This includes Todd and Marty if you are out there. OK here's the deal. The last time I rode the bike two weeks ago I notices it sputtered a little, then when I pulled up to a stop light and pulled in the clutch the bike died. I restarted it and let the rps's come back down and it died as if Ihit thekey switch or kill button. I would re-start it and it would ride fine but then if I had to stop it would die. Well today I rode to work with no problems, then on my way to the post office before going home for lunch it did it again, so I decided to get the bike home before I couldn't. In the garage I started it and reved it up a couple of times and then released the throttle and it died. Well I went inside to eat lunch and later came out to head back to work, started the bike up and reved it and the idle was perfect, I did this several times, starting the bike and hitting the gas, and it was just like brand new. Any ideas? I can hear the valves once in a while if I'm in the right rpm range, could it be a gas problem, idle jet? I got to work pulled in the clutch and it was still OK. This is weird. And speaking of gas, do we have a filter? Should we install one if we don't? HELP!!!

 

sounds like a lack of fuel

 

Is it better or worse after it heats up?

 

Well since I'm only a couple of miles all around from home/work/town I really don't know, but if I had to lean in a direction it would be after its warmed up.

 

I had a similar problem on one of the Pilots. I won't go into the whole ordeal but it ended up being a little piece of foreign material in the pilot jet. It was kind of "floating" and making it so that it didn't die at idle 100% of the time but most of the time. If I would hold the throttle open and keep the rpm's up it would run.
Took the carb apart and could see the problem. Cleaned it and it ran great!

 

Ok my next question then would be how hard is this to do? I mean is there anything I need to know before I tackle this? Should I take off the tank, or can I spin the carb in place and pull the bowl and get to the pilot jet? Is there anyone out there who has the exploded view of the carb? Oh wait I bootlegged a manual, never mind. We never had this conversation.[8D]

 

Since I'm assuming you've made no other changes since it was last running good, I would suspect 1 of two things. As vfrpilot suggested, it could be something in your fuel, float bowl, jet partially clogged, etc. Or ... you said you have about 4k miles on it. Have you ever had your valve clearances checked? Could be they are starting to remain open and not fully closing. If left unchecked, it will eventually not start at all. They're easy to check even if you don't feel comfortable adjusting them. If that's the case and they need adjusted, you can always haul it down to the shop for that, but if they check out OK, that will point to the problem most likely being the carb.

Could also be something simple like spark plug - you may want to take it out, clean it good, and make sure it's gapped correctly.

 

Will do, I think I'll start with the carb, and rule that out.

 

I had the stalling at stop signs issue. My air screw was out too far. I went the recommended 2.5 turns and it would kill it at stoplights. I'm around 1.75-2.0 now and the idle comes down a bit at stopsigns but not enough to come close to stalling. This was only after the bike was fully warmed up though.