Best way to clean a carburetor ?

Ah, the Peanut Gallery speaks! OP, there are no aftermarket carburetors available from Sudco or any other vendor that are "set up and ready to go." The best any tuner can do at a distance is to baseline the jetting; final tuning is up to the buyer. If you decide on VM's, do not expect me to give you personal guidance or to straighten out the nonsense that your inquiries will attract. I've already written all I know on the subject, and it's up to you to do your homework.
 
Grizzly Adams, I think you should call mike morse at 650.com before speaking in absolutes. I bought a st from him and he nailed it. A genuine carb expert I installed mine and have never tuned or changed his original set up. Have 8000 miles on them now still running strong. Yes it is obvious you said all you knew.
 
Bud, I've known Michael Morse longer than you've been a member here and likely longer than you've known what an XS650 is, and he'll tell you the same thing I just did. You got lucky. That having been said, why did you recommend Sudco? Their tech support doesn't hold a candle to Michael's; he'll keep patiently working with a newbie long after Sudco will have cut him off. He and Gary Hoos are the only vendors I recommend for VM carburetors for the XS650. BTW, the name is Dick Russell. I authored the VM section of the XS650 Garage USA Carb Guide and XS/TX650 Carburetors: A Manual for the Yamaha 650 Society.
 
No luck involved. I consulted the experts. Why waste valuable time continually cleaning and adjusting. Go to those who know. Cheaper in the long run. I also recommended Sudco because they set up my xs400. Again went to the experts, spent the money and didn't look back. I work smart not hard. Lets not drift away from the original posting. My advice to everyone is to replace and modernize. Ride more and spend less time mucking about.
 
Modernize?! The VM series design is around a decade older than the BS series, more fiddly and less reliable on several parameters. The TM36/68 flat slide pumpers on my D-model are "modern" carbies--meaning that the design dates from the late 1980's, just before the advent of EFI froze carburetor evolution forever.

Michael's jetting happened to hit the sweet spot with your carb set, but most of the time some fine tuning is required, and much of the time a lot of effort is needed. I spent a bit of time at the Dogwood Rally with a long time 650 Society member who knows his stuff trying to figure out why his VM34's were running rich with Michael's jetting. And yes, he'd consulted with Michael on the problem and got and followed good advice and got some improvement, but the job still wasn't finished. I suggested some changes to try.

Does that mean I think I know more than Michael? Of course not! He wasn't there with his hand on the throttle, and I was. Many situations like that over the years lead me to strongly discourage anyone from believing that they can be sure of accurate final tuning in mail order carburetors, and Michael doesn't send his "Bumbler's Guide" handbook with his carbs because he doesn't think it will be needed.
 
When I was in the army I served with Comander Dick Penis in the Brass Ball Battalion. We didn't use parachutes, we were tough. Commander Penis use to say" Bury your head in the sand long enough and all you'll see is worm turds." Now he was insane, either from the grenade that went off inside his helmet or from being shot in his eye by a surface to air missile during a jump. But he was right. Fans of Mythbusters will remember that it is possible to polish a turd. Keep looking for worm turds and polish the ones you find. Same with so many old carbs. Find them, polish them and in the end you still have a turd. PS the modernize reference goes to new manufacture and quality control. Peace Out
 
It's sure great to receive all this certainty and wisdom from somebody who knows exactly enough to spend money and has experience doing just that. Thank you for your insight.
 
Nice to hear from a self important boob. Who knows all the real experts and still brags about all his failures. Your name really is DICK! I'm going riding now. I can do that because I spent a few dollars to get a reliable daily rider.
 
- - - the modernize reference goes to new manufacture and quality control - - -

Hi reb,
back when I was an apprentice and we were first designing the Concorde I attended a lecture by a quality control engineer.
He asked the class:-
"What is quality control for?"
We all knew that one:-
"It's for making sure that whatever we make is the best possible part it can be."
"Wrong! It's for making sure that whatever you make is the cheapest part that'll actually do the job."
Saddest moment of my entire technical training.
 
Fred, same thing happened down here. Mandatory quality control seminar. I was asked "What is quality control?", responded with "Conformance to specifications". Wrong, it's "Everything everybody does all of the time". Knowing the goofballs that worked there, I knew this would be the end of North American manufacturing as we knew it...
 
Wow I guess it comes down to pride in oneself. I still have faith in my upgrades. Having learned in the past week that I have the talent to get them to work is a great bonus.
 
Back
Top