Prior to carb removal
The carb came off fairly easily once I figured out how to create slack on the throttle and choke cables connecting it to the bike. I took it over to my work bench, a converted coffee stand in a previous life, and took off the air covers. I think that's what they're called. Whatever isn't the float bowl. I got a chance to crank up ye olde air compressor to push air through the jets. What a joy. Of all the tools available pneumatic tools are the coolest looking. They're made of shiny stainless steel and generally need to be oiled daily so they look cool for a long time. I only have a 3/8" ratchet and an air gun (ffft ffft!) but they're a lot of fun. The hilarious, ridiculous thing is that I have a whopping 15 gallon 150 PSI air compressor. It's overkill, but hey that's fine. If you ever need air in your tires and you're in the neighborhood you know what to do. But I digress.
The jets were cleared, the top of the carburetor isn't very compelling. It's the floats that gets all the action so it was time to crack those puppies open. I got through one screw. All the rest were frozen solid. The head on one screw was stripped out. This was definitely one of those stopping points. I asked around the office and got advice on how to drill out a stripped screw. Yep, drill out, whereby I would take a drill with a super strong bit and push it through the screw. Then I'd get my tap/die kit and tear out the rest of it hoping I didn't totally re-thread anything the wrong way. No problem right? ugh. I was nervous about this procedure so I went online and looked up alternatives. Apparently, there's this magical device called an impact driver which is like a special screw or bolt driver. Essentially you put the tool in the screw and smack the other end with a hammer. There's a spring and a revolving cylinder in between the bit and the impact area that turns as a result of the downward force. Further screw stripping is much less likely. This sounded much better to me than drilling into a delicate mechanical device so I rolled into Auto Zone and got myself one of these gadgets.
The tops of the released carbs
The carb came off fairly easily once I figured out how to create slack on the throttle and choke cables connecting it to the bike. I took it over to my work bench, a converted coffee stand in a previous life, and took off the air covers. I think that's what they're called. Whatever isn't the float bowl. I got a chance to crank up ye olde air compressor to push air through the jets. What a joy. Of all the tools available pneumatic tools are the coolest looking. They're made of shiny stainless steel and generally need to be oiled daily so they look cool for a long time. I only have a 3/8" ratchet and an air gun (ffft ffft!) but they're a lot of fun. The hilarious, ridiculous thing is that I have a whopping 15 gallon 150 PSI air compressor. It's overkill, but hey that's fine. If you ever need air in your tires and you're in the neighborhood you know what to do. But I digress.
The jets were cleared, the top of the carburetor isn't very compelling. It's the floats that gets all the action so it was time to crack those puppies open. I got through one screw. All the rest were frozen solid. The head on one screw was stripped out. This was definitely one of those stopping points. I asked around the office and got advice on how to drill out a stripped screw. Yep, drill out, whereby I would take a drill with a super strong bit and push it through the screw. Then I'd get my tap/die kit and tear out the rest of it hoping I didn't totally re-thread anything the wrong way. No problem right? ugh. I was nervous about this procedure so I went online and looked up alternatives. Apparently, there's this magical device called an impact driver which is like a special screw or bolt driver. Essentially you put the tool in the screw and smack the other end with a hammer. There's a spring and a revolving cylinder in between the bit and the impact area that turns as a result of the downward force. Further screw stripping is much less likely. This sounded much better to me than drilling into a delicate mechanical device so I rolled into Auto Zone and got myself one of these gadgets.
Behold the exposed float chamber!
It took a bit of doing, and I thought I wouldn't be able to get it at first, but eventually all the screws turned for the impact driver. The result is the picture here to the right. Look, Ma, no bowls. I'd like to take this time to point out that I love the vocab here what with all this talk about bowls, carbs, jets, and the like. Makes me feel like I'm in a head shop. I'm surprised by how clean the actual float bowls are though. They need to be de-gunked, but not by much. The seals need to be replaced, too. They were crusty when I gingerly pulled them out. I thought they'd snap on me. The relative good health of the carburetor concerns me a bit. If that's not what's been causing the bike starting issues, then what, pray tell could it be? Idunno. I guess I'll have to figure that out when I come to it. In the meantime I need to figure out what kind of large, open mouthed glass container I'm going to dump this metal thing in along with highly combustible and toxic chemicals to remove the lacquer on ol' girl's respiratory/digestive system.
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