off for a minute and tried playing with the choke a bit but like i said it doesnt really work... I started the bike up again and it went straight to 4500 again, so i shut it off.

Im glad it starting, now i just gotta figure out what is going on. Also i only had it running maybe 2 minutes and the engine was pretty hot, not burn my hand hot but hotter than i imagined ti would be for running such a short time

Also here is the video on youtube of the first start, if you watch the speedometer you can see it start to rise and then you can here it rise on its own after the camera pulls away, then i shut it down. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Y7N3k-ehtI

 

the 1200/1500 was running on two cylinders the the third started running and it went up a little then all of them fired and the idle took off.
if the choke cable comes out a little when it's to the right (choke off) then you know the cable isn't holding the choke on, a little is a good thing

 

Either the choke plungers aren't being fully released or you simply need to back the main idle knob down a bit as it warms up.

 

ok so i fixed the choke cable, it wasnt tightened down around the cable at the carbs, now it seems to work fine. but the bike is still reving really high, played with the main idle screw and the fixed choke but nothing really seemed to make much of a difference. im thinking my carbs might still need some tweaking?? not sure its kinda just a guess.

 

You've probably already seen this, but:

http://xjbikes.com/Forums/viewtopic/t=43179.html

sounds awfully familiar, right? I remember seeing some cracks in your #1 carb-to-engine boot. I can drop by Monday night after work if you're gonna be tinkering.

 

thanks ted i did see that post and thought the same thing, very similar! and i should be around on monday night give me a call to make sure im home.

well today i decided to take the carbs off and recheck everything i had done previously since it had been a while since i worked on them. they need to be re cleaned and will probably do that tmw when i have more time, got a bit dirty sitting off the bike. but i decided to recheck my float levels and some of them were off so i did some adjustments and like where they sit now much better. 1 and 3 were a bit high so now they should be better.

And for those of you who liked my home made valve spring compressor you might also enjoy my version of the carb stand for checking levels. i still need to figure out a temporary fuel 'tank' but for the time being i just hold my actual tank above the carbs on my rack and hook it up.

Start off by securing an extra 2x4 to the studs of my garage, making sure its level. and then with some of the spare boots i had from the extra head, i secured them to the board, again making sure that the carbs are level when attached.


Now the carbs are at a much easier and more accessible height so that i can check the float levels.


Sorry no pictures of me actually checking the levels its hard to hold the tank, hose, screwdriver and camera all at once! lol

but hopefully the adjustments i made to the float levels will help a bit, dont have time to get the carbs back on to test, gotta get ready for work and i got the next 2 days off to mess with it all i want!

 

Great (and very creative) idea on the carb "stand" Josh!

 

I like this carb stand......even better & cheaper & quicker to build than the PVC model....

Thanks for sharing....

I just put mine together in about 5 minutes....except I used my good carb boots.....didnt have spare ones laying around........attach 2 feet of vac line to hook to aux gas tank & vice grips to close off fuel.......ready to put board in vise, quick adjustment to level carbs, & then set floats....

Josh,

great idea & thanks

 

Mine did the exact same thing! rev up on its own, and when you let off the choke it would hardly idle and when you gave it gas, it would shutoff. I have a couple cracks in my intake boots. I temp fixed them with automotive GOOP, and she purrs now!

 

ok so today i finished wet setting the floats, and recleaned the carbs, got it all reassembled and it turned right over (with some help from a battery jump box) but i got a good idle and it sounds awesome, i got another video ill post the link when it loads.

thing is now i have some sorta power drain, i believe it has something to do with the head light because that is not staying on constantly, so im guessing its grounding out somewhere and draining power from the battery. it need the jump box every time even with a newly charged battery.

but i am super pleased with the results! thanks to every one for all your advice and for Ted for lending me all your tools, you can have them back now, lol

FiveofaKind your welcome im glad other people like my creative ideas as well!

 

Thanks for a great idea! I was gonna chuck my old manifolds in the trash.....no more! One carb stand coming up!

 

sure beats the PVC stand.....

 

that is a great idea for a "fuel tank" fiveofakind that is just what i may do!

 

Add an inline fuel filter (I did on my similar "aux tank.")

 

heres the video of it running last night it sounds more 'ticky' than it actually is but that probably just because im using my cell phone, and ive always gotten bad sound from cell phone cameras. oh and i got the head light working as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07tVCOw-Ph4

 

Sweeeeeet man. You gonna' ride that thing over tonight for a vacuum sych?

Before I got my bike & when my brother was still riding it he had an issue with a constant power drain like that. He would leave the bike turned off for 2 hrs & it would be stone-cold dead every time. It turned out to be the (I think it's called) battery level wire. If i remember correctly on mine it's white with a red stripe and a little diode near the end of it. This used to go to the battery to monitor level but the newer batteries don't have a place to hook it up so it was just laying under the seat and grounding out on the frame.

 

bigfitz, why the need to add an inline filter just to set the floats....??? Seems overkill to me.....fuel is going into fuel tube directly into the float bowls....& then one is checking them & then draining them.....

 

Overkill? Fiveofakind have you actually cleaned the pilot circuits of your carbs? If you have then you should know that even the slightest piece of non-gas material will screw that puppy up. Even the PC has a rudimentary filter because *&#! always finds a way to hang with gas. I've yet to meet a 100% clean gas can, tank, container, etc. I would say Fitz' advice is wise and shamelessly easy to do. My auxiliary fuel tank, which is a HDPE bottle that formerly contained pure EtOH lab grade, has the same $5 in-line filter I use for my main tank. Considering the last pilot cleaning took many hours of my time it's a wise investment. NEVER NEVER will I give any foreign *(#@ a chance to enter my carbs-by gas or by air!!!

SilentRaven: your bike sounds really nice and rhythmic and that is mega good for all you've done, but your idle is still just a bit high. Should be able to get it happy right at 1200, and it will sound a bit lopey there but will rev just fine and run out from stop nice and smooth at that spec level rev. Nice work by the way!

 

MercuryMan,

Yes I have broken my rack & cleaned the carbs and made sure every circuit was opened.

Ok I agree.... a liitle extra measure when setting floats can't hurt.....I just didn't think of it.