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my bike

here are a few pics of the bike

decided to sell my xs650 special. its done 25000 miles, was imported from the States in the 80's. its MOT'd till June 2011 and taxed till January 2011. i recently spent £250 getting the carbs cleaned and the boyer black box replaced, so now it starts easily and runs nicely. gearbox works well...

i'm prone to imagine the worst possible scenario. i'm also quite supersticious now about even fiddling with the bike as i always seem to make things much worse. i had that starting problem earlier in the year and after pulling carbs to bits then running the tank dry and crap from the bottom...

thanks all, i like the go faster suggestion as that is easily sorted. i wish it was the operator at fault because that can also be fixed but i have nagging feeling that it may be answer number 3, which means oil all over the garage floor, skinned fingers, lots of swearing and finally...

where i live there are some very steep narrow roads that i have been taking the xs up. i usually just potter up slowly in second gear (i should be going up in first but the revs are a bit high and noisy). so there i am chugging up this hill in the wrong gear and suddenly it slips out of second...

now that i have the bike sorted i'm enjoying using it but could do with some advice about the speed/revs. at 3000 revs i'm going at 45 mph, which is fine for me as i usually just potter along on narrow back roads. but when i go a bit faster, say 50 mph the revs climb to 3500 and the engine...

mine sounds like that too. a kind of rythmic ticking. i assumed it was the cam chain and have been trying to tension it to make the noice go away (with little success). maybe the copper washer has to be replaced with the plastic one in the cam chain tensioner or could it also be the valve...

my bike wouldnt run properly and in the end i gave it to the bike mechanic to fix. he thought the boyer ignition was faulty so sent it off to boyer in the south of england. they will test it for a tenner and if its faulty and within the warrenty period will send out a new one free of charge...

i think each time i go out on it i will just tighten it up half a turn and see how it runs, although always keeping in mind "its better to hear it than to smell it" which i read recently here

i took out the adjuster screw and found the copper washer. dont really know where to go from here though. i read a post about using a plastic washer instead, would that help. like the idea of replacing the whole thing for a later one with lock nut. good idea. i will keep my eye on ebay for one.

thanks guys for the picture and your suggestions. my bike doesnt have that narrow nut, only the big one. but its a 79 SF, so thats probably the reason (havnt worked out how to put my bike details on the bottom of my posts yet). so if some bikes never had that narrow lock nut what did they...

turns out i cant adjust the tensioner when the bike is idling because the screw wants to unscrew itself and there is no way (atleast on my bike) of locking it in place. i can only lock it tight when i screw the outer acorn shaped nut in place. i also tried to unscrew the bolt until the inner...

many thanks 5twins for your clear explanation. i feel more confident now and will try this method instead

hi, i have been trying to adjust the cam chain properly with your help but have run into a slight problem and need more advice. i have lined up the T mark with the rotor to find TDC and then adjusted the tensioner plunger with the outer adjuster bolt until its flush. then i rotated the...

working on it now but its not quite so straightforward. i have aligned the T mark with the rotor to find TDC and then adjusted the tensioner plunger with the outer adjuster bolt until its flush. ok thats done. then i rotated the engine to check the setting but just before it rotated 360 back...

i have read that its either done with the engine running or engine off. which choice is best/easiest.

no, i hav'nt done either. are they easy to do ?

hi started using the bike and its fun but i can detect a constant tinny sounding rattle/clatter coming from the engine and wonder what the noise is and can i fix it or is it just normal engine noise from the xs

thanks everyone for such speedy replies. whilst the mechanic had it recently i asked him to check out my electric start which never worked and sounded just awful. he said the bendix was worn or maybe the shaft ( cant remember which and have temporarily lost the bit of paper with the info on)...