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Help Zeal not starting under the rain

Discussion in 'Yamaha 250cc In-Line 4's' started by Pyr0technicien, Feb 7, 2020.

  1. Gizziracer

    Gizziracer Well-Known Member Contributing Member

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    Clean all the crud out of cylinder head, install new plugs. Top up coolant and see if it fires on all cylinders.. re install muffler once it fires and blows All the crap out of the pipes... see how you go... easy to check for sparks with new plugs.. if it’s getting spark to all 4 cylinders and the fuel supply is good it should fire even if head gasket is damaged.. well maybe. If it starts running and is not blowing white smoke probably no issue with gasket.
     
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  2. Linkin

    Linkin The Mechanic Premium Member Contributing Member Dirty Wheel Club

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    Head gasket won't always blow white smoke unless it's really chuffing a lot of coolant. A good tell is a perfectly clean cylinder, piston and spark plug. Steam cleaning! Dirty is good in this case.

    Once you get it running on all four, go take it for the 'italian tune up'
     
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  3. GreyImport

    GreyImport Administrator Staff Member The Chief Contributing Member

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    You dont need the muffler for it to run

    I would pull off the headers and clean them out properly
    While they are off I would pull the plugs and take off the carbys and put it in 2nd gear and roll it forward to blow out any crap and while everything is off take a look 'inside'

    Post up a pic if u find a pair of mating squirrels in there :cool:
     
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  4. Pyr0technicien

    Pyr0technicien Active Member

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    Update of the day !
    Got myself a 16mm plug wrench, tested the first plug that was dead. I didn't bother, removed four of them and to the bin. Didn't change them since i got the bike so probably the best solution.

    Bike start right away, happy. Not for long.

    I have a big lack of power in low revs. Same feeling than when my battery was dying. I can drive but not well. Idle speed seems to hold pretty well tough.

    Basically if I'm not full throttle in 1st gear, i'll stall. Can't start in 2nd. I will also stall if the slope is to steep.

    My 4 cylinders are running, the temperature on each header is pretty similar.

    Tested my caps, they are showing 10 Ohm, testing my leads and coils the only difference I have with GreyImport is the primary reading, I read 3.2 instead of 2.8.

    The only thing I can see now, is removing the headers too see if anything comes out. Am I suppose to have full power with header off ?

    I would'nt consider any carb settings as the bike was fine before all of this started. Also I don't feel like removing the carbs, the rubber below wouldn't resist I think. However if that's the only solution.

    I met this lack of power when I was struggeling after a rainy night ( but the power was back after riding for a few minutes), or when battery was dead.

    My four plugs were this color : IMG_20200211_202846.jpg

    One had a little bit of depot.
     

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  5. Linkin

    Linkin The Mechanic Premium Member Contributing Member Dirty Wheel Club

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    Do not start the bike with the whole exhaust removed. For one, it's extremely loud and two it's bad for motor, three it may set something on fire or melt something.

    What temperature are the exhaust headers getting up to?
     
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  6. Pyr0technicien

    Pyr0technicien Active Member

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    Mmh couldn't tell the exact temperature, but I can't leave my hand on it more than half a second after driving for 5/10 minutes so pretty hot.

    Good to know about the headers, so basically just pushing in second gear to push anything out ?
     
  7. Pyr0technicien

    Pyr0technicien Active Member

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    I forgot to mention, I found the airbox filter a little bit wet ( fuel) on the carb side.
    If i put my hand in front of the air intake, when i rev up, i can feel the carb spitting a bit of fuel. I don't think I ever saw this on any of my bikes before...
     
  8. Pyr0technicien

    Pyr0technicien Active Member

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    And this picture doesn't looks like mine :
    https://www.2fiftycc.com/index.php?attachments/coil-to-plug-configuration-jpg.17155/

    My second coil, ( for the second and third cylinder) are inverted, By that i mean the outer lead goes to cylinders 3 and the inner one goes to cylinder 2 ( it's the opposite on the image, not sure how accurate it is). I'm pretty sure that's how it was before as the outer lead is too short to reach cylinder 2 ...

