Leaderboard

A mind like a rusty steel trap, never know when it's gonna snap! Aviation Mechanic Structures (AMS) 3rd class petty officer (AMS3)

Hey Ron, prior Navy here as well AMS3, it's ironic, I like riding too. Welcome to the site.

Hello. My name is Ron. Retired Navy. Enjoy just riding.

@skydoc_17,, Earl I know that pic looked absolutely normal to you, and it probably would to me too if I had just went thru fry pan adjustment like you just worked your way thru, but something did not come thru correctly on my end so I thought I would volunteer some rotational assistance. Tippy wants to know if, after your ears stop ringing, you would ask that lovely bride of yours how she chooses Rockwell hardness on her fry pans she uses for corrective devices? She mumbled something about the point on my bald head having a tendency of deforming her pans. Puc

Just to fill you in a little better on the Navy vernacular about what I did in Uncle Sam's yacht club. An aviation structural mechanic, better know as a metal mauler (hence the 2 crossed hammers), the job duties were the repair of all the exterior flight surfaces of aircraft. All the interior subframe structures, and on helicopters, which I repaired for 4 years, all the blades and flight control cables and that sorts. Here is what my rate badge looked like. I also learned how to professionally paint compliments of Uncle Sam and the American taxpayer.

Had some rather large, dead branches way up high on a tree, overhanging where I usually park the cars, so I rented a 55' lift to get up there and cut them down. The lift BARELY got me there, but I got 'er dun. Was a bit squirrely up that high running a saw, leaning over the side of the basket. The main branch that I was worried about was on the tree to the right, just at the Y.

You have to watch out for those retired Navy Guys. Welcome to the group.

THAT is AWESOME!! Thank you Brad for your service and thank you for the schoolin!! Tip is tugging on my arm to take her out for our daily 2 mile walk (doctors orders - my heart, her colestoral) BEFORE it gets dark here in Michigan but I got some thoughts rattling around in my head (as usual) concerning the matter.. Be right back!! Puc

Thank you Squid!! I knew it would have something to do with being the brains of some kind of operation. It sounds like you are describing taking care of the structural aspect of airplanes? If so, did you ever get to see/touch an A-10 Warthog? Reason I ask, many years ago my son Jay and I went up to Waters Michigan to a practice air base out in the middle of nowhere called "Steel Gate" - it was during the early 90's and the place was open to the public,,, wayyyy cool!! We watched A-10's fly in for "practice" with their 20mm gatlings opening up on some beat up tanks and stuff in a huge field.. WOWZY was that amazing!! Shoulda heard them gatlings - OH MY GOODNESS, talk about fire power.. We saw lots of birds, including Helio's up there thru the years but bar none,, our favorite was the Warthog!!

Thank you Puc! I'm looking forward to digging into the carbs more and learning how they work. I looked on ebay for a used set, just to play around with and explore how they work. Oh my, that's an expensive toy, $300+ for a set of used carbs!

Ok brother,,, as you know,, I know nothing of the military so you gotta explain something to me,, what is AMS3? I get one guess right? Right.. Soooo,, my guess,,, Almost Mid Ship 3rd bunk... Am I close😄? Heyy,, I tried!!

Tip, Tweeks and I went huntin for a Vogel one time and this is what we found (YE BE WARNED):

You are correct, Dennis was a serious gearhead. Very meticulous with any maintenance he did on any machine. If he did the work, it was done correct to perfection.

Hi Puc, Up until this last ride, and maybe one other time, the two back pipes did not read the same. I am able to take the exact same reading (directly on the pip, same angle, etc) on both of them. #1 is always ~400+ and #3 was reading the same (~200) as I got on the #1 & #2 flanges. I guess I made a bad assumption there on those readings (pipe vs. flange). Part of my learning/education process. I guess I see now the difference in thermal mass, but not sure why I was seeing such a difference, directly on the #1 & #3 pipes before. And for what its worth, #1 gets to that temperature within minutes. From what I'm learning from all you zen masters, that sounds like it is running lean and now maybe the same for #3. I'm going to follow Patch's bench sync advice and see what comes next. @bpate4home Yeah, I hear you and having an EE background that was my first instinct also. I hooked up 12 v to the fan connector and confirmed it came on and then also got her warm & let it sit until the fan kicked on to confirm all the other sensor & control circuitry works. If it makes small sparks, I understand it. Its all this big, controlled explosion stuff that's outside of my wheelhouse!

Yep. Welcome to IT. 🤪

The spark plug caps are not sealed very well to the wires. Moisture gets in there and corrodes the copper core spark plug wire. Usually snipping off a little wire and reinserting the wire into the cap is all that is needed to get the spark back to normal. Very common issue with these bikes.

