Paulages was kind enough to swing by yesterday and do a full tune-up for me on timing and carbs. The left seems much less affected by the mixture screw than the right, the right seemed like a snap to figure out.
...today stuff got interesting-er.
I took the bike for a 5 mile ride just to make sure I was relatively close to home in case it died on me. I had to mess with the idle kind of a lot to keep it idling at stops, but once I was home it was no problem. Go figure.
There seems to be some kind of step-off when I use the idle adjust near the handlebars, either it idles away relatively smoothly at 1800, or it bogs to 1k, 800, then dead.
If I run for >5k rpms for any amount of time, then try to idle, it does the same thing. When I'm RIDING, it feels great, pulls enough to put me back in the seat, and is generally a lot of fun.
Oh, and trying to kick it over when it's good and hot is a betch. I need to really jump on it, HARD. I can't say I remember it doing that, but then again I've also used the starter button mostly until now.
After the ride I let it cool for a little bit and then pulled the plugs.
The results this time aren't far different from what I was seeing before, which isn't exactly heartening considering how we adjusted the carbs etc
Right Plug- The right cylinder's exhaust has been cooler at all times and all rpms than the left's. Appearance: black around edge n ground strap, center ceramic is dark chocolate brown. Black is not fluffy- seems kinda tarry. Yes, I know what that means, but I want someone to tell me it's okay.
Left Plug- The left has always been warmer than the right. Appearance: Ground strap has some white on it. Center ceramic is greyish white. runnin' pretty lean?
WTF? Is there any way I can get out of this without it being like pulling teeth? I guess the caveat to the way the right plug looks is that I don't blow smoke out of that exhaust pipe, so despite whatever fouling is going on there, it's not translating to the exhaust. Also weird, though, is how the left (lower) exhaust was blowing a crap ton of smoke yesterday while Paul was here, seeming rich as hell, but the plug still looks as lean as it did when the bike shut down on me and died some weeks ago.
Charging is good, though. With the light on, I read 12.55 at the battery terminals while the bike idles and got 12.8v after my ride yesterday.
I'd try turning that idle air screw out a little, but from what we were seeing yesterday, it didn't seem to make much difference. That and if the right plug is oil fouling, then adjusting that idle air screw won't do anything either.
It also seems as though one cylinder drops out occasionally while at idle, so it'll be at 2,000 then drop suddenly to 1200. I blip the throttle and it comes right back up again.
Where do I go from here? I'd like to start at the least invasive stuff first, obviously, but when things need done, they need done.
