My 1st carb rebuild has begun! 86 VFR750

(Head in hand....WTF!)

Your problems have just started.

 

I heard a rumor that Honda was forced to develop the single sided swingarm just so MMI graduates couldn't get the rear wheel on crooked after a tire change ??

 

Toe Cutter: There was no way in hell that carb was coming out without taking the plate off. The rubber boots are rock solid and in dire need of replacement. To what extent of future trauma do you believe I have caused myself by removing the plate? (which broke nothing)

Squirrel: Agreed, the fact that I listened to him, and then let him take over and ending up busting the rim of the plate... my bad and I'll own up for that. Shit, give me a little credit. I could have lied my ass off and not said a damn thing about it, but I did come forward and was honest about my screw up! I personally know none of you, and could most likely have gotten away with just saying "oh, camera died and I didn't get any shots" and then posted pics after the filter was back in place. Honesty is worth the ridicule, regardless of how bad the embarrassment. I'll take the D on this one. It's my first major project, and I expected nothing less than to have a hard time and screw it up in some way, shape or form. To expect perfection would have been ridiculously ignorant and ended up WAY worse than this!

Oh, and as for the single swing arm issue, that wasn't because of MMI students in general. I believe that move was made to cater to those poor saps taking the Harley Davidson Early/Late Model program, just in case they couldn't hack the measly pay in the "Big Boys" shop and had to go to work at an import dealer.

 

OK, extra points for honesty.

Don't think that many of us can claim we never screwed something up, and screwups are good learning experiences if we are honest.

However i can't agree that the carbs would NOT come off, it's just that you didn't have the technique. A heat gun or hair dryer to warm the boots ( or leaving the bike in the AZ sun for a few hours) plus CAREFUL prying with levers between valve covers and carbs ( thick part of vaccum chamber) or airbox base would have gotten them free.

<<<<<<<>>>>>>>

Next you're doing an oil change?? I'd suggest 2 precautions you might not have considered: first, fill the oil filter by hand very slowly until it appears about 2/3 full before mounting; second, turn the motor over with the RUN switch OFF until the red oil pressure light goes off.

These extra steps will prevent main and rod bearings suffering from lack of oil pressure on startup and make your engine last longer. As a matter of fact, the very best practice for starting any engine is to spin it over a few times on the starter before switching on the ignition (stop/run switch) in order to build oil pressure ! Take this info to school with you, kid.

And don't over-tighten the drain plug and replace the washer if it's severly dished or looks doubtful !!

 

Dude,

Squirrel and Toe are right, you can get them off without f'ing with that plate which causes more problem in the long run. I actually got to a point tuning mine where I could remove the carbs, rejet, reinstall and test ride in an hour back in the day. pateince and technique will get you a long ways. Dont f things up because you are in a hurry, these parts are hard to find.

 

Dude, yes everyone goes through their trials when working with these old things and especially with the carbs. Did you get a chance to read ToeCutters thread on carbs? Seems like an after thought but the 2 most important things in the thread are the 2 tricks Toe uses to get the carbs back on. The tilting of the carb boots and the use of the little hooks will cure (with the help of an extra body) your problem. I also used some ratchet straps and small blocks of 2x4 in lieu of an extra hand to put added pressure with-out having to strike the plate. I fortunately read another guys thread where he broke the plate with a rubber mallet and I knew what I did not want to do. Try checking out the schematic on bike bandit. It kind of shows the lay-out of everything kinda pulled apart. Don't worry about people busting your balls, when folks give you advice then you go and do exactly what they suggested you not do, if something goes wrong you can expect a few I told you so's. Last piece of advice I have is listen to a few of these guys on here as they have done everything wrong at least once and do not let a guy who "fixes bikes" think they knew more than Toe or Squirrelman so listen and read what they say. Don't be afraid to go in your own direction, but know it could end badly. Keep fiddling and taking things apart and your bound to learn how to put them back together.

Good Luck!

 

There have been a lot of I told you so's on this one... I'm just gonna say that ...I have broken a set of carbs doing it the EXACT WAY YOUR FRIEND DID.......understand this...we don't tell you something cause your a wetr behind the ears neewbie...we yeah but thats beside the point...we tell you because we have been exactly were you are and done the wrong thing......thats all I'm saying.

don't ever let your harley screwing friend touch your bike again its to high tech for his little pea brain.

 

Just a bit of practical, real, adult, post -grad reality: MMI is not well respected by shop owners or service managers, and it's very difficult to get hired -- but super easy to get fired !!

Damage a customer's bike= get fired.

