"...the first time," huh? That's a story i'd be interested in hearing.
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So if I have a jet that's a little too rich can I lean it out on the carb? For instance, I get a 105 main jet and the bike would like a 102 better can I adjust fuel mixture down without rejetting?
And now a 16T front sprocket is on my to do list as well.
Beware that the 16T is not very good for freeway/cruise driving. If the bike is in town only, the 16T is good.
The screw adjustment on the carb is an air screw primarily to tweak the pilot circuit mixture. The pilot circuit is dominant at up to 1/4 throttle setting where the throttle valve and Main jet take over. The pilot circuit doesn't have much contribution at WOT where the main jet is dominant. Further, if you did use the air screw to limit Main jet contribution, then the idle speed would be way lean and your throttle response for low RPM would be hideous.
Bike sales story:
I learned about the bike on the old SOHC4 mailing list. A guy posted and asked if the Cb550 was "unloved", as he was having a hard time finding a buyer. Since he was only about 5 miles away from me I went to go look at it. It didn't run, but was worth the asking price except there was no title. How this guy acquired it was kinda ...odd. I think he loaned someone money and when the borrower moved away, he "collected" the bike in his garage. Lot's of time passed without contact so he eventually decided to try and sell it, as he didn't even ride motorcycles. I said if he could produce a legal title, I would buy it. So, he went through some sort of lien sale process with the state, and acquired title to the bike. Took him 3 months. But, I finally bought it, loaded it into the truck, and took it home. Whoever had "owned" it tried to make a "sort of" cafe racer. The previous owner had stripped it down, probably because removing parts was cheap. Did a decent job on rattle can paint, but the tank was rusty inside and fouling carbs; it had lowered bars, no rear fender, bald rear tire, clutch cable routed so badly that the clutch would disengage if you turned the bars to the left. And for all the cafe leanings it still had a style low king/queen seat on it. I assume it was cheap/free and looked better than the original torn up seat. The Koni shocks on it looked good but would hardly move. The internals of them were dry and damaged. (I still have them in the parts pile.) There was this banging sound over bumps that was the shock end of travel, quite audible, and the springs were too strong.
Anyway, I went through the bike, brakes, carbs, a Kreem job for the tank. Put a the fender back on, some old shocks that would move if not have new damping, tires, carb rebuild, put on the seat you see in the pic, etc. Generally, I made it into a nice street bike. I used it for commuting in the summer. But, I had too many bikes. And when a guy at work showed an interest, we struck a deal and off it went. I still saw it at work, and helped him with the routine maintenance. A year goes by. The guy needed to go back to Nepal and live near his father who was having age related issues and he needed closer attention.
I bought the bike back for very very near what I had sold it to him. I kept it for a while. But, I still had too many bikes.
I saw a craigslist add from someone who wanted a CB550. I sent him the picture above. And we eventually struck deal #2. In hindsight, I should have refused. He was a new rider with zero knowledge about things mechanical and no aptitude to acquire those skills. He kept calling me about a starting problem. And every time I went to go check it out it worked fine for me. He kept telling me, he was getting stranded when it wouldn't start and the kick starter wouldn't work. Yes, I tried to explain that the clutch had to be out for the kick to work. But, when he stalled it, the bike would be in gear and the kick won't work unless in neutral. He couldn't grasp the concept. And, since he wouldn't drive the fast enough or keep the RPM much above idle, he kept running the battery down. So, the electric start wouldn't work. He finally damaged the battery enough so it was unreliable. After the fifth time going over to start his bike for him and finding nothing wrong, he finally stopped calling me.
About a year later. I encountered another person interested in buying a 550. He wanted a cheap one he could turn into a cafe racer. I wasn't willing to meet his price on any in my fleet. But, what he was asking for fit the description of the bike I sold last year. So, I called him to see if he wanted to sell it. He already had sold it to a woman about six months back, but knew she had to sell the bike. We got the number, called, and arranged to see what condition it was in. Under a tarp in front of her garage, there it was still looking like the last time I had seen it. She said she hadn't run it much since she was diagnosed with MS (The reason for selling). And, that replacing the battery immediately after buying, it had run well to that point. She liked the bike and was sad to sell it. She was worried it wouldn't run anymore as the battery had run down.
It was a funny situation. I kicked it though to check the compression. Then, I put on the gas valve, gave it full choke, turned off the lights, Key on and it started on the first kick. She was amazed. Knowing I had been the one who had owned it before said, "the master's touch".
#2 pipe wasn't heating properly. But, the bike was still drivable, if a bit lacking in power. I drove it, he drove it. I told him that the carbs may need cleaning, or possibly that a slow jet was stuffed, but, otherwise the bike was still a nice bike. The two of them struck a deal, and I felt I had sold it a third time.
He drove it back to my house (I followed in his car), where I supervised his removing the carb bowls and pilot jet removals. Sure enough one of them was clogged, #2. The bike now drove as I remembered it. And the new buyer was ecstatic that it now had so much more power than on the drive back to my house. Last I heard, he still had the bike.
That's how I sold the same bike 3 times.
Cheers,
