I know this topic has been covered extensively, and I feel like I've read all the tricks, but I still have my doubts on the correctness.
I have a 77 Cb550F with the stock carbs, and I'm trying to adjust the float bowls to the specified 22mm.
I have made a float adjust tool out of a gift card to make sure I can measure the distance accurately.
Before making any adjustments I checked the distance that the floats were currently set at, and I was surprised that they were all set to about 30mm. This is a far cry from the 22mm that they are intended to be set at, and yet the bike seemed to run reasonably well for being starved of fuel with that float setting.
The problem I'm having is that when I set the distance from the bottom of the float to the mating surface of the carb bowl, if I try to actuate the float to full compression of the needle it contacts the wall of the carb.
As you can see i the last to pictures, the tang is almost even with the cross support on the float