Dusty is on the trailer

[excess.11]

I thought I had cam chain  and main bearing issues  ......long before I bought a colortune and carbtune kit..
It s amazing how a little time spent to tune a motor can save many hours of pulling things apart fruitlessly and expensive mechanic repairs .

[Eveready1100]

Charged the battery upto full checked spark again, nothing except at the very end as I stopped turning the bike over I get one final spark.

Brett, that's a classic example of the battery not having enough oomph to run the starter motor and the TCI unit together.
Try just using jumper leads from your car to the bike battery and giving that a go. If you've been trying and trying to start the bike recently, be prepared for a bit of a bang when the unburnt fuel vapour in the exhaust ignites!
(I speak from experience here. I had many early morning explosions in the garage while i had my harness issues a long time ago)

Oh, one last thing,

Even though the rain was coming down I nor Danica could stand another night in the old house this time without even a mattress or blankets so we set of about mid day for the 5 hour drive

There's been numerous discussions in the past about wet weather misfiring, and while the bike's playing up like that, the motor does indeed sound like it's on its last legs with rattles and bangs etc.
Once it dries out, normally all those vicious noises disappear so don't go making major decisions until you've got the bike up and running again.

[Christian Raith]

Like Eddy said ALWAYS try the cheap easy to get to stuff first
I'm at Berkeley on the weekends
May be with the children at some point so ring first if you need anything

[XSIIE]

Hey Brettso,

I'm coming down to the South next Sunday (or Saturday) I can btring a working TCI unit so you can eliminate  (or confirm) that from you fault finding.

I had a similat problem with my RH..  flashed her up on emorning to ride to work and it felt like she was running on 2 cyl.

checked fuel.  good

shecked spark.. good

still ran like shit.

replaced spark plugs.  all back to normal

try the cheap stuff first.

Let me know if you want to try the TCI

Eddy

[excess.11]

Brett you say you have spark when cranking and when releasing the starter out of cct no spark . I m leaning toward the TCI unit...........you don t need to pay a mechanic to change out a "KNOWN" working unit ........if you can beg borrow or steal one........to see if this eliminates the run problem.
More than likely the mechanic definitely won t have one of these lying around at his disposal , to fault find either.
 Coils are fairly robust........I would also install a fresh set of spark plugs......BP6ES or Iridium equivalents.

[BrettS]

Thanks for the advice guys, sorry for the slow reply. With my lack of electric ability and also lack of internet for advice I decided to get the help of a local mechanic to pinpoint the issue. Been told he is good. My best guess is CDI unit I will keep you posted next week.
I haven't upgraded the coils to dynotec yet Jeff. One hope is a coil is gone and this can be fixed with the upgrade. Just hope the fix is not too involved i can't wait to get back on the rd again.

[SCARFEY]

Mine stopped mysteriously and it turned out to be the flexible wire on the vacuum advance had broken. Common problem. I repaired it using a piece of cable I took of a computer mouse because it was designed to wiggle about and was reinforced with some stringy stuff.

It may have been making and breaking for a while then finally let go??

[excess.11]

Brett...also check the resistor connection that it is ok and bridged out. I recall you fit the dynotec coils ...is that right....did you remove and bridge out the connection?

[BrettS]

Thanks Christian, I will have to make a call or two because it seems I have no spark. Put some petrol in today and no fire. Charged the battery upto full checked spark again, nothing except at the very end as I stopped turning the bike over I get one final spark. Checked all the wiring by eye can't see nothing. I am starting to wonder if the TCI unit as Jeff suggested could be the problem.
The new house has no internet so I feel very useless. (at the libary internet now)
Think I might have to give someone a call to get some help tracking the electrics? I think my digital tester is gone the ghost too. This could be good news but damn I hate electrics :/

[Christian Raith]

I am at Berkeley (near Dapto) on the weekends, have to pull the spare bike down and may have it on it's back next weekend so keep that in mind.

[BrettS]

Thanks for the reality check Jeff, not sure if I was imagining it but the engine sounded dry/ rattley and oil has again been leaking from cam tensioner/ head gasket? So I figured it might be a good time to pull the engine out and rebuild as always planned.
But I will get some petrol on the next free sunny day and see what I can find. One classic example of what you say was an old VR wagon. My amature mechanic mate agreed it had bottom end trouble so i sourced a new engine then as we went to replace the engine we found a faulty harmonic balancer. Replaced this and sold off the no longer needed replacement engine. 

