Air box fitment GSX1100ESD

[PaulP]

So, I have put new tyres, refurbed the calipers, new pads and hoses, new indicators, new head gasket, rebuilt the carbs, new oil and filter, and nearly finished, just need to refit the tank, fairing, carbs and air filter box, last time I installed that was probably 15 years ago and it was hard as hell then, some of the runners are quite hard now, does anyone have any tips on how to make this any easier ??, or should I go down the K&N style route ??

[Swiss Toni]

Keep the Airbox. Heat the rubbers up with a hair dryer or boiling water. There used to be some kind of concoction you steeped the rubbers in overnight, and they were quite supple in the morning. Buggered if I can remember what it was. Someone on here might?

 

Edited September 7, 2020 by Swiss Toni

[PaulP]

Soaking them overnight sounds a good solution if anyone knows what to use, it’s going to be tricky keeping 4 warm with a hairdryer 

[Swiss Toni]

It’s Oil of Wintergreen. Or Wintergreen Oil? Can’t remember! It’s got to be diluted with water, but it works! 

Edited September 7, 2020 by Swiss Toni

[PaulP]

Hi Swiss Toni

Wintergreen oil does exist anyway, apparently it’s good for headaches, that seems appropriate for fitting an air box on these. 
has anyone else heard of this or have any idea on dilution rate ???

[RGSX]

I have two bottles of of wintergreen I bought for that purpose but it's a short term solution, eventually you'll need to replace the rubbers which I did instead. Pharmacist asked me a lot of questions as to why I needed so much, apparently there are unapproved drug uses for it.

A heat gun/paint stripper plus grease works quite well too.

Edited September 8, 2020 by RGSX

[PaulP]

Looking for this wintergreen oil online it all seems to be nice smelling aromatherapy stuff, that seems a bit wasteful , maybe try a pharmacy, short term is fine, I only need them to be supple for an hour to fit the box, I don’t intend to remove it sgain for some time I hope 

[Blubber]

You could try a pet shop: they use Wintergreen oil on horses too. ( according to google)

[Dezza]

Wintergreen Oil: it's on the shelf next to the sky hooks and the elbow grease. It's a bit late now but if you choose a hot sunny day to re-fit your carb rubbers, letting them sit in the direct sunlight for a couple of hours first works wonders. This works for tyre fitting too.

Edited September 10, 2020 by Dezza

[PaulP]

Before I fit the air box I need to get it running well, I appreciate that the mixture will be a bit lean running it without the air box but when I try it’s not so good, if I feel the pipe temps on start up there is a lot of variation, no4 hardly heats at all until I take the choke off, I have stripped the carbs a few times and used carb cleaner and an air line, everything looks ok, but when I fit a spare set of carbs from a different model no4 heats up straight away, one thing I have never cleaned Is the individual choke plungers, it looks like you need to separate the carbs for this ?just looking at all the springs on the throttle linkage and it looks tricky, has anyone done this and have any advise ?, I know I could send them off to someone but hopefully you understand the preference to do it yourself, the carbs did sit for several years full of petrol, I have also checked the float heights and balanced the butterflies staticly 

all advise aprecciated 

paul 

Edited September 13, 2020 by PaulP

[Gixer1460]

DIY is great if you have the 'tools' to do everything! Ultrasonic cleaning is generally the best way for deep / extreme cleaning and then a full service - gaskets, o rings, etc. Some companies can do complete carb racks but home kits best broken down individually and disassembled! Carb problems are rarely quick or cheap to cure.

[PaulP]

That seems about right, I have tried cleaning yet again and find that although tickover is a bit lumpy the engine responds smooth and quick to a blip of the throttle, so I thought I was getting close, I then thought I should blip a bit more and find it won’t rev freely above 4000 and if I open her up fully it just cuts out, tried with my spare carb set and it does virtually the same, maybe reaching 1000 rpm more, checked the plugs and although they are not perfect they are not bad, still no air box fitted but I would be surprised if that caused such a difference, up to 4000 the slides are only just moving, when I try to go above 4000 they open a bit more but just flutter, all 4 looking equal on both carb sets, any ideas on where to look next ??

[Gixer1460]

Presumably this is in the garage / shed or outside on the stand? That'll tell you nothing as regards carb functioning - a large part of which is load on the engine. On a stand its virtually zero - it needs to be on road driven or on a dyno to load the engine. This is the only way to find out if the set up is working correctly or not. The flatline response @ 4-5k is fairly typical with CV carbs and no airbox - it'll be even more pronounced on the road and under load!

[PaulP]

Hi Gixer1460, you are correct in that it’s on the stand in neutral. 
are you saying that with the air box on it might rev ok ??, if so is there anyway I can get close to simulating an air box as obviously it’s a real pain to fit and I would like to have some confidence before installing it, the spare set of carbs was previously running with K&Ns and have had a jet fitted in the back to compensate, would you expect these also to have the same issue without the K&Ns installed ?

[Gixer1460]

The bike with those carbs was designed to use an airbox - i'm not saying it will cure everything as i'm not sure of what could be wrong but it'd be a good start! If you don't want to use an airbox then buy a Dynojet kit and aftermarket filters of your choice and fit those. It'll cost you the best part of £300/ $300 and still require some tweaking! The factories really do know what they are doing when they build bikes, spending billions of yen just for a backyard tinker monger to rip them apart cos he thinks he knows better! BTW just fitting K&N's won't solve the problem !

[alboo]

Wax oil good for hoses as well

[NorthernBloke]

I went through a very similar experience a few years ago on my old ES, I could never get it running cleanly on the original carbs and as you say Getting it running something like without the airbox was the way I also approached it. But I never got it running right it would often run on less than 4 cylinders intermittently and it always felt as though I was trying to drag the revs up or out of it, I gave up and fitted Bandit 1200 carbs and Ramair filters and it was 100 times better, like a brand new bike!