Intermittent Burning Smell

SV650 SK6
Mileage - 25100 miles.
Last full service : Engine oil, Oil filter, Air filter, spark plug, brake fluid, brake pads change, chain tightening, pivot points lubrication and fuel hoses checked. Tappets were checked at 21k service.

Since the past couple of months, I am getting this intermittent burning smell when I ride the bike. I have explained the problem to the Suzuki dealership and a pvt mechanic, both of whom didn't find any issues either with slush and mud on the silencer pipe or the fuel hoses leaking. Basically, I couldn't re-produce the problem in front of them. But there is a noticeable strain that I feel when I open the throttle and I feel that the machine doesn't run 'smoothly' as if something is holding it back slightly. It also cuts out at times when I ride it in the rain which is a known issue and I have read others having it too.

My concern is the burning smell as I will be going on a three week 2000 miles trip next month. Any help appreciated.

Do the revs hold steady or jump up and down? Could be a coil?

http://www.doityourself.com/stry/6-s...coil-failure#b

although when my bikes wet or its raining I get a burning smell from water hitting the radiator and manifold, when it smells what type of burning smell do you get? is it dry/wet? long or short journeys?

I had a coil problem around the 15k mark and one coil cut out which left me running on one cylinder. But the coil was replaced and that sorted the problem. I commute daily to work and I do get puffs of smell once in a while, hard to describe but smells more like plastic or some electric burning. I told this to the mechanic but he says, if it was an electrical problem the lights and other things would have stopped working. He even took it for a test ride and said it runs as an SV should run. But being an everyday rider, I can feel a massive difference in the way the bike rides. Feel a strain in the throttle and lack of power specially in lower gears. Could it be some clutch plate or gear related issue ?

[embee]

"Intermittent burning smell" - it's not when you're out in the rain and come to a stop, is it? The smell of hot road crud on exhausts/radiators is often like burning oily rubber ('cos that's what it is, tyre rubber/oil), typically worst when it rains after a longish dry spell and on heavily used roads, at traffic lights etc where rubber and oil from the traffic tends to accumulate.

The front cyl cutting out in the wet is, as you say, probably about the best known issue of the SV. It shouldn't be, but it is, and it's easily sorted out very effectively with the requisite fender extender and some silicone grease round the plug cap.

You may well have other issues with your bike, can't comment on that, but hope you get it sorted.