Dredging up this old thread to give a quick update.
I took the carbs off to put larger pilots in and to go over them thoroughly once more as carb 3 still wasn't reading on the sniffer at idle. Sort of the standard approach, took everything apart, blasted all the ports with PB Blaster, poked them with guitar string, blew them out with compressed air... One float was a little low, but clearly not enough to cause an issue.
It wasn't until I got to the idle fuel orifice, a tiny hole on the bottom of the engine side of the carb body, that I noticed an issue. The guitar string only went through one of the ports.
Seems someone, odds are it was me, over tightened the pilot fuel screws on 3 of 4 carbs causing the delicate tapered tips to jam in the idle port and shear off. In my defense, the springs and o-rings on the screws create some resistance, making it hard to know exactly when the screw has bottomed out.
Never having had all the screws off at the same time, I didn't notice that the tips of the screws looked different. Pretty obvious once they're on the table together though.
It's not an unusual problem, so I'm not beating myself up too badly. However, getting the broken off tips out of the carb bodies isn't the most fun I've ever had.
In any case, this explains some of the problems I was having, and new screws are on the way.
The other issue was one of the accelerator pump sticking. This was solved by using a felt polishing bob on a Dremel, and some Mother's to clean out the pump piston bore. Much nicer now and it returns fully every time.
As for jetting, the needles that come with the carbs might be fine for a stock GS750, but on a modified 836 they're too lean. 9DZH03's are much better, curing the huge lean-out that was occurring right after the end of the accelerator pump stroke finished. 127.5 mains were too lean with my open 4 into 4's and 50mm velocity stacks, but with balky pilots and a lean needle it's not an accurate measure. As soon as the new screws are in hand, we'll get back on the dyno and try again.