The Barzu Bike - XJ750

no prob barzu thats why were all here right......

 

Barzu, when you get those jets installed, here's how to adjust the pilot screws (copied from another post, written by rickomatic)

I just did this to my 650 and it runs so much better.

 

Earz, that's old school for sure. I love it! thx.

 

So I roughed in my TC Bros forward controls today...being very cautious on how they feel while I'm sitting on the bike not to lose leverage for the back brake, just like Lowlife suggested. They look really good. One thing I've got to tell you is that the forward controls are much beefier than I thought they would be. The pictures on the tcbros website make them look a bit on the weak sauce side, but I assure you, they're thick and meaty.

Now, one thing I did not realize is when I spent the extra $50 bucks on the linkage kit (extension rods, etc) they DO NOT come with the shift and brake arms. So I had to use the stock ones. My cheapo $49 ryobi angle grinder to the rescue. I had to grind down the posts on both arms as there was no normal way to detach them form the rest of the assembly.

I've circled the stock parts in green.

Getting these to where I liked them from start to finish took about 1 hour. That includes cutting down the linkage rods and reinforcements to size, as well as sitting on the bike a couple of times and tweaking the new pedals to ideal positions. Enjoy.

Up next: paint the linkage rods black, of course, what else?

 

oh man, that brake lever looks as short as mine is 8O
Test that rear brake at a slow speed you may have to make another one thats longer. I push as hard as I can with out bending the motor mount bracket the controls are mounted to and hardly feel any rear brake. I'm sorry for not putting a mesurement in my other post I think the old brake lever has to be at least 5" long or so I haven't got a new on to try yet so I don't know the correct mesurment for sure. The problem is it feels like your putting enough presure on the brakes when its on the stand but moving down the road you have a lot more momentom to try and stop. I've read on here of other guys having the same problem. Just be carfull the first time out you may find that you have very little rear braking power. 8O

 

This thread inspired me so I hacked off my mufflers last night. Very loud but running funky now. Wooo! Mission accomplished.

 

Ooooh, now I understand. I thought that you cut your linkage rods too short. Youre absolutely right, sitting on the bike not going anywhere feels right on. If Earzs pilot jets come in today, Ill have it synched and colortuned for tomorrow and take it out for a ride to see how that drum brake reacts.

Hey, it might give me an excuse to go out and buy a welder Then Ill just weld a 4 or 5 inch piece of steel to the current arm, polish it up and paint it black. If the arm needs 5 inches, that will mean it needs a good 3 inches of travel to depress the brake properly...hmm. This time around, Ill go to Home Depot and buy the materials for the linkage rods there though if the way I cut my current one ends up being too short. Well get it figured out!

 

Screw those [MODERATED] at oldbikebarn.com!!!

 

did you order something from them?.......get ready to wait

 

That_guy: no, unfortunately, I returned something and am waiting to get my money back...waiting...and waiting...

 

Mike, if you´re looking to do exhaust wrap, I can sent you the link to where I got mine from. These dudes sell 100lf for $50. Everywhere else I´ve seen it, exhaust wrap runs out $60-$70 for 50lf.

 

link would be good, how much did you use for your short pipes? I was thinking a could get away with a few 15ft 2" wide rolls....

 

Mike, here's the link for the exhaust wrap: http://www.thermalsound.com/proddetail. ... ial&cat=39

Also, here's the exhaust wrap calculator: http://www.heatshieldproducts.com/exhau ... ulator.php

I did a 1 inch overlap on all four pipes, which roughly took about 10' of wrap per pipe. I ordered extra because I was not sure down the road if I was going to re-wrap them with fresh wrap and figures $50 for 100 feet is very cheap.

 

So I took the carbs apart because Ear'z pilots came in (thx dude!) and the carbs look worse now then when I first cleaned them from the PO. Let me clarify, when I cleaned out the carbs, I also did a gas tank de-rust process.

Now obviously I did not rinse the tank properly because all the rust that got dislodged from the tank settled all throughout my carbs. I'm pretty hot about this right now. I got so stressed and pissed at myself that I had to go eat some chocolate chip cookies just to calm myself down.

It's whiskey time, here's to cleaning the carbs again, cuz I'm a douchebag and gunked them up all by myself

PS - I love Kroil!

I'm embarrased to post the pics, but hey, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few...or the one, poor me.

