New but old problem...

[JC Viper]

Yeah I disconnected the hoses on the petcock and no gas was coming out. Turned on the prime and fuel started flowing through the hose into a canister. It appears the petcock works and the hoses are in good shape.

Now if those float needles are past the butterfly then I'm kinda outta luck as the carbs won't come off the connection to the engine. I'm stuck without a diagram for a couple of weeks so I'm flying into this thing blind. I did however discovered that carburetor 1 was running too rich as the air adjust needle was almost screwed in while the others weren't.

Oh and the carb throat is still showing some moisture build up even after removing the hoses.

[BuzZz]

Yeah, you'll want to be taking the carbs out to check/replace the needle valve assembly. The needle valve is the device that allows fuel into the floatbowls..... from inside the floatbowls.

Once your manual comes, you'll see it is fairly straightforward, the biggest problems are old, hard rubber parts and tight access making making them hard to work with.

[JC Viper]

Carbs are off and the boots are still good. It just took some hard twisting. Of course things are never that easy... I removed the float bowls from 3 of 4 carburetors and checked their assemblies. Nice and clean which was to be expected.

The problem carburetor is still a problem: 3 of 4 screws on the float bowl came out with ease. there's a straggler stuck on and I've tried different drivers and force to the point where the head is stripped a bit making screw drivers hard to seat in.

The good news is that the float bowl is drained and hoping that the valve needle reseated itself because that screw ain't coming off... so now what?

At least the bike is easy to disassemble compared to today's bikes with everything accessible (save for the tight screws).

[paul246]

Carbs are off and the boots are still good. It just took some hard twisting. Of course things are never that easy... I removed the float bowls from 3 of 4 carburetors and checked their assemblies. Nice and clean which was to be expected.

The problem carburetor is still a problem: 3 of 4 screws on the float bowl came out with ease. there's a straggler stuck on and I've tried different drivers and force to the point where the head is stripped a bit making screw drivers hard to seat in.

The good news is that the float bowl is drained and hoping that the valve needle reseated itself because that screw ain't coming off... so now what?

At least the bike is easy to disassemble compared to today's bikes with everything accessible (save for the tight screws).

You'll have to get an ease-out or try a left handed drill bit. I had the same problem and the left handed drill bit worked great by itself. Or, just take the carb to a shop and let them do it for a minimal cost.

Then, replace all the carb bolts with allen capped bolts, most likely metric threaded. You won't have that problem again in the future by doing so.

[jstark47]

The good news is that the float bowl is drained and hoping that the valve needle reseated itself because that screw ain't coming off... so now what?

That valve probably ain't gonna reseat, there's gunk in there. Like Paul said, get a screw extractor, or take the carb to a machine shop. They generally don't charge a lot for little jobs like that - at least our local ones don't. It's a waste of time to put that carb back on the bike before you get inside it.

[BuzZz]

Get a manual impact driver. Use it on any screw that doesn't break loose easily with a regular screw driver. Especially on an older bike.

Depending on how badly your carb bowl screw is buggered, an impact driver may get it out as well. If not, then your stuck with the more destructive removal method mentioned above.

And they are right, it ain't likely to 're-seat' itself without opening it up and fixing the bad needle and seat. Re-installing it just means yanking it right back off to actually fix the problem.