I'd advise ANYONE who expects to work repairing 'cycles to have a good, viable "Plan B."

 

Before I continue with the posts on this project, theres some things that need to be said and put into perspective.

Squirrel, your comments and cynical advice about the type of work that "students" do and how pathetic MMI grads are would be better appreciated in forums over on Yahoo's side of the Net.

I know 4 people personally who have graduated pretty high in their class at MMI and are all working rather happily where they live. Micheal Dean was my last buddy who graduated just a week ago and was top of his class in Suzuki, and then went on to finish Honda top of his class and managing to get Student of the Course 4 times in a row. As for myself, I command a 96% CGPA and am 4th in a class of 100, so I don't think that I have much to worry about academically. MMI is just a name, one of many schools out there that teach for money. What you get out of it is directly proportionate to what you give. Graduate with a 3.0 and a 90% attendance... of course you're not gonna get a great job out of it. Those of us that take it seriously are the ones that look back and can thank our Instructors and peers for getting us where we are. The ones that sucked in school and aren't good mechanics to begin with are always the ones you hear bitching about how useless it was and that they couldn't get a decent job after graduation. I'm just sayin.

Obviously althought my grades show that I comprehend and know what I'm talking about when it comes to what I have learned in school so far, I haven't done shit when it comes to working on motorcycles EVER in my life, aside from changing oil and a few easy part swap outs on my old Rebel. This is 99% new to me, and the fact that I broke something on MY bike was completely foreseen by myself and is the #1 reason why I bought this bike to begin with. I needed an older bike to learn on, and I wanted something that I could be proud of fixing up. I did NOT foresee the carbs giving as much grief as they have, and yes I lost my cool when I broke the plate but it was done on MY OWN property. Had I been working on someone elses bike, or a "customers bike" as you put it, I would have walked away, called for help, or simply stopped until I was sure on how to proceed and what the problem was before me. Hindsight is 20/20, we live - we make mistakes - we learn from them and move on.

I know that Squirrels comments are not indicative of the rest of you on the site. The I told you so's, grumbles, and rolling of the eyes are expected. However, poking at the fact that I'm a student and at the school that I've chosen isn't warranted and as you can see has pissed me off a little bit. I joined this site a proud owner of a VFR, and was happily surprised at the warm welcome and optimism that everyone dished out at me. I quickly realized that VFRWorld was definately NOT some silly Yahoo forum with tons of ignorant bullies just wating for someone to say something wrong so that they could lash out and be mean to those who are still learning. It was quite the opposite and I love you guys for that. I've gotten some great information and pointers from ALL of you. I guess that when you've been working on bikes so long, and have spent so much time dedication and become somewhat of an expert on that particular model, you tend to forget where you've come from and how you were way back when you picked up your first wrench and said "I'm going to fix this here bike of mine!"

We were all rookies and wet behind the ears at some point in our careers. Hell, I do it when it comes to trucking. Been driving 13 years and have over a million miles accident free... sure I give rookies a hard time, but it also reminds me of how I was when I started driving. Scared shitless and white knuckled going down the mountain grades and in heavy rush hour traffic. Now it doesn't bother me at all, but thats where the experience comes into play.

I hope I haven't pissed anyone off by posting this, but I had to get it off my chest before I could continue with the project posts.

Squirrel, no hard feelings man. It's nothing I wouldn't have said to your face if we were sitting in the garage kicked back with some beers and good tunes in the background. Just who I am, take it or leave it.

 

OK, some pics of the filter plate. The first one is the part that I broke. Backside middle of the rim, where the center screw goes in. It busted in two pieces, the screw part being the larger of the two. Luckily it didn't fracture into too many tiny pieces and I was able to blow out the remaineder of the splinters.

As you can see, I JB Welded it back together as best I could. The aluminum kind of bent before it busted, so it didn't make a completely even fix, and I had to fill in a gap on the lip itself which is why it's bulged out at the rim. The inside looked pretty good.

Once I attached the filter basket onto the plate and screwed it in, I could see that I may have to file down the weld bubble a tad. It didn't dry in as I thought it would have. Hmmmm, so what's the best way to file down JB Weld without screwing up the bond?

I did a gap test by putting a LED flashlight inside the box and turning out all the lights. What you see in the last pic is what I saw at the break. No gap, no light shining through. Not the prettiest sight, but it worked. May put some sort of a sealant around the rim just to be sure that she doesn't suck air in at full throttle, but otherwise she is fixed.

