Why are these bike so hard to start in the cold? Here in Upstate NY the temperature has been in the 20's and 30's and we have about 8" of snow on the ground. Even though I'm not going to run the KLX on the road, I like to start them and run around the block to keep everything working.
It is just about impossible to start my sons stock KLX or my modified KLX when it is cold. This is weird, because snowmobiles, chainsaws and snow blowers all start fine.
Does anyone have a method of getting these beasts fired up when it is in the 20's?
Thanks,
Glen

 

Only thing I can really think of is to store the bikes somewhere a little warmer.

It hasnt been real cold here yet so I dont know what to expect from my bike. Started her once when it was just about freezing with nothing unusual. Just got to choke her and thats it. Of course same goes for summertime as well. I did notice that you dont have to be stopped very long before you have to use choke to fire her up. five minutes or so !!!

Just a sidenote: That choke is some hard to pull out with winter gloves on!

Hopefully someone else will help u better. best o' luck.

 

Here's a post over at ThumperTalk with a possible solution:

http://www.thumpertalk.com/forum/sho...14#post7096714

I haven't tried it because I live in Florida right now and it doesn't get cold. I'll be moving to NY next spring though, so I may do this to my bike next fall. If you do this mod, post here to let us know how it works!

 

I think it may have something to do with the battery not having enough umph. I tried to start mine yesterday after sitting at least a month. When it was turning over it just sounded like it wasn't spinning as fast as it does in warmer weather. It didn't want to start, and the battery was slowing down. It was in the upper 30's. I tipped the bike on it's side to drain the carb bowl and plugged it in to the battery tender. An hour or so later I came back and gave it another try. It still sounded like it was turning over slowly, but just when I thought it wasn't going to, it started. I have already noticed my battery gives out pretty quickly if you don't get it started right away, warm or cold weather. This makes me think about getting a kick starter. Earlier this year in March when I got the bike it was cold out and I had trouble with the battery not spinning the motor fast enough and giving out too soon. I bought a black and decker motorcycle battery tender and that seemed to help things. After I got the bike started yesterday I turned the petcock off and ran it until it died, then I parked it with the batery tender on it. I am going to go out this weekend and see how easy it fires up after all that.

 

Honestly, you could have a car battery attached to this bike, and if you let it sit for a month without trying to start it, it'll be slow to roll over. That's not a design flaw, that's a rider flaw (ride that bad boy more )

Cold weather: Mine wouldn't start one morning, even choked, so I tried the finger over the exhaust trick, and sure enough, it fired right up. But 999 times out of 1000 my bike will start any temp, might have to leave it choked longer to warm up, though. The key is to run it as much as possible, as in, don't let it sit for a week+ without running and then try to fire it up in 20 degrees. Run it every other day or every three days if you can, and I garauntee with high percentage that it will start right up.

 

Ha ha, I'd like to ride it all winter, but I don't have the gear or the time to get all suited up each time I go somewhere. I'd have to disagree with the car battery idea, I think a car battery would spin it longer and keep it turning over quickly. The way my bike sits now, I'd say you have about 3 five+ second shots at getting it to fire, after that the battery starts to fall off. I could actually try that out. My battery tender has a pigtail that I have attached to the battery terminals. I could connect the pigtail to my boat battery and see how it turns over. Really I'm thinking that running the bowl empty, and leaving the battery tender on all the time may keep the bike ready to start. Going out and starting it every three days might work, but would probably be as much a pain as fighting to get it started once a month. I probably won't ride it , or even start it, again until next spring, unless I pull the kids around in their sleds sometime this winter.

 

When in doubt give it a lil sniff of ether

 

Well if you're gonna let it sit until the spring, take the battery out of the bike and plug it into your battery tender, after burning the gas in the bowl (and probably drain your gas tank while you're at it??). But all you'd have to do if you wanted to keep it "up" is to go outside, start it, and warm it up every few days. I've gone a whole week without touching mine and it started right up.

 

Battery is fine, you need one of these



worked for me anyway

 

Research the Cold starting / Hard starting threads.
Much research has been done on this susbject.
A pumper carb helps but the cost is high and a bit of a pain to install.

The best solution found is
1) Run the bike out of gas if you plan on not riding for a week.
2) Drain the bowl prior to starting the bike.

Both of these simple solutions work excellent.

My bike starts when it's 20 degF and has been sitting for 2 weeks, or if it's the middle of summer.

I know it's a weird phenomena, but with todays fuels and small volume bowl, the solution is very effective.

DJF