Choke and starting

Hi!

I find that at different settings on the choke, it affects whether the bike will start easily or not- ie with no choke, it starts fine but doesn't keep going (cos it needs a bit of choke for warming up, like) but there's only a few places on the choke where the engine will start happily (instead of the starter turning a few times and the engine not catching).

I am thinking that this is down to mucky choke plungers (battery is fine and recently put new reg/rec in, so no problems there). Is there anything else this could be?

How hard is it to clean the plungers? I'm not all that confident in taking the carbs apart as such, but if it's just a case of getting the air box off and working on the choke plungers from there, I might give it a go. What's to do? Just give em a spray with WD40 and dry them? I assume the sockets they fit in also will need a bit of a clean.

Would the carb balance affect this at all? That's something I'm not equipped to do (and can't afford to chuck at a mechanic at the mo).

Well there could be a who load of things that afect the starting of the bike and the choke cable is just one of them. I could be like I had one of the plungers had snapped off so the choke was only adjusting on one carb. You could have unbalanced carbs as you mentioned though you would notice this when you riding as the ride would be rather rough at slow speeds. Then you could have dirt in the jets maybe causing fueling problems, I had this on the rear carb before makes it feel the same as unbalanced carbs.
Or it could be that your spark plug/s are breaking down or dirty causing problems when the engine is cold.

Loobing the cables is a good start though and you can get a cable loober from most bike shops for about 5 quid as it allows you to spray wd40 down the lines.

Cheers Grinch.

The running is fairly smooth, so I guess it's less likely to be the carbs. I ride every day and cleaned the carbs (with spray) a few months ago, which made little difference.

Because of the difference of the choke settings (it kind of revs up and down or stalls at low choke after a few minutes riding), I think that could be the main thing. I'll start studying the Haynes Manual for the procedure then.

Bumped this one a little.

Took the airbox off last night (it was seated properly, so not the problem). When I move the choke lever, there is a clicking sound from the back carb. I reckon this could be-
A) Rear choke plunger/cable broken and clicking cos of that
B) that's the sound it makes (cos of the springs) and therefore the front plunger is broken cos it's not making any noise
C) none of the above
D) All of the above (excluding c)

Unfortunately, I couldn't get the rear plunger out- the screw socket started to round. Gods it was turned up tight. Why can't Suzuki make their fasteners out of proper, grown up metal?

Sounds a bit nicer after cleaning the carbs with spray, though.

So- quickie questions folks- any ideas based on above? Would it be the end of the cable or the plunger itself that's broked? Can plungers be bought seperate, or just in a set?

Answers on a postcard to the above address, please!

Thanks as ever

thed

Anyone? Please?!

Right- I'm finally going to take my choke plungers out tomorrow and have a look at them.

I had a problem (mentioned earlier) in that the rear choke assembly screw started to round- it seems to be screwed in well tight.



So- providing I can get it out (I don't think it's beyond happening or at the take it to a mech stage yet)- how tight to these things need to be done up? (I checked and a new screw is ?11+vat from Spares Direct!).

Following sorting the choke and cabs out, I'll be looking at the starter motor next.

Grr- there's always something with this bike!