Possible vapor lock?
Posted: Fri Mar 27, 2009 1:36 pm
Hi all,
So I rode the bike in to work yesterday and she ran great as I hoped she would. When I got home I turned the petcock OFF thinking that I might not ride in today. Well, I in fact DID decide to ride today so I pulled the bike out, applied full choke, turn the kill switch to ON, hit the starter button, and she fired up within about a second. I'm guessing it took about 4 or 5 minutes for the revs to kick up to about 3000 at which point I closed the choke all the way. I want to mention that I would NORMALLY leave the choke applied for another couple minutes or so before closing it. So I sat there for another couple minutes with the bike running at idle. I then noticed it starting to sputter a little bit. I though to myself, "Crap, the petcock is turned off!" So I reached down and turned it on. In the past I never really turned the petcock off. For some reason I thought that I would start doing it for whatever reason. I sat there for another minute or so then put the bike in gear and started making my way down the driveway. Right away I noticed that it seemed a little rougher just off idle when letting out the clutch but I just figured she was still a little cold. I was stopped at the end of the driveway waiting for traffic to clear when I started to let out the clutch to get going - then the bike died. I hit the starter switch again and she fired right back up. At this point I heard a pop coming out of the exhaust. So I started revving the bike a bit and I noticed that she was indeed backfiring. I got off, took off my helmet and listened closely and noticed that the bike was still running as if it was running out of gas. After letting it run for another 5 - 10 minutes I put her back in the garage and took the truck in to work. Anyway, sorry for the long explanation but I was wondering if this could just be a case of the fuel system being vapor locked from starting to run out of gas? I thought I read somewhere a while back something about it taking 15 minutes or so for the bike to run smoothly again after switching to RESERVE when the bike starts running out of gas. Could this be a similar type of thing?
Thanks!
Brandon
So I rode the bike in to work yesterday and she ran great as I hoped she would. When I got home I turned the petcock OFF thinking that I might not ride in today. Well, I in fact DID decide to ride today so I pulled the bike out, applied full choke, turn the kill switch to ON, hit the starter button, and she fired up within about a second. I'm guessing it took about 4 or 5 minutes for the revs to kick up to about 3000 at which point I closed the choke all the way. I want to mention that I would NORMALLY leave the choke applied for another couple minutes or so before closing it. So I sat there for another couple minutes with the bike running at idle. I then noticed it starting to sputter a little bit. I though to myself, "Crap, the petcock is turned off!" So I reached down and turned it on. In the past I never really turned the petcock off. For some reason I thought that I would start doing it for whatever reason. I sat there for another minute or so then put the bike in gear and started making my way down the driveway. Right away I noticed that it seemed a little rougher just off idle when letting out the clutch but I just figured she was still a little cold. I was stopped at the end of the driveway waiting for traffic to clear when I started to let out the clutch to get going - then the bike died. I hit the starter switch again and she fired right back up. At this point I heard a pop coming out of the exhaust. So I started revving the bike a bit and I noticed that she was indeed backfiring. I got off, took off my helmet and listened closely and noticed that the bike was still running as if it was running out of gas. After letting it run for another 5 - 10 minutes I put her back in the garage and took the truck in to work. Anyway, sorry for the long explanation but I was wondering if this could just be a case of the fuel system being vapor locked from starting to run out of gas? I thought I read somewhere a while back something about it taking 15 minutes or so for the bike to run smoothly again after switching to RESERVE when the bike starts running out of gas. Could this be a similar type of thing?
Thanks!
Brandon