these are the worst motorcycles ever

I am of the opinion that those who complain about XJ-Series bikes probably can't wrench and with labor rates nearing the 100-dollar-an-hour mark, ... can't afford to have a flat fixed.

I have a Seca 900 and a 750 Midnight Max.

The 900 I robbed the PO for set me back a whopping $150.00!
The Max the PO gave me for hauling it away.

The 900 took me nearly a year to restore.
The Max took 18 months; but it was a mess.

If you regard Maintenance and Restoration of old motorcycles a joyful hobby; bringing a Yamaha XJ-Bike close to new, again ... is a passion which approaches an obsession.

 

No I dont think he should, mainly because it's rubbish

 

I hope to be getting rebuild kits for Christmas. This is the float needles kit. I have fat blue spark. Compression from left to right 150,145,145,145. Using a Mac Tool checker. The backwards petcock works. Freshly charged battery. All the ingrediants to start the bike but it won't start. I even put the stock exhaust on. Took me 3 months to get the oil filter thing off. 12mm went to a 7/15 hammered on. OIL runs through the bolt. When something strips the manufature gets fined a billion dollars. No excuse. It wouldn't even start with starter fluid. Makes no sense. Thank you Fatabebabe you're a million percent correct. I BLAME THE BIKE. The money you put into your bike Daffy Duck you could have purchased a new one with a warrenty. Junk Junk Junk Junk Junk Junk Junk. Had I known. I live near Harrisburg, Pa. It's suppose to be warm over the weekend. This is getting megasquirted. Those carbs are Junk. Junk. Junk. Junk. This is the kind of thing you would think happens to a superbike. Not this. Morons and their YICS or CVCC.

 

There we go. This is where your rants belong; in the most entertaining bike-blaming thread ever.

Typhoon still hasn't hit the Hitachi factory yet...

Flame on.

 

Dude it's obvious your mechanical skills suck. Try basket weaving

 

If it was easy everyone would be riding an XJ. A lot of us have spent a lot of time scratching our heads with problems but with a calm attitude just about anything can be figured out with the help others on here. If you have any intentions of wanting to ride your 650, the first step is changing your attitude and obviously doing a little bit more homework. Jeez. By now you may have lost respect from two incredible gurus above (Daffy Duck? seriously, your 45 dude. get over yourself) but if you start posting questions with some logic instead of saying "these bikes are junk" you'd be surprised how little advice can go a long ways. If it was easy everyone would be riding an XJ.

 

Then just feel free to GIVE the bike to one of us.we'll get running right, and enjoy it.

 

Atlandf is still here? I thought he got rid of the bike long ago.

Some people just aren't suited for them. No shame, and it's not the bikes fault. Get something you'll like better.

 

Did my reply to painter in his "best forum" thread throw gas on an old fire? Keep in mind that it contains up to 10% ethanol, which is good for the environment.

 

No, I linked to this thread in my reply; and then somebody felt the need to respond to it and this thread got bumped into the present day.

This is my favorite "blame the bike" thread; altlandf's frustrated rants definitely belong here.

Some folks just aren't cut out to work on things they can't fully wrap their heads around.

 

Making an old bike run well, ... is all in the details. You have to put a whole lot of energy into the project.
Starting Fluid failing to start the plant usually indicates an Ignition related problem.
An Ignition related issue can be very complicated to sort-out.
Fuse Panels deteriorate until they become worthless.
Coils near 30 years old become possessed.
A bad TCI and you're dead in the water.
Combine all three and you wind-up going to meetings and reciting the serenity prayer.
Not having a thorough and comprehensive Service Manual effectively blindfolds you.
As you progress toward the ultimate goal of having a Bike you can say that you are ready to fine-tune; the process becomes more complicated and requires special tools along with the ability to perform the complex steps requiring the manual dexterity to succeed.

You can't put the blame on component parts being why that bike won't start.
The bottom line is, ... you.
Those Carbs are Aluminum, Bronze and Brass. Made to last a long time.

Ask Santa for a big cardboard box and a new black Magic Marker..
Make a sign.
"For Sale. As is!"

Let someone who can read, wrench and trouble-shoot put you out of your misery.

 

wow, man get back on your huffy and call it a day.

