G'day from mat

[melbxs]

Welcome aboard Matt.

You might want to look at richening up the mixture in your carbs. That will often cure a backfire, especially if it is happening on deceleration. A Colourtune would help you get the mixture spot on.

Also, have you balanced them with a good vacuum guage?

[Eveready1100]

G'day Mat, and welcome to the fold.... Heh...heh....Heh.....
These XS'S will grab you and hold on hard,.................. but they will pay you back with years of enjoyment, from blasting through the twisty bits, to a slow undulating run over your favorite roads with your favorite person............................in most cases.
Have a read through the threads, online here, or, if your question still isn't covered by the information already at your perusal, just ask, and one of our Xssive guru's will head you in the right direction.

[steptoe]

stay away from "most motorcycle mechanics"  whether they don't know about these or are just plain not interested, but close enough isn't good enough,, not to us purists anyhow,

see if you can get hold of "rhodie 55" he's up there to,, will give him a ring and let him know to check with you,, he's not long finished a comprehensive rebuild on his

 after your big flood ride,, bundy's just over the hill and round the corner  if you need w/shop time
 if all else fails, sing out on here mate,,, some one will come back with advice or a knowledgeable solution, no matter the problem

oooh almost forgot,, welcome to our little gathering

did you happen to put the pods on the end of the velocity stacks,,or straight onto the carbs popping will be an air fuel mix prob,, is the vac adv hose on the carbs or the intake manifold,,

there are so many finicky measurements that have to be spot on, to get these right,, close enough isn't good enough
 
sounds like the old girl ran like a train on the home run, the vac adv won't be the prob

it'll be fuel and the carbs you,ve put on it

can you get your old set down here easily/cheaply or not, if so send em down and I'll go thru them for you,, just ask Eveready1100

PM me if you can send them

[Jonesy]

G,day Mat
definitely one hell of an introduction to XS's. Good story and welcome aboard, reckon you'll find some good tips here to get that bike sorted and running just right.

Jonesy.

[matman]

I'm Mat.

I've been tooling around on bikes for about 10 years, first with a postie (wish I never sold it), then a 1978 cb400T (still got it - rock solid) and recently I got a 1979 XS11 without really intending to, and now I am hooked on it.

I went to Sydney in January and while I was there got news that an uncle of mine (below 1000 Ulysses member) is quite unwell. And he had an XS that he loved and wanted to keep in the family, and so I bought it from him. And I rode it from Sydney up the pacific highway to Lismore, where I spent a couple days cleaning out the carbs (there was fuel overflowing onto the bike.. not good). After that, the rains started (remember the rain and floods?) and to get home to Townsville, my girlfriend and I had to ride west: Tenterfield, and up to Tamworth and through the Darling Downs, outrunning the rain by hours each day. It was pretty good going, the flood waters around Dalby had just receded from the first flood, we tore through, and the rain brought more flooding to the poor bastards down there. We went west to Augathella, and north up to Barcaldine, hoping to cross over to Emerald, but on the way into Barcaldine a spark plug blew out! I was overtaking a truck at about 140km/h and bang! number 2. It held on by the lead but how I'll never know. So it was stop in Barcaldine for a few days to get a helicoil etc etc. Nice place, Barcaldine.  Six or seven pubs...

Back on the road, but the Emerald road was a no go-er due to flooding, so west to Longreach, up to Winton and then Hughenden and back east to home sweet home, or as I call it: Townsville.

Since then, I have had the XS at another mechanic who insisted the heli needed redoing (well, ok), and then I have had no end of trouble with carbs. My uncle told me he had intended to change the carbs as his next job, but hadn't got there yet. Turns out the carbs on it weren't original, so I thought I'd buy a set of original carbs and redo them. I got a set, $100. They need some work, including replacing some bits that Yamaha was going to charge me $800 or so all up for. I spoke to some people who spoke to their people, and the news came back that I could get a set of 36mm Miukni RS smoothbores for the same (plus $100 for a push-pull throttle, and now pod filters, I guess..?). So I got them (and now I have 2 sets of carbs that fit but need some work and expensive parts or patience to find suitable replacements... anyone interested in them?). The RS weren't spaced for the XS, but they come with guides and drilled holes etc for easy respacing to XS dimensions. Took me about 2ish days, but I got it going yesterday. And it is basically a whole new bike.

Although, it still backfires like a lunatic...

And I think the vacuum advance was causing the idle speed to continually creep upwards. I restricted it with a cable tie around a kink, and this seems to have slowed it down a bit. But I 'm not sure it is a wise thing to do since I don't really know what a vacuum advance is for... except plugging onto the number 2 carb...

Anyway, for now it seems ok. I guess I might take it to a good mechanic who can teach me or tune it or tune it for me...