Cylinders dropping out

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gltriker
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#31

Post by gltriker »

Koboldwrangler wrote: Sat Aug 20, 2022 11:28 pm
snip- if it were running really rich on two cylinders id expect it to be running like the choke was on.

"Running like the choke was on" rings a bell for me.

2 years ago I found the choke cable on my trike's engine didn't have enough slack in the off position and the right side carburetors' choke shutters, only, weren't spring returning to a fully open position.

A year or so before my engine's choke issue, I recall another member was puzzling through a plugs fouling issue on one side of his engine. He finally discovered the choke shutters weren't fully opening on that side of his engine.
Wasn't caused by insufficient choke cable slack adjustment though.
May have been the actual problem was discovered under the soft black rubber cap that covers that particular side's fine wire torsion spring?

Done ;)
Cliff (74yrs ;) )

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'75 GL1000 home built trike; http://www.ngwclub.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=39996
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#32

Post by Koboldwrangler »

Welp, happy ending.

Ordered the ignition, coils, and wire kit. should be here sometime next week.

Fixed the float bowl screws. All you need is an 8-32 tap and some screws. No drilling necessary.

Before reinstalling the carbs, I wanted to figure out what the main issue was. I started by ohming out the coils through the boots. First coil was ~23kohm, second was ~145kohm. Huh, bad coil, eh? I went up in the attic and grabbed a spare set of VF500F coils I had to use in the mean time. Before tearing into it, I wanted to double check my findings so I could report back here. First set, 23kohm, second set....open circuit? But nothings changed...

Alright, maybe its the boots. Took the boots off and checked the coils through the leads. First one, 14.3kohm, second 14.9kohm. I wish they were a bit closer, but not terrible for 44 year old coils. Soooo...the issue lies in the boots then. Checked the boots and...all but one tested open. Odd considering I had a good reading on one of the coils...

Tore into the boots. All the resistors checked okay, with the readings between 4.2kohm-4.8kohm. Alright, what else could it be? Shined a light into the boot and...wow, theres a crap load of carbon buildup on the surface where the spring sits. So much that it was rather hard to see since it blended in with the plastic.

Got in there with anything remotely sharp that also fit, and was long enough, and started scraping. Got most of the carbon out after a few passes and reassembled the boots. Each one now read a consistent 4.2kohm-4.8kohm. Cool.

After plopping the carbs back in and getting everything reassembled, I took the bike around the block, and wow what a difference. No red light stutter, and no high rpm drop out anymore. Engine revved smooth as butter.

What a wild ride for something simple. It was so odd that the issue got worse as the engine got hotter. Guess I'll keep this event in my mental notes under things to look out for on old hondas
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#33

Post by redglbx »

Good news !

A couple of additional things, I am a big fan of high output coils in my Old Honda’s as the oe’s are generally In the 5-7k volts output and the Dyna’s or equivalent are generally 30-35k output, big difference, it seems to make them start and idle better as well as less cold blooded, that’s where the high output coils really make a difference.

On the plug caps, I’ve taken to just removing the resistors anymore and replace them with a piece of heavy copper grounding wire, makes them now read 0 ohms across them and should stay that way to infinity and beyond ! But you need some resistance down stream to help fill the coils so I just use resistor plugs,they are more readily available and measure the same resistance as the caps should if you buy the equivalent of the oe plugs but in a resistor type. By the way I use iridium plugs which should in theory last 100k miles, theoretically ! But I will say that the next time I replace plugs I’ll probably just use standard resistor plugs.

Glad to hear you got your bike running good, they are a true delight to ride WHEN they run right, enjoy it!
Red 1976 oe owner
1976 LTD restored
1980 CBX , in the que, to fix the ignorant heavy handed owner
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#34

Post by CYBORG »

redglbx wrote: Sun Aug 21, 2022 9:05 am Good news !

A couple of additional things, I am a big fan of high output coils in my Old Honda’s as the oe’s are generally In the 5-7k volts output and the Dyna’s or equivalent are generally 30-35k output, big difference, it seems to make them start and idle better as well as less cold blooded, that’s where the high output coils really make a difference.

On the plug caps, I’ve taken to just removing the resistors anymore and replace them with a piece of heavy copper grounding wire, makes them now read 0 ohms across them and should stay that way to infinity and beyond ! But you need some resistance down stream to help fill the coils so I just use resistor plugs,they are more readily available and measure the same resistance as the caps should if you buy the equivalent of the oe plugs but in a resistor type. By the way I use iridium plugs which should in theory last 100k miles, theoretically ! But I will say that the next time I replace plugs I’ll probably just use standard resistor plugs.

Glad to hear you got your bike running good, they are a true delight to ride WHEN they run right, enjoy it!
I agree about the iridium plugs. Never liked them....gave up on them
1978 custom GL1000
1977 custom with 1200 engine
1985 gl1200
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#35

Post by JAMi_750 »

A quick note to check-in as I had this same set of problems on my '77 GL - erratic idle, and running good one minute, then seemingly running on two cylinders the next. The bike has rebuilt carbs and a dyna electric ignition to replace the points. It turns out there were two issues a foot, the first issue was a partially collapsed right header, and the second, which turned-out to be the primary issue, was a bad coil. Replaced the coils and the bike runs great!
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#36

Post by Dirty Dave »

Koboldwrangler wrote: Fri Aug 19, 2022 10:50 am


Why three turns? I currently have them set to 1.5 turns according to randakks blog.

