Hard to start 1976 900 LTD

Earlier this summer, I had all the carbs cleaned & rebuilt, new plugs, they adjusted the valves, did a leakdown check. The points, condensor & wires were all good. They rejetted the carbs also, as I had them install a 4 into 1 Vance & Hines pipe. New battery & regulator rectifier installed. I have rode the bike approx. 450 miles, since all this work was done. Now, after setting for about 2 months, the thing smells like it is getting to much gas ( or I am flooding it) & it feels like it may not be getting enough spark, to fire it off. I have a weak starter, so I usually kick start it & it wears me out ever time. I have a new starter now, but I have not replaced it yet. Even when I first got it out of the shop, it was still hard to start & real cold natured. I owned a couple of 750 triple years ago, and they were not as hard to start as this bike is. Is this typical of the 900's? Any help with this would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Tim

Try hold throttle open while kicking it a few times to dry out the gas if its flooded

sounds like to me they didnt get the jets dialed in, do you know what size? also you say they did a leak down, do you know what your compression is and how much each cylinder? would get that starter on asap, most bikes that have sat for two months take a bit to start.

cruznlow70 wrote: ...Even when I first got it out of the shop, it was still hard to start & real cold natured....

Please reveal the name and location of the shop, so we can all avoid it like the plague.

Good Fortune!

There's a couple of possibilities here, but the first one that jumps out at me from what you wrote, is a weak battery. Has the battery been on a charger? Even if it has, how new or old is the battery? You need to meter the battery with a multimeter and check the baseline voltage. A weak battery can certainly produce a no-start condition even with kick starting.

Pull a spark plug and hook it up to the wire, grounding the plug on the head. See if you get spark when you crank it. Don't do this if there's a really strong fuel smell. That would indicate you have a float valve not seating all the way, or the petcock is bad and you've been leaking through all this time. Unscrew the oil fill plug and smell in there. If there is a really strong fuel smell, that's what has happened. You'll smell some which is normal, I mean the engine does burn gasoline after all, and residual byproducts of combustion can make oil smell a bit gassy. A strong smell indicates it's in the crankcase and you don't want to start it anyway until you change the oil and fix the problem at the carbs or petcock.

But it sounds like what you said, a no-spark condition and I'd lean again, towards that battery.

Edit:
Let me give you a guideline here as to what the metered battery voltage may mean. Make sure you use a good, accurate DVOM (digital volt-ohm meter) for this. According to the Interstate Batteries book on Heavy-Duty electrical (their battery training manual), the state of charge is what you're examining with a battery, not hooked up to anything, metered by an accurate meter. Again, this is with both terminals free of any connections:

12.66 volts, 100% State of Charge
12.45 volts, 75%
12.24 volts, 50%
12.06 volts, 25%
11.89 volts, 0%

So, you can see from this that a battery with say, 12.25 volts might look like it has a good charge, but it's between a 25 and 50% state of charge. This would be the same for any 12-volt lead acid battery, doesn't matter the size of it. The size dictates the cold crank amps, but you're measuring voltage at this point just to get an idea of the state of charge. Hope this helps.

The bike has been sitting for 2 months. If the battery was not on a battery tender, it is the problem. Remove it from the bike and charge it on a 1 amp/hr charger. Do not jump start the bike from a running vehicle as this will damage the electrical system. You really should run the engine from time to time rather than let it sit that long or you may encounter other problems related to fuel. Ed

It has a new battery, I said the starter was weak. I guess I will take it back to the shop. The mechanic that worked on it is the chief mechanic for the current Suzuki factory race team.

might look inside tank also, if you have a scale or light rust build up it could contaminate the fuel system, even if the carbs are cleaned it wouldnt take long to build up again, might check petcock to see if it is shuting fuel off.

Switch to a Dyna electronic ignition

i have heard that a good way to temporarily fix a weak spark is to slightly close the gap on the plug to help the spark jump across easier.
Check where the plugs go into the coils and see if theres any corrosion around there.
Also make sure that the caps that go on the plugs themselves are screwed onto the wires good.
Low compression can make a bike start hard to. Go pick up a US general compression tester from harbor frieght and make sure you got at least 110 PSI compression. I believe that is considered OK I recommend doing the work to your bike yourself. Just about every shop i have been to in my town, they were kinda greasy as far as the work they did and what they charged. when my dad first got back into riding a few years back, he took his KZ to a shop here in Sioux city.
They were supposed to put new kits in his carbs and sync them. A few years later i took his carbs apart to clean them myself and show him how to do it. All the pilot jets were buggered up and i could hardly get a screwdriver to bite and take them out... also, all the brass in there looked like it was used... like really used.... like never had new kits put in used..... just my opinion though.

Oh, boy, I sure agree with you on that sentiment about shops! My gosh, I'm working on this KZ1100 I bought from a buddy who's a great guy, but between his hack-jobs and the mechanic who worked on this poor thing, I am getting a crick in my neck from shaking my head so much...

You're absolutely right about doing the work ones self. These bikes ain't rocket science. Parts are generally plentiful with some rare exceptions. For those, there's eBay.

Doing carbs on an in-line multi-cylinder bike like these Asian marques is a challenge in itself, but with some patience and a good service manual, it can be done. I've been snatching racked carbs on and off bikes since 1980 (here and there), this is my 2nd Resto job of late, and I still forgot to clean out the enrichment port down at the bottom of the float bowl.. Argggg.. had to yank 'em off again. But now she starts great, cold! lol