Hard to start bike after tons of rain

Hi Guys,

Just a quick one,

I was wondering if anyone could shed a little light on this. I have a K3 Pointy and yesterday when i was riding to work and coming home it was bouncing down with rain, even with all my kit on i was drenched. Anyway the bike seem to be fine until this morning when i got up for work and went to start the bike. It started ok but then as it warmed up the idle dropped to like 0.5 and sounded like it was about to stall.

Anyway i jumped on the bike and went to put more fuel in but the bike was running really rough in lower revs but once i got it to about 4000 it was ok. As i rode and the engine got warmer the bike sorted itself out, as if it was all dried out. The bike now runs fine and idles ok.

Whats should i check first if this happens again and is there anything i could possible do to stop this from happening again?

Cheers Guys

Si

[STRAMASHER]

Water in the front plug probably.

Silicon grease round the top of the plug cap giving it a waterproof seal is the cure.

Or buy a fender-extender.

[ophic]

In my experience, a fender extender is not a 100% cure. Mine still went to one cylinder, although I was virtually swimming down the M62 at the time.

There's also a small drain hole in the front cylinder head. Make sure this isn't blocked. Squirt some WD40 up it and see if that helps.

They all do that sir

[Littlepeahead]

I find not riding in anything but bright sunshine solves this problem.

[SoulKiss]

Originally Posted by -Ralph-

They all do that sir

YOU LIAR!!!

At the risk of cursing things, mine hasn't.

Originally Posted by SoulKiss

YOU LIAR!!!

At the risk of cursing things, mine hasn't.

Ha ha!

K4 onwards has a small rubber flap below the rad to stop spray coming up off the front wheel, sort of negates the need for a fender extender. But as mentioned if that drain hole blocks you're fecked either way if you ride in anything heavy for a significant length of time water will collect in there, not a bad idea to do a plug swap and copper grease the new plugs before you insert them.

[dizzyblonde]

wd40 with straw attachment, spray in here, unblock spark plug drain hole. It might not start, but at least it will be clean of crap!

hey, I had a very simular issue. (actually worse than your's. Couldn't run in the rain for 10 minutes before loosing a cylinder.) I did all the checks all suggested above. I found no damp around the spark plug and the drainer was clean and clear. I followed the HT lead round to the ignition coil ( mounted just on the inside of the frame on the left hand side) A small twist of the lead and a load of water came flooding out.

The Ignition coil was a relatively cheap part to replace and although fiddly only took me a coule hours to do.
Haven't had the problem since at all.

Could almost go swimming with it :P