 

Wow - that bowl looks bad. Did you coat the inside of the tank after the de-rust? You may want to install 2 inline filters and run it for a while to catch any possible remaining rust. I would also encourage you to coat the tank if you have not done so.

Red Kote is your friend

 

Eearz, no, I just used an oil/gas mixture to coat it after I etched it. Any recommendations on inline filters? Something I can get at autozone or crap? I AM riding this bike tomorrow, even if I've gotta spend all night getting it ready.

 

Any inline filter for your fuel hose size. I like the clear plastic with a brass colored stone thing in them, but any will do. Try to get something you can see thru to check for sediment.

 

Also - shine a flashlight in your tank to check for rust.

 

Couple things:
Earz, I have to redo the whole de rust process on my tank again. I swear to god it looks worse then when I cleaned it out the first time. You mentioned Lcoat before, do you use this? (for coating, I mean)

Next, I went to colortune the bike this morning (Motorduck, I sent you a PM) and the second I rigged the gas to the carbs and opened the valves, carbs 4 then 3 started spewing gasoline from the air filters.

I pulled the carbs and took them apart, found that the rubber stopper in the float pin of carb 4 was missing. Interesting, found the other piece in the assembly. It broke clean off. Very odd since I inspected all the parts before putting the carbs back together again.

I can tell you that what happened this morning is a good thing because about 30 minutes after this fiasco, my little girl got a fever of 103 and we had to take her to the doctor. So it's a good thing I ended up being "grounded" at home today by my XJ.

Chacal is in the loop and goods are on order.

So I got pissed again and chopped the shocks and lowered the bike about 2" or so

Thanks for listening to Galaxy News Radio!

P.S. Pouring straight muratic (hydrocloric) acid into a carb bowl to remove the rust is not a good idea. It looks like a good idea at first, until the acid starts boiling, heating up and bowl and eating up the aluminum. What an adventure!

 

barzu i see you are stupid like me and decide to chop a bike during the riding season. so when we finish our rides, we need to organize a winter wonderland ride and see how our bikes do!!!

i wanted to do my exhaust like yours and crath's but i pussed out, my riding partners complain about one guy's D&D piped r6, so i figured i'd keep it somewhat muffled... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6Ayam_LBSc

hope your daughter is ok and on the mend!

 

Zookie, haha! I watched that video 2 months before I decided to buy a bike. Very cool exhaust. I love how you chopped it. As far as chopping up the bike mid season...I could not help myself. I had it for a week and could not hold back any longer. I'm down for a winter ride. More importantly, I'm getting a couple of dudes together for a ride down to Vegas this coming spring. If you're up for it, come along with us. Matter of fact, if anyone here is up for it, come along. It's gonna be crazy. We even have a dude coming from Jersey!

Thanks for the well wishes. Ava is good and all medicated up. She's eating well too, so clearly daddy over reacted. Naturally, of course, she's my little girl.

 

I bought a really sweet one at Auto Zone. $10. I would have bought two and put them in series on the line, but they only had one and I didn't feel like driving elsewhere to pick up another. If I need another, I'll pick it up.

 

Wow dude, what a story. I hope all turns out well soon. Is your fuel bowl going to be ok after the muriatic acid episode? I really wanted to take my bike apart as well this summer, but decided to ride instead. I have been working hard like a squirel gathering nuts for the winter though. I have many goodies that I hope to install on my bike. I plan on removing the engine and painting it, polish, pods, rewiring, adn who knows.

I can't wait to her how your carbs turn out.

How many chocolate chip cookies did you end up eating to calm your self down?

I usually just make my self a fat steak on the grill to calm myself down. lol

 

Xulf, the carb bowl is okay. Discolored on the inside, but it's usable. It was crazy, the acid started boiling over and the bowl got super hot, I had to grab it with some pliers and run it outside. I expected a bit more action in the bowl then if you dilute it with water, but not that much. Thankfully I didn't burn off my face or anything, but my eyebrows are gone, HA!

I'm right there with you on the winter projects. I'll be pulling the engine to paint as well, along with trying to find some place local that can powder the frame flat black.

Zookie is right along with me here. I keep saying that I'll be riding soon, but there's always one more thing - and the occasional disaster. It's all part of the fun.

