lucked out re: leaking carb

emzdogz

emzdogz

Aunty Em
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So, the weather's getting decent again now in Florida, and I'm starting to work on my (endless) 80 chopper project again. It sat for weeks and weeks and weeks through the Florida humidity and heat.
I open the petcocks to go ahead and let fuel flow down into the float bowls. I had also forgotten to drain the bowls. So fuel starts gushing out of the left aircleaner. GUSHING.

But I smacked the float bowl area with a wrench and it stopped leaking right away. Cool, huh? I guess the float was a little stuck and didn't want to let the float needle do it's job at first. I feel lucky not to have to mess w/carbs now.

Have put higher bars on it now (had to order a new brake line) and a new tail light.

Of all things, I put the stock rototiller bars back on.:wtf:
Very comfortable. I just wish they pulled back a bit more, more similar to some of the higher Harley buckhorns.

Funny, everyone hates buckhorns and rototillers, but for me they are wicked comfortable.

Will have a pic or two soon, if it rides out well this way - because after that it will be time for dis-assembly for paint. I really want to finish this bike before next summer.
:)
 
emzdogz said:
...I open the petcocks to go ahead and let fuel flow down into the float bowls. I had also forgotten to drain the bowls. So fuel starts gushing out of the left aircleaner. GUSHING.

But I smacked the float bowl area with a wrench and it stopped leaking right away. Cool, huh? I guess the float was a little stuck and didn't want to let the float needle do it's job at first.
Click to expand...

Funny you posted this. The other day I had to remove my carbs and clean the float bowl where the enricher tube goes into it. It was clogged and the right carb choke wouldn't work. Quick poke and clean and it was fixed. After I put the carbs on and turned on the fuel I noticed, by looking at the fuel filter, that the fuel was still flowing, still flowing, uh...um....then I spotted, and smelled, the fuel flowing out of my air filter. I sprang into action and tapped the bowl. It stopped. It'll scare you for a second.
 
yeah it made me really nervous because I'd just hooked up a battery tender with the alligator teeth connectors...a spark would not have been good. (I guess)
Anyway....gotta love the "tap the floatbowl" procedure - if it works.
 
Your floats stuck for a reason. Tapping is a temporary fix and you should investigate to find out why it stuck.
 
Last edited:
if it does it again I will investigate, otherwise I will assume that not having run it for a few months caused the remaining gas to gunk up and act like glue, preventing the one float from pivoting (should have put some Stabil in, maybe) - and that running some new gas through eliminated the prob.
I rebuilt these a few months ago.
Hope not to have to re-visit the problem!
We shall see.
 
Hasn't leaked out carb any more, but I've only started it a few times since. It sure did run better before it sat all summer. Had to kick it to start today after the first time. Starter did the job one time, then not enough juice. So had to kick it.

Idles great. Just off-idle while letting clutch out, I'm really having to rev it so it doesn't die. Got better though, as it ran. Still, I feel like one cyl is dieing at just off-idle, under load. I have (for now) those clear see-through spark plug caps - both sides still spark though...it's not as if the plug on one side ceases to fire. Battery must be weak though, since the elec foot would not crank it more than a couple times.
I wonder if the batt. being weak could be the cause for rough running as I described.
Idles fine with choke off.

I'd love to run it out at 3/4 to full throttle but no place to do that around here.

Many things to check....
 
ok so now it's maybe 15-20 mins later, I went out and inspected the rubber cap on the "barbs" sure enough, one side had a significant crack and the other side had a tiny crack. These are newish rubber caps, too. Less than a year old I'd say. So I neatly wrapped a piece of black elec. tape around them and just for laughs, pushed the starter button and bam, it started up with the starter, without having put it on charger at all. I should take it back on the street and see if the other condition cleared up, too. hmm.
 
much better now - actually runs decently. I think it may need a clutch adjustment, that is what's dragging at take-off. I changed out to higher bars without doing a clutch adjustment, altho it's the same cable.
Amazing how just sitting causes problems in a bike. It's like it "rots" if not used.
 
emzdogz said:
ok so now it's maybe 15-20 mins later, I went out and inspected the rubber cap on the "barbs" sure enough, one side had a significant crack and the other side had a tiny crack. These are newish rubber caps, too. Less than a year old I'd say. So I neatly wrapped a piece of black elec. tape around them and just for laughs, pushed the starter button and bam, it started up with the starter, without having put it on charger at all. I should take it back on the street and see if the other condition cleared up, too. hmm.
Click to expand...

If you're running aftermarket petcocks it might not be a bad idea to link those 2 barbs together with a length of vacuum hose......prolly last a lot longer than those barb caps.
 
You can get replacement rubber caps at the auto parts store, a couple dollars for a 6 pack .....

VacCaps.jpg
 
TonyC, you were right, my carbs had (have) worse problems than just that sticky float. Almost everything gummed itself up sitting over the summer, unused, with ethanol gas in it and no Stabil or Seafoam. So, carbs are off now and pilot jets look kind of clogged. Air mixture screws were hard to unscrew/remove and I ruined the head of one of them.

Wondering when I put the new ones in, if I should maybe grease the threads?

Also one of the needle valve jets (that the slide needle rises in and out of, had MOVED and the top of it was no longer nearly flush with the bottom of the bore of carb throat. It had pulled up about 3/16ths or so higher than the other one.

So I have lots to consider. Just ordered $60 worth of parts from Mikes (new mixture screws and the "rebuild kit" for 34's, which gives you new float needles)

So from now on I will run Seafoam into this thing when I park it.

You hear about people being able to stick a new battery in an old barn bike and it firing right up. Makes me wonder how - if this one couldn't even sit over a summer without becoming a gummy brown mess.

Anyway, in a way I'm glad, as I now know why it was running so badly.

Makes me wonder about that slide needle jet - why that would rise upward like it did. I know it wasn't that way when I put the carbs on the bike.
 
taper jet; It's easy to get the order of washers springs spacers etc. wrong?
Sitting mess; Is it possible you have a leaky petcock letting a slow trickle of gas evaporate into the float bowls? My BS34's are going on 4 years after overhaul and I haven't had to touch them. Dry, cool, storage though. Bike sits 4 months with ethanol gas in it, put petcock on prime, fires right off and I ride away.:shrug:
 
Gary I have manual petcocks, so at least it's not flowing any extra gas when parked. However, the gas remaining in those bowls really did a lot of sticky harm.
Do you run your bowls dry before letting it sit 4 months?
 
just to give a sort of "visual" when I put the carbs on the first time, there was nothing brown - at all. When I took these off, the bowls were brown like carmelized sugar had coated the float bowls.
 

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