As of right now, they are dynamically sync'd as close as I can get them. The sync gauge slides werent perfectly straight with each other, but they are close. I cannot get them perfect with the tools I have. I need to get a sync wrench...
Are all 16 float bowl retaining screws equally tight.No stripped threads.Very Important!
The bowls are tight, though I do have stripped screws (thanks PO :roll: ). Whenever I pull the bowls I have to re-epoxy the screws and clamp the two bowls to ensure they wont leak. How do I go about fixing this? Drill and retap?

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Seems Randakk & Mike Nixon agree on the idle mix screw turnout.

Early 78, 1 & 1/2 turns (769A)
Late 78, 79, 2 turns (771A)
(As per Mike Nixon's 2009 GL1000 carb rebuilding booklet that came with Randakk's kit)

Cliff's bike prefers 3 turns. Dunno. Trial and error are best.

I had to replace multiple float bowl screws with Heli-Coil inserts.
I wouldn't trust epoxy with the heat.
1978/9 GL1000
1997 Honda Valkyrie
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#37

Post by Koboldwrangler »

Dirty Dave wrote: Thu Sep 22, 2022 9:46 pm
Early 78, 1 & 1/2 turns (769A)
Late 78, 79, 2 turns (771A)
(As per Mike Nixon's 2009 GL1000 carb rebuilding booklet that came with Randakk's kit)

Cliff's bike prefers 3 turns. Dunno. Trial and error are best.

I had to replace multiple float bowl screws with Heli-Coil inserts.
I wouldn't trust epoxy with the heat.
Please read post #32 regarding the screws.
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#38

Post by robin1731 »

I use time-serts for the bowl screws. Better than helicoils for screws that small.
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#39

Post by pidjones »

On one of my rescues, 16 bowl screws had to be Helicoiled. Darned PO had sheet metal, wood, and sheet rock screws in it. One the correct JIS - it was stripped.
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#40

Post by redglbx »

PID, seems that wood & sheet metal screws are a common fix on these bikes for some people. I have an 80 1100 that I bought from a friend who just threw up his hands and gave up on ! I recommended a guy to him to redo the carbs for him and the bike hasn’t ran since ! All the carb bowls are attached with wood screws ! I feel really bad because the guy charged him well over $600 to rebuild them and just effed them up ! The rebuilder was a long time friend and a supposed long time GL expert, they are a total mess !

Anyway, I bought a supply of helicoils in anticipation of rebuilding them, hope to get into them shortly.

Robin, can you explain the difference between a helicoil and a time-sert by chance ?
Red 1976 oe owner
1976 LTD restored
1980 CBX , in the que, to fix the ignorant heavy handed owner
1981 CBX
1977 CB750 K7
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1980 GL1100
1984 GL1200 naked
1969 CL350, in the que
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#41

Post by Whiskerfish »

redglbx wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 6:34 am SNIP

Robin, can you explain the difference between a helicoil and a time-sert by chance ?

Video here viewtopic.php?f=8&p=810977#p810977
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#42

Post by robin1731 »

Whiskerfish wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 7:29 am
redglbx wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 6:34 am SNIP

Robin, can you explain the difference between a helicoil and a time-sert by chance ?

Video here viewtopic.php?f=8&p=810977#p810977
I've watched a few of their videos and I must say, IMO, that isn't one of the better ones. It does do a good job of showing the differences though. FYI, you can get the time-serts in different lengths. They are not cheap, but worth the expense. I have had to do a lot of thread repair on carbs. Sometimes doing all 16.
1976 Goldwing Super Sport
1985 Honda Elite
1976 KZ900 Dragbike
1992 ZX7 Dragbike (KZ900 style motor w/NOS)
and a rotation of various purchases
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#43

Post by redglbx »

Thanks guys, after finishing the current set of carbs and doing all 16 bowl screws with heli-coils and multiple assembly & disassembly of bowls I can see that “time-serts” would’ve maybe been a better choice I think. But they are now done & tight and no leaks ! If I delve into them again and definitely on the 1100 carbs once I get into them to fix the wood screw cowboys mess. Again, thanks guys !
Red 1976 oe owner
1976 LTD restored
1980 CBX , in the que, to fix the ignorant heavy handed owner
1981 CBX
1977 CB750 K7
2014 FJR OE owner, sold
1980 GL1100
1984 GL1200 naked
1969 CL350, in the que
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Re: Cylinders dropping out

#44

Post by Bloodhound »

Sounds like mine was , I got mine hot , then removed one intake rubber at a time and idle screw and brake cleaned and blew out back and forth on the idle discharge port , I also added a ignition relay to boost my power to the input side of the ballast I have a 76 , get a ignition output tester some of the power probes you just put tip on outer ignition lead , mine has chinese replacement coils runs good now but I think the coils could be better .when your on 3 or 3 ½ cylinders they wouldn't pull the skin off a rice pudding ! .cheers.
76 GL1000 ,73 Norton mk5 , 75 Triumph T160 , 49 Matchless G80 500 rigid ,and
X4 76 HondaTL250s
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