Seeing I got summons here (thanks @Patch) I thought I better join in on the fun and share some more, maybe it will help - maybe it won't back yard wrench spinning free advice.. Noting now @circa1968 that you have been taking your temp reading off different spots on both the front and rear jugs changes the dynamics a lot IMHO. Taking the reading right off the header itself on the rears and off the clamps on the front should actually read about what you are describing.. The headers are way thinner than the clamps and are also in direct line of fire for exhaust flames,, to me what you are saying makes sense. Also, those front jugs are directly exposed to air flow with the rear jugs getting no where near the exposure. I ran/rebuilt/tuned/modded numerous HD air cooled over the years and being air cooled - one of the things I did was ran dual carbs (or later injected with a race tuner was even easier to do this) and then run fatter on the rear jug to keep it cooler.. Lean = hot IMHO. I always found the following advice a little easier to do on a single, or even a twin cylinder scoot but with a little focus on my part I can usually adjust by ear a multi jug, multi carb in the following way too. Another way besides the following is with either a sniffer or a Color Tune (so you can actually look into the combustion chamber and adjust for the blue flame) but again, I have found following to work well. If lean does equal heat than it may be possible that you are seeing a lean condition.. That would not surprise me because it seems like for many years bike manufacturers have been actually outputting scoots that run extremely lean since new, maybe due to EPA regs,, maybe not.. Maybe I am even wayyyy off base with that comment but it seems that way to me.. I have noticed lean idle circuits also causing erratic idle and also stumble right off the bottom when you crack the throttle,, a bog so to speak.. The way an idle circuit works, at least in my pea brain, is that with the throttle plates closed meaning your throttle is twisted at all and your throttle cable has slack in it, vacuum forms behind the throttle plate and fuel/air mix is drawn into the throat of the carb thru that set of little holes you will see back there. One of the ways I always used, right or wrong it worked for me, to know that my low speed jets were correct size and that I used for setting my air screws with NO sniffer or carb tune was by ear tuning. Simply run your air screws down to bottom lightly and back them out a turn, start your bike and let it warm up so it is no longer needing choke, set your idle at 1000 rpm, now adjust the air screw and adjust it out till it reaches top r's - there should be a point where it reaches top rpms and if you keep unscrewing it will falls off again, then screw it back in till it reaches top r's again, now screw it in farther and it will fall off again. The "sweet spot" of top R's on the air screw is where I always found the perfect idle circuitry tune. Now if you run the screw back to bottom and note the turns it takes to get to a soft bottom - if the turns equal between 1 and 3 turns out you have the correct idle/low speed jet in that carb. If the top r's are below 1 turn your low speed jet is to small, higher than 3 turns out and your low speed jet is to high. Make since? If so, and I have used this method for years in tuning, than you can now see where you could use that logic in diagnosing whether you are dealing with a lean low speed circuitry caused by crud buildup in one of your carbs or not simply by tuning them. Right off idle and up to WOT (wide open throttle) and the tapered metering rod hanging off the slide into the emulsion tube and the main jet at the bottom of the tube take over. I spent a couple years doing final tune on small 1 pot Hondas at a Honda dealership and 90% of the final tune work on those brand new bikes right out of the crate was moving the E clip on that jet needle hanging from the slide to get em to run right.. Most of the time this meant fattening em up so they didnt bog when I wacked the throttle. Because our V-4's carbs do not have E-clips I am running shimmed metering rods in mine right now. Shimming them out gives you a fatter off idle/mid range/WOT,, lowering them will lean er down.. Why do I mention this? Because,, IMHO, you could - for very little money - fatten up a jug or two and see if your temps drop.. If they did, again IMHO, this could indicate a partially blocked main.. Make since? I know,, getting long winded,, dont blame me, blame @Patch lol

Thank you Patch. I understood your procedure perfectly and will follow it. Unfortunately, I did not track the plugs when I removed them, but have a few miles on the new plugs, so will pull them & get pics to see if that is of any use. I will also take pics of the old plugs, for what that's worth. I'm pretty mechanically inclined and have an engineering degree and a quick study of most things that come along. I like challenges, just have zero experience working on engines or carbs and don't want to screw anything up. But that said, I've learned a lot already and each new step leaves me wanting to learn/do more. Fascinating stuff. I did get out for a ride yesterday. the cooling issue seems to be much better. I noticed it getting warm a couple times when in traffic, but out on the twisty road had no issues. Of course it was also in the 60's vs. 90's when I first got the bike and noticed the heat. At the end of my ride, the radiator was reading ~200F, a little warm, but seems mostly normal. #1 & #3 (two back) were reading 400+ on the exhaust pipe (#3 was not this high previously). #2 & 4 were reading ~200ish but I can only check those on the mounting flange, not the pipe itself. For what its worth, when I check the mounting flange on #1 & #3, instead of the exhaust pipe, they are also 200ish. Again, I sincerely appreciate the help and information!

I always thought of one of those as a deer stand.

Ah Pucster, Thank you brother! Like you said, with my head laying sideways on the puter desk that pic looked quite normal to me ! (Actually, I tried to rotate that pic several times, with NO luck!) Jean said she used the Pork Chops in light oil heat treat method which never fails to render me horizontal on the computer desk! In the case of your Magus Cranium Brainium, we could be talking something in the 50 cal. weight to get thru that kanoggin' of yours! Just sayin'!! Thanks again, my friend! Earl

HEY! I resemble that comment......

Clearly I'm in the right place....

You don’t have to apologize here, this place is full of twisted demented minds.

When you synced the carbs, did you try adjusting the idle mixture screws? I'm in the process of valve adjustment on my Kawasaki ZN700 four. It only has 6k plus miles on it and the valves are too tight to meet spec on 3 of the 4 cyl and the 4th is at the lower edge of spec. I have revved the crap out of that engine though and a few times over revved it when I missed a shift. It will not shift quickly when it's revved tight. (10,000 rpm redline) The Yamaha V4s may be entirely different though. Cowpuc says he ran his 5 XVZ1200s over 200k miles and never adjusted the valves!

We stay at Vogel State Park, several people camp and some stay in local motels. Everyone is welcome no matter what ride or drive and you can look up past Vogels to see what fun is had.

Thats Big Mike with him, great pic of them, thanks for posting it

Yep, and some of us are so well blessed as to have 2 of those things. I have no idea what they're used for or how to manipulate them, but somebody will sure be able to set things in the right order.