Fuel delivery problem
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Grand HDF Member
Joined: Nov 2012
Posts: 3,784
Likes: 100
From: Pasadena TX
Originally Posted by texashillcountry
Hey John are you thinking about attending the meet up?
Dirt don't hurt
Joined: Jan 2011
Posts: 21,065
Likes: 4,561
From: Haslet Texas
Have you got fuel coming through the petcock?
Stage IV
Joined: Apr 2018
Posts: 4
Likes: 0
From: Tampa Bay, Florida
I didn't mean to hijack John's thread... I believe so because I can drain the bowl of the carb, hit the starter, and fuel will come out the discharge tube. My brother talked me through putting in SeaFoam overnight, opening the throttle to let the foam work on the jets. I'm thinking I didn't get all the fuel out of the lines when I last put the bike away a year ago. Just now I was able to get the engine to chug very slowly by spraying in some carb cleaner to the air intake and working the starter. It chugged very slowly for a minute or so before it died. Now the battery is too low to try again, so I'm waiting for it to charge up a little.
So when I try to start again, what is the best way to proceed? Choke/no choke, try giving throttle/leave throttle alone. My brother suggested obscuring the air intake since it will be pulling too much air with no air cleaner in place, making it run too lean. Any advice is very appreciated. I'm not mechanical at all.
So when I try to start again, what is the best way to proceed? Choke/no choke, try giving throttle/leave throttle alone. My brother suggested obscuring the air intake since it will be pulling too much air with no air cleaner in place, making it run too lean. Any advice is very appreciated. I'm not mechanical at all.
Dirt don't hurt
Joined: Jan 2011
Posts: 21,065
Likes: 4,561
From: Haslet Texas
I didn't mean to hijack John's thread... I believe so because I can drain the bowl of the carb, hit the starter, and fuel will come out the discharge tube. My brother talked me through putting in SeaFoam overnight, opening the throttle to let the foam work on the jets. I'm thinking I didn't get all the fuel out of the lines when I last put the bike away a year ago. Just now I was able to get the engine to chug very slowly by spraying in some carb cleaner to the air intake and working the starter. It chugged very slowly for a minute or so before it died. Now the battery is too low to try again, so I'm waiting for it to charge up a little.
So when I try to start again, what is the best way to proceed? Choke/no choke, try giving throttle/leave throttle alone. My brother suggested obscuring the air intake since it will be pulling too much air with no air cleaner in place, making it run too lean. Any advice is very appreciated. I'm not mechanical at all.
So when I try to start again, what is the best way to proceed? Choke/no choke, try giving throttle/leave throttle alone. My brother suggested obscuring the air intake since it will be pulling too much air with no air cleaner in place, making it run too lean. Any advice is very appreciated. I'm not mechanical at all.
If you can get the bike to run with carb cleaner then your problem is between the intake and the tank.
One of the best things you can do is get rid of that vacuum operated petcock. JMO
You may need to clean/rebuild the carb.
Cruiser
Joined: Jul 2016
Posts: 195
Likes: 75
From: North Fl.
John, if you decide to replace the petcock I strongly suggest investing in a Pingle. I bought a new to me 92 Heritage Classic. I contaminated the fuel and bike would run a bit then die out.
Was advised by forum members on how to clean out tanks and to get a new petcock. Previous owner had installed a Pingle so I priced a new Pingle compared to going back to a stock petcock. (I had found a small hole in the petcock filter screen) price was about $25.00 higher for the Pingle. I was then told that Pingle would rebuild the petcock for $18.00 and that cost would cover return shipping. Sent petcock to Pingle. They received it on Thursday at 10 a.m. Rebuilt petcock was in my mail box on Monday.
I'd call Pingle and talk with them about the specifics of your bike. Was also told by Pingle to use approximately 3 to 3 1/2 wraps of plumbers tape on petcock threads to avoid fuel leaks and to be able to align petcock to fuel lines.
Was advised by forum members on how to clean out tanks and to get a new petcock. Previous owner had installed a Pingle so I priced a new Pingle compared to going back to a stock petcock. (I had found a small hole in the petcock filter screen) price was about $25.00 higher for the Pingle. I was then told that Pingle would rebuild the petcock for $18.00 and that cost would cover return shipping. Sent petcock to Pingle. They received it on Thursday at 10 a.m. Rebuilt petcock was in my mail box on Monday.
I'd call Pingle and talk with them about the specifics of your bike. Was also told by Pingle to use approximately 3 to 3 1/2 wraps of plumbers tape on petcock threads to avoid fuel leaks and to be able to align petcock to fuel lines.
Dirt don't hurt
Joined: Jan 2011
Posts: 21,065
Likes: 4,561
From: Haslet Texas
FWIW I've never used anything on my Pingel petcocks and I've never had a leak or trouble aligning petcock to fuel lines.
Stage IV
Joined: Apr 2018
Posts: 4
Likes: 0
From: Tampa Bay, Florida
In case this helps anyone searching, here's what I did to straighten out the clogged carb situation on my stock 1999 CV carb. This may all be wrong, I give no guarantees or even pretend to know what I'm doing. Try the following at your own risk:
Drain out all the gas from the tanks. Drain the carburetor fuel bowl. Put some SeaFoam in the gas tank, enough to flow through the petcock to the carburetor. Open the throttle and use the friction twisty to hold open. Put some SeaFoam into a spray bottle. Spray into the air intake after removing the air filter. Let sit overnight. Next morning I didn't even add gasoline, I ran the starter just with the sea foam. Refresh the spray in through the air intake. Let sit another overnight. Then either pump the SeaFoam out of the gas tank or mix in some fresh gasoline. Keep trying to start by priming with carb cleaner sprayed into the air intake. Took me several days of patient trying to get to the point where the engine would even try to continue running. As of last night I finally got the engine to idle and respond to the throttle without dying. Tonight I try to start it without priming with carb cleaner. If that works, then it's time for a road test.
That's what worked for me...and as stated before I'm in no way mechanical and just sort of blundered through to get the bike running. The procedure above is the condensed version of me starting over 19 times to finally get the right actions in place.
And once the engine starts running...the SeaFoam will smoke like a wood stove until the SeaFoam is all burned out. Don't panic like I did and run madly for a fire extinguisher. It will slowly stop smoking as everything works through.
Hope this helps someone with the same situation
Shmo
Drain out all the gas from the tanks. Drain the carburetor fuel bowl. Put some SeaFoam in the gas tank, enough to flow through the petcock to the carburetor. Open the throttle and use the friction twisty to hold open. Put some SeaFoam into a spray bottle. Spray into the air intake after removing the air filter. Let sit overnight. Next morning I didn't even add gasoline, I ran the starter just with the sea foam. Refresh the spray in through the air intake. Let sit another overnight. Then either pump the SeaFoam out of the gas tank or mix in some fresh gasoline. Keep trying to start by priming with carb cleaner sprayed into the air intake. Took me several days of patient trying to get to the point where the engine would even try to continue running. As of last night I finally got the engine to idle and respond to the throttle without dying. Tonight I try to start it without priming with carb cleaner. If that works, then it's time for a road test.
That's what worked for me...and as stated before I'm in no way mechanical and just sort of blundered through to get the bike running. The procedure above is the condensed version of me starting over 19 times to finally get the right actions in place.
And once the engine starts running...the SeaFoam will smoke like a wood stove until the SeaFoam is all burned out. Don't panic like I did and run madly for a fire extinguisher. It will slowly stop smoking as everything works through.
Hope this helps someone with the same situation
Shmo
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