I’ve been having fun with the VFR. I got my new, new set of carbs and closely examined them. They looked spot on from the outside so I opened them up. Compare and contrast with the scrap set I originally bought:
That was a joy and a relief. They were so clean I decided to just fit them. Pretty straightforward job (now. I’ve done it so many times). It was running all four cylinders on tickover (YAY!), but as soon as I put the choke in it died. I tried adjusting the idle, but nothing worked. I ended up unscrewing the idle adjuster I was adjusting it that much. I was panicking because I couldn’t work out what was wrong. I was stressing overnight, then I woke up and realised it runs on choke, so it’s running too lean. I took the carbs off again and adjusted the mixture screws. Job’s a good ‘un.
I forgot to record it, but I had a hell of an ordeal a week or so ago. It was when my seal wouldn’t seat. I thought I’d finished my jobs, wheeled the bike out of the shed for a test ride, then found the seal wasn’t seated and I was leaking oil. I took the bike back into the shed, gutted, and dropped it!
It was a nightmare! The right hand handlebar had gone straight through a shelf on my racking and was jammed. I couldn’t get in behind it to lift it up, I didn’t have the leverage to drag it towards me, and it was stuck. I had to take the handlebar off, which left me with even less leverage. I must have spent an hour and a half trying to lift it. All the while it was leaking petrol. the floor is wooden and has been soaked in lots of oil so is slidey, there is a Harley to the right of that picture so no room, and the roof supports are too thin to bear the weight of ratchet strap to lift it. It wasn’t until I tried to lift the back end up with a ratchet strap on the racking that I managed it. The strap stopped it sliding away so I was able to stand it up. I was at my wits end. I just couldn’t see how I could get it up again. By the time I finally got it upright I had completely forgotten about being sad about having to strip it again to do the seal. I was so relieved. By some miracle I didn’t smash any fairings or badly scratch my tank. (That’s why there’s a towel taped to it in the picture, it’s not a fashion statement.) That is something I never want to do again.
Today I had a play with my spares/ scrap set of carbs to see if I could strip reassemble them. The word is that they are a tricky nightmare. Not really.
It was a bit challenging but I enjoyed it. It was fun. Like a 3D jigsaw puzzle for bikers. I’ve taken it all apart again and now I’m just waiting for my seal set to arrive. I’ve ordered some new petrol pipe. I’ll strip the original set that was on the bike, put it through my funky new ultrasonic cleaner, rebuild it with new seals and petrol pipes, bench synch it, then do a proper synch with my (nearly as funky) new electronic carb balancer.
That should be totally that then. Valve clearances set, carbs completely refurbished, the engine should just run and run for the next 16,000 miles.
In other news I’m still sane and enjoying it.
I’ve been applying for new jobs, but so far it’s not going very well. I applied for the Home Bargains one again today. £18.50 p/h, 4 on, 4 off, 05.00 – 07.00 starts, on my doorstep. But when I rang up, the £18.50 is with holiday pay included. And once taken on it’s £16.20 per hour. That would sting. About £180 less for a 40 hour week! It would average out at about £475 per week take home. Nope.
I’ve applied for another, which would be perfect, (07.00 start, Mon-Fri, trailer swap in Swindon or Scotland, so one run per day) but the devil is in the detail. “Up to £17.41 per hour”. Up to. If that means doing nights, on a bank holiday, holiday pay included then it could be a £15 per hour gig. I so want it, but not for that money. We’ll see.