Recent content by andy2175m4

I left the 1975 XS650 in the garage for a couple years and the carbs got gummed up with curdled gas. I removed and cleaned the carbs, now it will start, barely, but it won't run. acts like there is an air leak somewhere, but I cannot find it, any troubleshooting suggestions for balky carbs...

that part of the tank is a bit distorted, and could be filled and leveled but a fuel proof goop would be quicker, I will try the permatex permashield, looks good.

sealing the petcock to the fuel tank

I there a gasket sealer out there that will form a good seal in a joint that has a bit of a gap, and form its own gasket, like a silcone sealer, but is gasoline and hot oil proof ?

OK so that takes care of the street bike, the track bike is still in pieces and has no carbs yet, I do have a pair of rusty old 34mm CV's but am leaning toward the flat slide 34mm Mikunis for the final track bike configuration, comments on that would be appreciated too,

OK so after cleaning out the secret passageways and orifices 3 times, it finally started, ran perfect, but it was a long time getting there, no new parts, these carbs are original and 46 years old, that's an old gasket, but now it starts and runs smooth, that's it, hidden air passages

so that's where the secret passage is ... now I have a fighting chance of fixing This !

Hi Guys, thanks for the replies, I have worked on dozens of carbs over the years and sometimes they just quit, just dont work and I found the only way to fix them, is to replace them, that's why I suspect that there may be a clogged mystery path somewhere I cant get to . So for these Mikuni...

I have a 1975 xs650 with the original 38mm mikuni carbs, K&N filters, worked fine for 46 years, until the pandemic, bike sat for over a year, carbs full of gas, gas corroded and gummed up carbs, now it won't run, wont even start. I have thoroughly cleaned the carbs, and appear to be normal...

Thinking at first It might be the oil, I tried 2 or 3 different oils, made NO difference. tried 2 types of "4 stroke motorcycle oil" no help, After I swapped out the clutch plates went back to 10W-40 regular car motor oil, worked fine. So I looked carefully at the "old" steel and fiber...

The clutch basket in the '75 (my main project) was not grooved or worn so that was not the problem, so needing another fix to try, I took all the clutch plates out of my '79 donor engine and put them in the '75 and lo and behold the clutch dragging problem is completely gone ! Neutral is...

I found another article on clutches showing a clutch basket with wear grooves, that would retard the clutch plates from moving freely in and out, this makes a lot of sense, this condition would physically prevent the clutch plates from fully separating when the clutch is pulled in. The other...

I bought a 650 flat track bike recently and noticed the shifter is still on the left side. i dont race actually but as I recall flat track racing is on an oval track turning left, so if the shifter was on the right side would that not be better ? I was reading about old sportsters raced in...

my 650 was shifting hard so installed a new shift shaft and changed the oil. took out the old brown oil (sae unknown) and put in regular automotive SAE10-40 oil, now the clutch drags even more and the bike shifts harder still what is the best oil to use to reduce clutch drag and shifting...