[excess.11]

Brett ......check the vacuum hoses and carb boots for leaks. I would check all the simple solutions before assuming the worst. Replace all sparks plugs....check the vac advance unit holds under suction and does nt slowly retard due to a leak in the internal diaphragm. The tci unit may be breaking down itself.....if you don t have a spare unit to change out see if you can borrow a known working unit to substitute to help find the darsted gremlins...or.....that common problem of the pick up wiring on the  inductors intermittently separating. Also....do you think the heavy rain was a  issue with the spark....or did the problem evolve before getting rained down on ?Any fuel blockage in the tank or fuel tap setup  or vac issues relating to the perception you had of starvation  should be looked into and eliminated. No point in rebuilding an engine if it was a fuel or spark issue.

[BrettS]

Thanks for the run down Eddy, being in a rental house for about the next year as well as all these amazing bike riding hills around i don't want to mess around too much. I think I always figured I would get someone to build my engine that knows what they are doing.
Balanced and blueprinted with larger bore and compression seemed the go but realistically i prob don't have that money to throw around at the moment.
I had thought about a replacement motor or even complete bike. Might have to keep a look out on the sales pages as well?

[XSIIE]

Hey Bretts,

Man, that's some bad luck.

If I were a betting man, and going on your previous form, I would bet that you're going to attempt the rebuild yourself.

I've just completed one and it's not that difficult.  it is/was time consuming. I had heaps of good advice from the hallowed pages within this forum and reached out to our pommy bretheren for other answers to techo questions.

Now this is just my opinion, but I would:

invest in a wiseco big bore kit $500
Rebore - $25 per pot
Refurb the head - $200
Gasket kit - $100 on ebay.com or ebay.co.uk
Undercut the 2nd gear - Your time
engine spray - $25
random seals and bearings - Your guess
Big ends - on ebay.com for around $70
new carb boots - $100 on ebay.com.

around $1500 if you do it yourself.

or,

you could send it away and get it done professionally.  I'm not sure how much but $3000 would be a good guestimate.

you could get a good working engine from ebay.com for a couple of hundred bucks.  low miles.  shipping would cost more than the donk but could prove cheaper than a rebuild.

All options.

May the force be with you brettsy one kanobi.

[BrettS]

I was looking forward to riding the XS through the kangaroo valley mountains as the last trip to be taken to our new home but it seemed all my luck had run out. I couldn't complain I had used a lot of luck up in the move so far.
Even though the rain was coming down I nor Danica could stand another night in the old house this time without even a mattress or blankets so we set of about mid day for the 5 hour drive. Right from the start it seemed dusty was not up for this ride. Anything much over 100kmh and it started to surge it also seemed to fe leaking more oil than usual hmmm. I probably should have turned around then but the eternal optimist told me to keep going.
I decided the oil was a secondary issue and I was mainly dealing with a fuel issue. Not only did speed over 100kms cause the surges but at low speeds I had to throttle it to get the revs up to avoid the surges.
Had trouble starting it after a stop 100 Km's on, although I doubted I could get it the whole 500kms to the new house I figured every 100 was less I had to travel back to pick it up so pushed on.
Some times I thought it was going to due but it kept going. Then I had a new problem around Yass the rain really started coming down. Not sure how you experienced guys handle this but with a faulty bike and not being able to see shit I missed the Yass service centre Arrrrrrggggg! At least i didn't end up under one of those bloody trucks.
So although I was teased with supposed service centres my ego would like to say Dusty stopped from some terminal failure but I think it is safe to say it ultimately stopped about 800 meters from the big Merino service centre from lack of fuel 309kms into the trip.
I considered several options from pushing the bike to taking it petrol but the ugly sound of a dry oil motor even though it had plenty and the hardness to start, the heavy rain and my inexperience in dealing with this by not being able to see a bloody thing ascwell as the mountains ahead helped to make the decision to leave dusty and the fish tank in my seat in the support viechle on the side of the rd.
Got to the new address, unloaded the car and trailer, slept 4 hours then headed back the 200 km to get dusty and the fish tank before anyone else got some bright idea to give dusty a better home.
I haven't tried to start the bike since but I am thinking it is time to take the motor out and get a full rebuild.
I will be looking for some advice on who can build a good XS1100 motor in the east what I can expect to pay and what value modifications would be recomended.
Thanks