Sunday, March 16, 2014

"That ain't the answer I was looking for!"

   I guess that it is a telling factor that most of my mechanical quotes are from Robert Duvall in "Days of Thunder."  The most recent was when I walked into the shop and there was a puddle of fuel under the bike again.  I immediately thought of Robert talking to the race car before the Daytona 500 and finding an oil puddle on the floor and he said, "that ain't the answer I was looking for!"  Me either!  Then I walked around the bike and shook it as I looked into the oil sight glass.  Fuel in the crank case again.  Obviously my carb repair a few weeks ago was not as successful as I had thought.  First things first draining the oil again and removing the carb and fuel tank.
Through some discussion with my brethren on the forums I decided that #1 my new petcock was faulty and not shutting off the fuel supply, #2 the fuel supply valve was faulty, and #3 possibly the float was also defective.  So I ordered a carb kit and float from a local dealer.


Next I ordered a new genuine Raptor petcock.  Apparently the great deal I got before was no so great.  Below you see from left to right, the OEM, cheap knock off , and Raptor from Yamaha.


In take valve parts.


New verses old. If you look closely you will see the wear on the older part on the right.


New valve seat installed.


I had trouble fitting the new float so I reinstalled the old, but it still leaked.


Using my rotary tool I was able to make the new float fit perfectly by slightly trimming the tab where it attached between the mounting post. 


 Setting the float to the proper height is very important.


The new petcock installed and the carb reinstalled.


Its going to take a few test rides to see if this solved the problem.








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