 

LMAO - basket weaving.. that cracked me up Polock! :lol:

Just went back and read through that guy's previous posts. Don't know how I missed them before but it was pretty entertaining! Typical "victim" mentality..

bike won't run.. it's Yamaha's fault.
carbs don't work.. it's Hitachi's fault.
Prelude won't idle.. it's Honda's fault.
can't get the VIN right.. the Pennsylvania DOT's fault.
can't upload pics.. it's the website's fault.
takes him 3 months (really!?) to "get the oil filter thing off".. it's the manufacturer's fault!? :lol:
can't understand a vacuum-operated petcock or the YICS system - it's the engineer's fault.

Reminds me of a quote from one of my all-time favorite movies.. some of you old-timers on here will remember:

"What we've got here is failure to communicate. Some men you just can't reach. So you get what we had here last week, which is the way he wants it. Well, he gets it. I don't like it any more than you men."

 

Cool Hand Luke. Loved that movie. Especially the opening scene where Paul Newman is cutting off the parking meters with a pipe cutter.
And what, exactly, is an "oil filter thing"? I can't find it in Yamaha's parts list.

 

Did you take a bath in the powerplant cooling pool or something? Calm down.

I haven't got an XJ to run properly yet, but that's no reason to pop an aneurysm like that.

 

Go back and read his other posts. It's all Hitachi and Yamaha's fault. Oh, and Honda's too, but that's a car issue.

 

To be fair, sometimes the design of a machine can be at fault. For instance, Chrysler has one of the more idiotic electrical systems I've seen. They have a 15A fuse in series feeding a half-dozen other fuses, one of which is a 20A. What this translates into is a faulty door lock taking out radio, interior lights, gauges and gauge lights and I forget what else.

1980's bikes aren't particularly complex. The worst part about them is the carburetors. Everything else that goes wrong is just a factor of age and degree of neglect.

 

That's pretty much what goes "wrong" with the carbs too. (Age and degree of neglect.)

 

Nice trolling quote, even if out of context. If the design was at fault, everyone would have these issues, which isn't the case. A few people have carb issues, and have worked them out. You haven't.

I think you should cut your losses. I don't see what you get out of the drama.

 

I agree with JPaganel. I have a 95 Lebaron that the left front speaker never worked. They have two connectors that plug into the radio. One connector had power and the other connecter had all of the speakers I thought. Looking at the wiring diagrams Chrysler place the left front speaker wire on the power connecter. Eversince I purchased the bike 2 years ago I have been putting money into it. This summer I purchased another bike of the same year so I have spare parts. I have 3 sets of carbs. I have done all sorts of maintance to the bike. I change the oil after I got the oil filter thing off. Replaced the coils and valve cover gasket. The bike leaked like a pig. I think I spent plenty of money trying to keep the bike running. I had the bike I purchased this summer running with starter fluid. I sprayed a little in number 1 spark plug and it started but it wouldn't stay running. I sprayed a little more starter fluid into the engine again and removed the air cleaner. When the bike started I sprayed starter fluid into the air box for about 10 seconds. I wouldn't take gas. It would have contiuned to idle if I kept spraying starter fluid into engine. I stopped after 10 seconds. I don't think that's a good way to run a bike. The reason the engine wouldn't run is floats were frozen with brown hard stuff.

 

Pags, you might be onto something.

So now, in order of degree of diatribe we have unmasked the following diabolical purveyors of seriously flawed products:

-Yamaha
-Hitachi
-Honda
-the Pennsylvania Dept. of Motor Vehicles
-and now Chrysler.

Damn. It's a wonder how any of them have stayed in business this long, producing the horribly engineered crap they do. How I managed to wring 354,000+ miles out of a Dodge Grand Caravan with a Mitsubishi motor in it beats me. Those blasted Japs can't get anything right, I'm tellin' ya...

Except my XJs all start and run just fine. 8O

Must be an anomaly... :roll:

 

Atlandf, in the spirit of good will to all mankind i applaud you for still being here! others have disappeared much quicker. well done!

You have provided continuing entertainment!

If you take a more considered position there are still folk willing to help :wink:

 

WAIT!! I think I finally figured out what the problem is!! Sounds to me like you've got some bad "starter fluid".... I bet you bought that Hitachi brand starter fluid - that stuff is junk, junk, junk man! You need to get some of the good stuff! Here's what you do:

1. Put down your crayons, they can wait.
B. Go upstairs & grab a can of your mom's harispray - that stuff is flammable as hell and eats brown hard stuff for breakfast.
6. Take a deep breath & think about puppies - it's OK man, you can do it.
?. Now hold a lighter in front of the can & spray it at your carbs.

If that doesn't work than nothing will.. donate the bike to jmilliken and get a bus pass.