Later I'm going to take the plate back off, drop the carbs back into the intakes and batten down the hatches. Tomorrow I'm going to make an attempt at tackeling the vacuum lines and putting em back the way they are supposed to go. BTW, I did bitch out my buddy for ripping them off and told him he wasn't allowed to work on my bike anymore! Kind of hurt his feelings, but he caused me a ton more work than I should have had on reassembly.

Abner, if you could post those pics of the hoses are how they actually look so I can compare them to what I have in my manual, I'd appreciate it.

 

Don't sweat it dude.....the Squirrelman can be a little outspoken at times and grumpy as well.

 

I usually take it with a grain of salt, Toe Cutter. Just every once in a while something grabs me the wrong way, and this happened to be one of those times. MMI gets a bad rap from a lot of people that either attended, did horrible or missed a lot of days and couldn't get a decent job because of it - or they just simply can't afford to go because of the price or location.

It's a really good school and is loaded with some very knowledgeable instructors. I mean seriously, it's the only tech school in the nation that can brag that is the only school authorized to teach Harley Davidson all the way through it's program. You can learn about Harley's at lots of different schools, but if you want full certification at graduation - it's MMI or nothing.

Anyways, I had my say on the matter. Moving on now....

 

I can weigh in on the school thing...over the course of 25 years I've trained in at least a few guys from MMI. Hmm..let's see now.

One guy, very smart but a bad tendency to leave things loose. Should've waited 'til after work to 'fire' up the bong instead of lunch time. Fired after setting up a 'smokin joes' CBR and crashing on the test ride, claiming the throttle stuck open. Went on to start his own repair shop.

Another one...green but a great kid. Famous for cussing repeatedly at how nastily the recoil rope flew out of his hands on a Yamaha YT 125 when he tried to start it (he had just rebuilt the recoil)...turned out recoil spring was backwards. It's actually amazing the little Yamaha started at all considering pulling the rope was turning the engine over backwards. After a couple years he got acceptably good. Went on to start his own repair shop.

Another one...service writer. Graduated MMI and then worked as a tech for a few years at Bert's Mega Mall in LA. VERY sharp and is wasting his talents I think.

Currently have been working with another guy for a bit over a year...green, but listens and is curious to learn. He sticks with it another few years and he'll be an A tech.

Don't get frustrated Lazy in AZ...Some shops DO hire MMI people and if it's something you want to do it is a way to get your 'foot in the door'. I enjoyed reading about your 'fear and loathing' in VFR induction systems. Maybe there's a future for you in technical writing?

 

OK, I had some time to actually work on the bike today (seems to be a "when I can" project even though I can't wait to ride her).

Got the carbs back on without a hitch, having the plate off when I set it into the intake rubbers and then putting the plate on, tightening the side screws and then tightening the plate. The clamps were no problem to tighten to spec with the exception of the one on #3, which split completely on me upon removal of the carbs. I'm going to test for a leak when it's running by applying a light spray of carb cleaner at that spot and seeing if the idle raises slightly or not. If it does (which I'm pretty sure it will - just being optimistic that it won't) then I'll apply a light coat of sealant to the outer area at the split and see how that goes.

Spent nearly an hour reassembling all the vacuum lines that my buddy kindly removed without labeling for me. I really don't like the Cali emissions crap, and wouldn't mind removing it completely. However, I was told by a classmate that once a bike is registered in AZ as a Cali emissions bike, it HAS to be on the bike at every testing. Since it was registered with it on prior, I'm not about to rip it all off and get told at DMV that I can't proceed without it, so I'm gonna leave it for now. Once it's run through and tagged, I'm going to take it to Clinic 5 and put it on the machine again to see how well it runs without the system on it (performance +/- and emissions +/-). Depending on the #'s I get back on it will determine whether I leave the hoses intact or if I delete the system and just hold onto it till next emissions testing.

Because I'm too damn broke now for a new filter, I'm doing what I used to do on my Mustang... sprayed cleaner on the air filter, waited a few mins then ran under the sprayer at the sink with pipin hot water and got all the dirt and crap out of it. It really wasn't all that bad, but I didn't wanna put it back on like it was. Before you guys all go gettin uppity about re-using the filter.... know that it's only short term and that as soon as I get the cash to get another filter I will replace it ASAP. I'm not working right now and need the cash I DO have for registration and gas.

Anyways, waiting now for the filter to dry off (got the box heater pushing warm air on it as I type) and once that's dry I'll put the filter case back together.... Hmmm, that reminds me. I wanted to ask ya'lls opinion on the pre-filter that sits on the heat shield. The one on my bike is like... well, rotten and crusty and looks like shit! It appears to be attached permanently to the shield. I wanted to replace it with a filter similar to a vacuum cleaner/humidifier screen (that sponge like filter) but it doesn't look like I can remove it without screwing up the whole shield. Any ideas? Should I just leave it alone? Only reason I mention it is because it's so nasty that I'm surprised she is able to breathe at all with it like it is.