Chocolate chip cookies: 4. It's all about I can do in a row.

Steak sounds really good right about now...but I'm too comfy laying around drinking beer and watching the Indy race at Chicagoland speedway.

 

Yeah, sorry Lcoat was a typo. Follow the link below for the stuff you need. You may check locally to see if anyone sells it. Don't use any other brands of tank liners.

http://www.valu-bilt.com/product_info.php?product_id=10937&item_number=A 478521

 

You're absolutely right. On the back brake drum, there's a little gauge that travels along a curved line and shows how far the brake gets activated when you depress the brake.

When I was testing the brake with the stock pedals, the gauge pointer traveled about 1/4 or an inch. Now that I've got the TC bros forward controls on it, the pointer only travels about half of that...which clearly explains why you and I have useless back brakes at the moment.

The plan: pick up a brake arm (one piece) from an '82 seca/maxim 650 on ebay. Cut it down to about 4" and drill the hole for the linkage rods.

The extra 2 1/2 inches in travel on the brake arm will provide enough leverage to make that pointer gauge travel 1/4 inch as before.

 

Dude, good job on the bike so far. Wondering what kind'a suspendable gas tank you're using in the video that you posted on the first page? That would come handy when tuning carbs. Let me know bro. Thanks

 

Blister, I wish I was that fancy. It's a $5 cheapo pouring tube that leaks like a sieve. Here's the link: http://www.autozone.com/autozone/catalo ... tid=473798
I had to rig it with plumbers tape to stop the leaks. Once I hacked it, it became usable again.

 

I thought of welding up the old brake lever and trying again too, then I thought about the time I really need that rear brake and the dam thing breaks at my weld 8O wouldn't be pretty I think you can find them on ebay for under 10 bucks.
James


Hey for the aux. gas tank I use an old gear oil bottle with the nipple end on it and a screw stuck in the bottom.Your fuel line will push right on the nipple and then I just kinds wedge the bottle in to the frame upside down and remove the screw for air to flow into the bottle fuel flows out ex.ex.ex.
worked good for checking floats and all, just remember to put the screw back in before tipping the bottle right side up.

 

Thanks for the tips guys. I'll check it out.

 

Barzu, not sure if you got your carbs cleaned out yet. If not- you may check out this method
Cheap soda blaster

 

Earz, they're all cleaned out. I do like the soda blaster though.

Time for an update. Carbs got cleaned out again. I installed the 40 pilot jets. Had serious leaking issues again, so I bench synched and adjusted the float levels to 13/16th from the BOWL (not gasket) to the LIP on the back (not hinged) part of the floats.

No leaks and the bike idles great, but still very rich. Crap.

I threw the colortune on it and cannot get the friggin flame to turn blue. My fuel mixture screws are turned all the way in, and I can almost get to blue, but not quite.

I turned out the idle adjustment thinking that if I turn that out and turn out the mixture screws a bit I might get there. No cigar.

Reading through the forums I came accross a post and Dpawl said that he had the same issue with the colortune and it turned out to be his pilot circuit that was clogged. Here's the thread: http://xjbikes.com/Forums/viewtopic/t=1 ... screw.html

I can tell you honestly that I've overlooked the pilot circuit completely while cleaning the carbs. Why? I can't tell you b/c I don't know. What the crap?

Being that it's such a tiny opening, I bet it IS clogged, especially after seeing how gunked up the carbs were from the rust in the gas tank. I won't have that problem since I threw in an inline filter.

What do you fools think about this?

 

That looks pretty sweet!! Heck , I may rip my carbs off and hit 'em with that mini-blaster....just because I can..

 

Hey Barzu, any updates? Are you under the weather? come on man, I'm looking forward to your updates.

 

Xulf, my time, while waiting a whole day and a half to get Chacal's goods, was spent on taking the carbs apart NUMEROUS times to get the float levels right. I'm confident that I've got them perfect now. No leaks, and all the carb bowls get the same amount of fluid.

I also painted your risers black and put the drag bars on there. They look outstanding, BUT hit the gas tank. Not that big of a deal, but I won't address this issue until off season. When I do address the drag bar issue, I will also be swapping out my controls for components that are low profile. Including grips, brake/clutch, and electronic controls (turn, start, horn, etc) and finally get better mirrors.

