running rich

My 82 650 Maxim I recently purchased seems to run on the rich side, I smell it when I start it up and after about 10 minutes the smell is not as apparent.
I did pour in Seafoam in the tank and see if that helps.
I pulled the plugs and they are black, air filter is clean, any suggestions?

 

I have the same problem. I checked the temps on the exhaust pipes at the first bend at prestart, 5 minutes at idle, 10 minutes at 2000 rpm, and again at 15 minutes at 2500 rpm. I found the following: #1 - 83, 180, 192, 218; #2 - 82, 143, 160, 230; #3 - 81, 100, 101, 120; and #4 - 80, 143, 165, 180. Is anyone out there can give me any idea as to what to look at to correct the problem. I can't tell if its #1/#3 or #2/#4 that have issues.

 

I have the same problem. I checked the temps on the exhaust pipes at the first bend at prestart, 5 minutes at idle, 10 minutes at 2000 rpm, and again at 15 minutes at 2500 rpm. I found the following: #1 - 83, 180, 192, 218; #2 - 82, 143, 160, 230; #3 - 81, 100, 101, 120; and #4 - 80, 143, 165, 180. Is anyone out there can give me any idea as to what to look at to correct the problem. I can't tell if its #1/#3 or #2/#4 that have issues.

 

Based on those temperature numbers lpayne, I'd say either 3/4 are not firing properly, or 1/2 are lean and generating more heat.

trekrider, clean (or replace) your plugs, and try to make some adjustments to your mixture screws. If that doesnt take care of it, you might have to start checking jets to see if they're swapped around or just flat out the wrong ones.

 

believe it or not I finally found where the air/mixture screws are located, there is a cap on top of them, what is the best way to remove them?

 

The caps were gone on my bike, but on my carb'd cars in the past, I've poked a small hole with a punch, then jabbed either a hooked pick in there, or a small small screwdriver in there, and popped the little bugger out.

You can drill them out, but be VERY VERY VERY careful .... the screws arent far below those caps and you do NOT want to mangle one up with the drill.

 

thanks again for the info, this is xj forum is such a great site
now I have to figure out how to make it run leaner??

 

If the 1&2 carbs are running lean then how do you rich'em up?

 

LPayne, if 1 & 2 are lean, you can try to richen them by turning the mixture screws COUNTER clockwise. Small amounts at a time, until your plugs look right. Plug chops are a kinda long and involved process, but well worth it. First off though, what do those plugs look like? Black and sooty? White? "Healthy" tan color?

Trekrider: to make a given carb run a bit leaner you just turn the mixture screw in CLOCKWISE. Again, small amounts at a time. Width of a dime, maybe less. 1 or 2 degrees. Not much at all. Makes a huge difference on these bikes.

Now on my 81 seca, when I started tuning, my mixture screws were set all over the place, so I _gently_ bottomed them all out, then backed them all out to 3 turns out from bottom, and went from there. Just a "rule of thumb" i picked up from some thread on here at one point.

 

Another "rule of thumb" that often goes overlooked: Check and adjust your VALVE CLEARANCES before beginning any serious carb tuning, or you'll just drive yourself crazy.

 

haha, agreed. I was lucky enough that mine were all close enough to "factory spec" that I didn't have any issues, but from what I read on here it definately seems most people aren't that lucky.

Get yourself a set of feeler gauges if you dont have em already and go at it, inexpensive to check, and not much more to fix if needed, but will save you a TON of headaches down the road if there IS something wrong in the valvetrain.