Ok, back on track. Once the filter is ready for work, I'm gonna reassemble the filter box, hook up the tank (which I cleaned out with injector cleaner additive and shook up really good, gettin rid of most of the icky stuff that had settled inside) and then put the battery in and fire it up. I should also mention that I replaced the spark plugs, so there shouldn't really be any reason that it won't fire up for me.

I'm not expecting perfection on start up, mind you. I know the carbs most likely need to be sync'd (need a vacuum reader to do that) which will have to wait till I get to school. But the rough idle and stalling issue should be rectified and I shouldn't have to babysit the bike to keep it idling. We'll see. I'm going to record a video of the start up, so I'll try and get that on here for ya's.

Assuming that she starts, and idles... I'll give her about 15-20 mins to warm up and see how she does. If the lines don't leak fuel and all is well then I'm takin her out for a 50 mile run and give her a good once over, then another 50 miles and another check. If it's all good, she's getting T-tagged and run to school Monday night! My instructor is talking to his buddy that runs Clinic 5 where they have the emissions machine, and sometime this week I'll hook her up and see what kind of numbers I'm dealing with.

So, that's the update. I'd appreciate any ideas about that pre-filter. Don't wanna rip it up and destroy it if I don't have to, ya know?

 

A 20 minute warmup in the garage has little purpose and may overheat the motor--especially in that warm climate.

Engines can easily overheat while bike's sitting still even if the fan's blasting away; radiator needs full airflow for best cooling, so the bike should be ready to ride and be leak-checked within 5 minutes, max. AT least ride it around the block a couple times.

Nice trip is up the #87 to Indian casino or beyond and return by Salt river canyon. Or ride up to Sunflower, short rest, and turn around.

Wear your helmet, and "Always preserve nature."

 

Wow..... did you just say Crusty looks like shit? That's wrong dude. You haven't even met him yet!



Just Kiddin....

 

I also learned the hard way on this adventure and wound up breaking one of the plastic vent tubes on mine trying to get the carbs in with out the plenum on mine would not go either i found by loosening the screws a little gives you a little help with a little grease in the manifolds they are a bitch if you havent done it before . i wasnt aware those tubes are no longer available.

 

Ya know, as I was writing it I was thinkin "Hmmm, maybe I should reword that... naah, he'll know I wasn't talkin about him."

 

Squirrel, I'll take your word on the 5 minute warm up. Had to chuckle at the mention of "that warm climate". Was chilly and rainy today with a high of 58. After living here for the past 10 years, anything under 70 is jacket weather!

A ride up the 87 sounds like fun! Maybe I'll run up Ellsworth (Usery Pass) to Bush Hwy and then East up to Hwy 87, then take that back down to Gilbert Road and take that to the 202 and back home. Should be around 50-55 miles and take me close to an hour.

So yeah, will finish puttin the tank, seat and plastics on... hook up the battery and all that in the morning. Got the tank on, but the filter I got at Checkers is a bit short so I need to get a longer hose cut and didn't feel like draggin my ass back up to the store again. Besides, it was already dark and still nasty wet outside so I wouldn't be able to ride it much anyways. After a FIVE minute warm up, we'll see how well the lines held up and then take her for a spin. Shit, I may just HAVE to take her for a spin around the neighborhood. Kinda hard not to want to after having her sit in my garage the past few weeks, and now that she's back together again....

Oh, and for the record... I never ride without my skull cap on. That's just crazy stupid!

 

I too loosened the screws to set them in place. I was SUPER careful not to flex the plastics though. That was the first thing I learned on here when I mentioned doin the carb cleaning "Don't break the plastic tubes!!!" There's about 14 VFR's over at Bob's Cycle (all RWB's so he says) and 7 motors that are in tact and running (again, according to the guy at the desk) so all hope wasn't lost if I did break one, but knowing that parts on this model are discontinued and hard as hell to find did make me hella nervous about what I had gotten myself into.

As for the split rubber, I honestly think that it was cracked through before I even touched it. There are so many deteriorating plastic/rubber parts that I've seen on this bike since I got it that it's hard for me to believe it was in perfect shape before I pulled the carb out of it! No idea if the rubber boots are still avail OEM or not. Doesn't show on the Honda parts directory I've looked at.