    Sorry for the multiple post, i can't edit previous ones.
     
  9. Linkin

    Linkin The Mechanic Premium Member Contributing Member Dirty Wheel Club

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    It sounds like the carb may be flooding, especially if the filter is wet.

    Get yourself an infrared thermometer from Jaycar or a cheap eBay special so you can accurately check the exhaust header temp, it's an important troubleshooting step.
     
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  10. Pyr0technicien

    Pyr0technicien Active Member

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    Ok might getting to something, when i turn off the engine, i have this "tictictictic" noise ( that's the fuel pump if i'm correct). But what does it mean ?
     
  11. Linkin

    Linkin The Mechanic Premium Member Contributing Member Dirty Wheel Club

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    Where is the noise coming from? Are you turning off the key or just using the kill switch?
     
  12. Pyr0technicien

    Pyr0technicien Active Member

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    My bad, fuel tank was off, this was the fuel pump but i'm just stupid
     
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  13. Pyr0technicien

    Pyr0technicien Active Member

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    Is there anyway I can test the output power of each sparkplugs ? Instead of testing the resistance of everything, testing the actual voltage getting out at the ignition ?
     
  14. maelstrom

    maelstrom LiteTek Staff Member Premium Member 250cc Vendor Contributing Member

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    Really? So you know there is no water in the bowls, filters are not blocked, tank is not full or rust and garbage, pilot circuits are not blocked, all o-rings and seals are in good condition, etc, etc?
     
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  15. Gizziracer

    Gizziracer Well-Known Member Contributing Member

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    Yep, gotta concur with maelstrom.. there are so many Elements to a motor bike, all these systems that work independently but also rely on each other functioning correctly.. sometimes it’s easy to Fixate on one aspect of a repair ,, spend hours chasing a problem, solve it, and be rewarded/punished with a bike that runs no better. I’d be checking the whole fuel delivery system, cooling system and electrical system..if a spark is consistently present at all the plugs, even if some look weak,, the thing should fire and run.
     
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  16. Pyr0technicien

    Pyr0technicien Active Member

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    I think I got it solved ...
    In between the carbs and the engine, the rubbers have some sort of intake pipes connecting two of these rubber together with a rubber hose ( fuel hose type).

    On one side the hose was broken, allowing air to get in after the carbs, I just blocked the two intakes. Performance were a little bit better but far from good.

    My take was that my carbs were fine before the rain, I don't see why rain would have changed anything. I have played enough with carbs to know that once you open old carbs like that, you mostly gonna make them leak unless you change every joints.
    I'm staying in Australia 4 more month, it's not worth it for me to spend so much money in renovating these carbs. + The rubber behind are cracked, removing the carbs probably means breaking them. Have a look on internet, 4 new rubber cost the price of the bike. I can fix them tough but it's a lot of work.

    Anyway, I realised the bike started on two cylinders without muffler. So I removed the muffler again and suprise, the bike started drifting in the grass with just a little "twist from the wrist ".
    One of the two muffler was barely getting hot, and nothing coming out of it.

    IMG_20200212_145102.jpg

    That's the inside of my mufflers... Water probably made it tick like concrete, I tried to put a vacuum at the end of the muffler and had no aspiration on the other end in one of them. So I'll just try my best to clean this mess.
    These are actually handmade muffler from a brisbane company, a random guy recognised them one day in brisbane and told me he worked for the company building them.

    Also, other surprise of the day. The spider living in my bike for the last 6 month finally showed up. Look at this nice red back underneath my wrench. Guess I would have preferred some mating squirrel.

    IMG_20200212_140156.jpg

    Will keep you update as soon as these muffler are clean. Not sure if it's really good sign to have so much deposit it there, but hey, that's 20y of crap.
     
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  17. Pyr0technicien

    Pyr0technicien Active Member

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    So the bike is fixed, that was the sparkplugs and the blocked muffler.

    I'll update my other post, the smoke coming out of my gearbox was most probably due to that muffler getting stuck little by little.

    Cheers everyone for the help once again
     
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