I have a 75 with an edelbrock quicksilver carb. the previous owner of my bike turned the pipes really blue from running so lean, he said he fixed it and got the carb dialed in. when I got the bike last week (it came across country on a truck)I could not get it started , changed the plugs, charged the battery, and kicked like hell, finally got it started. after reading many methods for starting I realized that every bike was different,, so the way mine started is I had to twist the trottle wide open about 6-10 times then it would fire up. I havent been able to ride it until tonight because of steering problems. anyways thats the info leading up to tonight, I barley made it out of the drive with all the sputtering, gave the throttle a good twist and I get no acceleration and a lot of back firing, I kept on going through all the gears to see how it responded and it does this the whole way through. I went onto edelbrocks website and all these symtoms lead to the bike running lean. does this sound like its lean to you guys (piniongear feel free to step in)? the edelbrock site shows how to adjust the low end 0-1/3 throttle, it looks like I would need a new needle to adjust mid-high range, I dont know that I need the new needle though, he swears it ran great, would adjusting the lowend to a richer setting cure the whole range. I would just assume get a new carb but cant afford it and really want to ride tomorrow. any suggestions are welcome. Is it possible that the float was damaged during transit, would this cause the same problem? I am at a loss.

 

I also want to add another question, The vent tube that comes out of the bottom of the motor on the right side ( the tube shoots downward it comes out of the round looking part at the front end of the right side cover) sorry im new to harleys and dont know what its called, anyways, it seems like when the bike is parked and ideling or when im reving it in place, that there is a light mist and drops on the ground underneith this tube. is this normal? or does mean there is a problem

 

That tube is the gearcase vent tube. It's normal fo a little ight mist but no more than that.

 

I would get rid of that Edelbrock. Sell it on Ebay and let it be someone elses headache. Find a used Bendix or Kehin.

 

If you wanna use a stocker I have one with the original breather

 

Generally, backfires through the carb is lean, backfires out the pipes is fat. I doubt your needle was damaged in shipping. If it came from a high altitude( Like from Denver) to sea level your jetting will be way off, but other than those extremes it should be adjustable I would think. Backfiring could be a timing problem as well.

 

Irondude, you are my man!!!!, opened the points cover, the screws had come loose and everything rotated around. I searched through some old posts on this site and found that the screw should be set to middle of the holes, made the adjustments, went for a ride. She is running like a raped ape. My goodness these things are fast. still seems to be just a hair on the lean side around full throttle, but its leaps and bounds better than it was. thanks for the help.