Long time to get warmed up or not?
 

Afternoon all,

being one of those mainly fair weather types I tend to only use my SV for fun at the weekends around this part of the year. On Sunday it was about 3 - 5 degrees here and with a very damp/misty air, but not raining. When I went out on my bike it seemed to take forever to get fully warmed up, I needed to give it choke for about 10 minutes. It's mostly urban slog for that 10 minute slot so maybe that delays the motor getting nicely heated up? Anyway is this normal for the bike to take quite so long to be able to pull cleanly without choke?
Once it was warmed up it ran without any issue for the next two hours, all aok. Just curious to know if the bike is behaving as intended. Ta for any feeback/insight proffered.

I do as suggested in the manual. Give it full choke to start, (once started, I rev it to ensure everything opens up), then gradually drop the choke, keeping the engine around 2-2.5k RPM. Do that for about 30s to a minute. By then, you should be able to close the choke fully, and it'll idle around 1-1.5k RPM.

I then however, get my jacket on, helmet, gloves etc, and leave the house. By then, the bike is running smoothly.

You might want to consider running your bike on super-unleaded (97RON or higher) for the winter, to prevent carb-icing (I got it, you suddenly have no power...) Its only a couple of pence more per litre, but you'll end up sticking about the same amount (cash wise) in when you fill up.

Hope that helps.

buy a pointy then theres no need for all that choke malarky.

I had a similar problem in Really cold weather - took ages to warm up but mine had the annoying habit of stalling at really inpoortune moments (i.e. at a junction when I was changing gears etc).

I upped the idling speed to around 15-1600 & that's done the job.


I do warm the bike with choke. Initially at approx 3000rpm, then as it warms up I lower it to around 2-2500. Then I turn the choke off. I do this in the time it takes me to get my gloves on (& if it's really cold the time it also takes to reverse my bike out of the drive) then I'm away.

My old Kwak ER5 was a nightmare in cold weather, would always conk out at lights for the first 20 minutes or so, hard to start, etc. The fuel injected SV never has trouble starting and always starts first time, even when there's snow or ice on the bike. And the only time it conks out is if I'm too ham fisted with the clutch/throttle at the lights. I wouldn't go back to a carbed bike.