On the task list for today is getting the carbs off ONE more time and cleaning the pilot circuit as I've overlooked this in my cleaning process, twice.

Once that's done, I'm slapping the colortune on and hopefully she'll be purring by this afternoon. Hell, I might even be able to ride her to my 4pm meeting... We'll see. Once she's all back together I'll take some pics and throw them up here.

 

Wow, it sounds like you've been busy man. On My bike the choke lever would hit the tank. So I clipped the lever and just left a little knob that I could still use with my thumb when needed. They did make the controls pretty bulky on these bikes. I'm looking forward to the pictures.

 

Where were those risers originally purchased? I need some!

 

There is a set on fleabay right now.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/1982-Yam ... 06.c0.m245

 

Ok. The bike is back together. I still need to sand and put two more coats on the gas tank, but F that. I need to ride.

LEAN POPPING. That's what I get now. I turned her over and ran her idle and she ran really rich (black smoke) for about 5 minutes. Then it was like a switch flipped on and all four pipes were puffing white smoke and the bike sounds lean, to the point that cylinder 3 misfires sometimes as there seems not to be enough gas.

I checked the bowls on the carbs and they're full of fuel. There's an inline filter on the fuel so I know there's no debris getting in there.

I did take out the mixture screws and cleaned them off. But that's about it.

Initially, I set the fuel mixture screws to 2.75 turns out. The weird thing is that the bike switched to lean without me touching anything. While the bike was lean, I started turning out the carb 4 mixture screw. Got through a whole turn with no change in behavior...so I'm off to the forums to see if I can learn from others' woes.

If you've got two cents, I'll surely take it about now, plz.

 

Did you bench synch them? Is your idle bolt between #2 & #3 backed off all the way? I found with mine that the center idle bolt was holding hte butterflys open enough that it didn't seem to matter what I did with the pilot screws.

 

Check and check. Yeah dude. I made sure that when I did the bench sync I had enough room to back out as well.

 

Barzu- I finally got my 650 dialed in after a lean issue. I followed the procedure I posted on page 4 of this thread. My mixture screws vary from 4 turns out to almost 8 turns out. 8 seemed excessive, but that's where it ran the best and I can still feel tension from the spring. Don't be afraid to back them out.

 

I love you man! I spent an hour looking for that info through the forums, I completely forgot that you quoted it in this thread.

I'll give this a go. Not till tomorrow though. I have a 4pm meeting and have to blow out of here by 3

I'll post an update. Meanwhile, here's some pics of the bike assembled and ready to rock:

 

DUDE, you're bike is looking HOT, HOT, HOT. Man that looks sweet.

 

Thanks Xulf, I've got to get rid of that GOD UGLY center stand tomorrow morning. I didn't realize how bad it looks until I see it in the picture. It's like a third boob...does not belong

 

I'm done with upgrades and chops for the season. Once I tune it up tomorrow, that's it for me.

The plan for the winter is:
Chop frame - solo seat (not sure hardtail/softail yet)
Move choke and ignition, etc.
Change headlight (bullet - black)
Change speed controls (bullet - black - digital, maybe?
Change mirror, mine are gay.
Change grips, break, clutch bars...pretty much make that drag bar as simple and clean looking as possible without all that garbage on there.
Rebuild MC, redo front forks
Bring exhaust pipes out of the headers to flush with the back brake drum, over/under on each side like a shotgun. (it's gonna look sweet)
...aaaand a whole host of other things that you'll just have to see to believe...

Now, who wants to ride?

 

LOL Very funny, you know what I do with mine while cruizin down the road? (a little trick I learned from lowriding)

I scrape mine and throw sparks!!

 

I read this in the car yesterday while on my way to the meeting. Cried laughing.

I told my bro since we're going riding today and he said "I'm leading."

 

Well dudes, I've re-cleaned the carbs AGAIN. Still cannot get the colortune to turn blue. I can turn the fuel mixture screws all the way in until they bottom out and the flame is still orange.

The bike idles perfectly fine, but as soon as you put it in gear and crank, it does nothing. Rides along slow and won't take off. My idle adjustment screw is almost all the way out too. 1050 rpms is no problem.

I know it's rich, but there does not seem to be any other way for me to cut the fuel out any more. Once the mixture screws are all the way down, that's it. The plugs are black after a ride around the block. This is BS. Crap.

 

this sucks....