Suddenly idling a bit high and smells rich

[JohnT]

Yesterday I fired the VR to go to my DOT physical. She settled into an idle at about 1200 rpm when the norm has been more like 800 or 900. Later that day, after say 100 miles of running errands (I may have taken the long way, all day) it now seems to smell very rich, real gassy. As in gasoline, not gassy like me after Mexican food. And it may have a slight stumble on one cylinder.

It ran fine when I shut it off the previous time it ran. I ran it Sunday, went to work Monday till Wednesday night and got on her Thursday morning. It just sat in the shed from the time it ran fine till it now runs differently. And not in a good way.

I had the carbs cleaned and tuned after I bought it. I run ethanol treatment religiously and have sea foamed it regularly. Any suggestions? Maybe the diaphragms or one of them, went bad?

[Snaggletooth]

First thing that would cause that would be a possible stuck float problem causing the fuel to overflow out the vent lines on top of the carbs. The rise in idle, heavy gas smell are the first signs and be sure to check for gas dripping, pooling or outright shooting out under the bike.

 

Now if you are getting heat temps like we are here the high temps seem to be bringing out the best of vacumn leaks when the bikes get warmed up good. That also brings on the high idle and can change the carb performance.

 

Mike

[JohnT]

Mike, I'm not seeing any gas poling or dripping. It has now "cooled off" to only the 80's and I am idling a bit lower (1000) and not smelling gas.

Hopefully my car has now stopped costing me money that should be spent on bike toys and tools. In the last month I have put in wheel bearings, rotors, calipers, pads, and lower control arms. Geez!

Like to get carb tune stuff. One less thing to go to the $repair shop$ for. Don't even have a vacum gauge any more. Remember when you would hook a vacuum gauge to your car, rip off most of the smog stuff, tune for good vacuum, and get great mileage and performance? I need to find a "good old days" icon. That was easy.

[Snaggletooth]

That's good news on finding no gas puddles. That can go either way real fast. Easy or hard. Since you keep up with the fuel treatments you're probably fine.

 

If you can figure which cylinder is stuttering you might pull that diaphragm and check it. I had one a couple weeks ago I found a small hole in, not a pin hole either, and it had some effect on the idle and even more on how it started. If you find one bad one, ya better eyeball them all.

 

Old school, heck yeah!! The last car I had that I actually liked and enjoy working on was my '69 GTO, or the '62 Impala. What smog stuff? LOL!

 

Now MPG, that was another story. The Impala got 12 to 14. Not bad. The Goat, well if I didn't run it much past idle I could get 7 MPG out it. Once the shoe hit the pedal that went out the window.

 

Feeler gauges, timing light and a vacumm bar. Pretty much did the trick back then.

 

SOB! Now I'm depressed.

 

Mike