The Art of the Kick Start

Topper wrote:

mtbspeedfreak wrote: Index the engine to the compression stroke.

So how exactly do you do that? I slowly rotate the kick shaft until I start to feel a little resistance. Is that what you're talking about?

Exactly!

Ease the starter down, until you get just past TDC. Then raise the starter all the way back up, and give it a good kick with all your weight on the kickstarter. Same way you start a big single.

How do you know you're just past TDC?

Topper wrote: How do you know you're just past TDC?

The kickstarter moves a lot easier. One piston on exhaust stroke, one piston on compression stroke. The reason for easing it just over TDC is it give you a head start at getting the engine up to speed as there is very little resistance for the first half revolution. Think of it as a running start.

Stand next to bike on right side and kick eith your left foot.

Thanks for all the tips. I have to say this has been maddening. I'll manage to start it, let it warm up, maybe even go for a ride. Let it sit for an hour or two, start it again, no problem. Go out the next morning try the exact same thing and get nothing.

Fuel levels have been set with clear tube, point gap and timing checked. Coils are new (ish). Battery checks out. Plugs gapped. Carbs are clean.

I don't know why it's so damn finicky. I still feel like there's something I'm doing that's subtly different each time I kick. But I can't work out what it is.

I've had three days of successful kick starting from cold. I hesitate to say what the solution was because with my luck it'll all stop working again this afternoon.

There doesn't really seem to have been a magic bullet here. The things that seem to have helped (and maybe will help others) were:

1. Opening the choke just a hair. I look at the plunger on the right side of the bike (I've technically got an enrichment circuit, not a choke) and open it just slightly. There's too much play in the choke lever to do it without watching the plunger. Initially I was opening the choke all the way, like I might for a cold electric start. That was a mistake. I think I was flooding the engine and then nothing else I did would start the bike. I open it a hair, kick start it, then open the choke up to keep it running while it warms up.

2. Finding TDC in the kick stroke and going just barely past it. I had to take off the points cover and watch for TDC to really learn exactly where it is and what it felt like when I found it in the kick stroke. If I go too far past it, no start. If I hit TDC too early in the kick stroke, it just locks and it feels like I just kicked the wall.

3. Trying to focus on a fast kick rather than a powerful kick. I think this has a lot to do with finding TDC. Before I was consistently finding that, I might hit TDC at any point in the kick stroke and that meant I needed a lot of power to get through without jamming up my leg. So I put a lot of weight on the kick lever, but this wasn't generating particularly fast kicks. Finding TDC first (and getting just barely on the other side of it) helps me to kick it quickly.

Anyway, this seems to have worked inside my shed for the last couple of days. Hopefully this will help anyone else struggling with mastering the art of the kick start. And hopefully now that I've got enough confidence in my ability to kick it from cold, I can get back to riding it.