 

Yup, sounds like that's all Hitachi's fault. They should've never engineered the floats with "brown hard stuff". :roll:
If I had room in my basement for another bike I'd take that poorly engineered machine off your hands and end your misery. Then I'd PROPERLY CLEAN the carbs like it needs and ride it past your house every day just to remind you of your failure to perform basic routine maintenance of carburetors.

Funny how the Hitachi carbs on my bike work just fine...along with thousands of other people's. Seems the fault is yours this time, altlandf.

 

This is almost my favorite thread. I bought my 650 in 2011, and used this forum to get a roughly-running bike to good enough for a summer, then more work for another 5000 mile summer, then last spring was just routine maintenance and I hit my personal 10,000 mile mark on it 5 days ago.

The 800 mile 3 day trip through the Rockies last june was a testament to the fact that paying attention to the instructions works. My Maxim rocked the road that weekend.

 

Time for another valve clearance check! I just turned 11K on my '83's resurrection; it's a good feeling isn't it?

 

To think that the bikes are the problem is to start with the wrong question.

I do have non running bikes but don't put the blame on them, it's the 30 years of neglect http I need to replace parts that should have before my sister was born.

Right now life is busy with a 1 year old baby, she had a seizure a few months back and that was not due to poor design.

Merry Christmas y'all

 

I've put 18k miles on my midnight since I got it. It's about 150 miles shy of 50k on the odometer now. Aside from adjusting valves and changing oil, I haven't had to do anything since the initial catch-up on neglected maintenance.

Bottom line is if you do half-ass work, you'll get half-ass results!

 

While a little strange as far as pinout, I don't see how that would be the reason for the speaker not working.

Correlation is not causation.

That doesn't say much. Could be the bike, could be you are replacing the wrong things.

Unless you had something majorly broken, that is kind of a pointless affair. If you replace one piece of 30-year old rubber with another piece of 30-year old rubber, you haven't really gained much of anything. Also, not a requirement, by any means.

Which means what? When I bought my 550 it came with two sets of carbs. Neither one was correct for the engine in the bike. The intake manifolds were rotted to crap with pieces missing. The guy couldn't figure out why his bike wouldn't run.

An oil change and a new gasket are something like $50-60. Coils are, what, $120? No idea whether you needed to replace the coils or not, but oil changes are more or less the same for any bike. So, this "plenty of money" thing is a bit debatable.

So, you have a bike that's all gunked up that is not running. Yep, definitely a deficient design, with all that dirt put in at the factory...

 

I don't have brown stuff in my carbs, but they seem to run just fine without it..........

My '04 TP Crusier is still going fine and it's going to turn 275,000 mi in a few more weeks----and I know there's no funny brown stuff in the carbs.....heck, it doesn't even HAVE carbs.

dave f

 

Hard brown stuff... Sounds like someone confused their carb rack for the phone & started talking down it lol :roll:

I do like this thread, I forgot how awful XJ's were with their frames and forks that BEND when crushed under the weight of a car! 8o What the heck sort of a design is that? :evil:

 

Is that a special "green" biodegradable model?

:lol: :twisted:

 

this thread is getting really entertaining.

CN

 

that's what it says on the doors................

 

Of course......it IS also starting to biodegrade......it's slowly starting to turn back into iron ore-----

dave

 

Badged by a dyslexic?

 

Worst Bikes ... ever.
I strenuously object.

I vote for the AMF Harley-Davidson.

 

I strenuously object.

I vote for the '78 Huffy.



Never could get that thing to run, no matter what I tried. The shifter didn't even work! Total junk!!!

 

I never met a motor I couldn't get to run; or get to run better than it was. I rode British bikes for most of my life (AMAL carbs, oh no!!!) have three XJs and my daughter has the aforementioned Chinese scooter. And guess what?

I suspect ol' Rick was "baiting" you-know-who.

 

Not baiting.

Offering an alternative.

 

As bad as the AMF Harleys were, their problems were inexpensive to fix. The current big twins eat compensators every 25k, and you can't fix those with a new set of gaskets.

Also; I actually loved that Huffy. It went to the scrapper before I could snag it out of dad's garage

 

My 26" from 4th grade thru high school was a Monkey Ward's store brand Huffy. I got my first stitches with that bike; it fared better than I.

 

I struggle with mine from time to time. I am not a mechanic and I know that. I don't bitch about it. I figure it out. That is why sites like this one exist.

 

The Huffy. That appeared over here as a "Dragstar" Came with either Shimano or Sturmey Archer gears. You were really someone if you had one!