Cold starting problem

[twinotter]

Hi
Have my first bike, a 1999 GS500E, that i bought third hand at the beginning of the summer. I have ridden about 8,000 km this summer and it was great, but it is October in Toronto and the weather has turned cold, 10c today,  and the bike won't start. I had a weekend 600 km ride two weekends ago and that is last time I had it running.

In total the bike has 38,000 km, and is in good shape with some character dents and scrapes it has picked up over the years. The bike trys to turn over, doesn't start, and then stops trying and just makes a click noise. All the lights work when the key is on, although they dim slightly as the engine is cranked. The chock is open and i have tried to start her with the throttle both open all the way and closed. I have taken the spark plugs out and they look fine and made sure the leads went back on tightly. Again, for a view seconds it tried to start but soon fell back into the clicking habit.

I am looking for any wild ideas, thoughts, and advice on things to try so i can get another round of rides befoe the snow flies.

Thanks

[ohgood]

Hi
Have my first bike, a 1999 GS500E, that i bought third hand at the beginning of the summer. I have ridden about 8,000 km this summer and it was great, but it is October in Toronto and the weather has turned cold, 10c today,  and the bike won't start. I had a weekend 600 km ride two weekends ago and that is last time I had it running.

In total the bike has 38,000 km, and is in good shape with some character dents and scrapes it has picked up over the years. The bike trys to turn over, doesn't start, and then stops trying and just makes a click noise. All the lights work when the key is on, although they dim slightly as the engine is cranked. The chock is open and i have tried to start her with the throttle both open all the way and closed. I have taken the spark plugs out and they look fine and made sure the leads went back on tightly. Again, for a view seconds it tried to start but soon fell back into the clicking habit.

I am looking for any wild ideas, thoughts, and advice on things to try so i can get another round of rides befoe the snow flies.

Thanks

dude, that's not very cold yet ! get a trickle charger, get a gallon of distilled water, and maintain your battery. it prolly just needs the water and a shot to get it back up to snuff. just keeping it up during the winter and not letting it freeze means you won't have to spend any money come the spring

got stabil  or some other fuel stabilizer ?

got a way to get the tires off the floor ?

[The Buddha]

Yea put a good battery in ... or charge yours ... and clean carbs ...
Cool.
Buddha.

[twinotter]

Thanks buddha and ohgood
I got my weekend ride in. A scarecrow convention in the fall fields north of the city, no rain, cool.
I picked up a trickle charger saturday night, my battery spent the night with her and in the morning, today, voila, good as new, well started up and ran for the day. All is good for now, I will see tomorrow morning in the batery holds the charge over night.
As for cleaning the carbs, I would like to tackle this over the winter. I am new to the bike fraternity, am not mechanicaly trained, but I am a carpenter so assembling something is not frieghtening.
The shop manuel came with the bike and i understand on the site somewhere a video of the procedure exists. Any ideas if tackling the carb removal and cleaning is a smart move for a beginner?
Thanks again, the twin otter

[ATLRIDER]

You don's say what type battery you have.  Sealed(maintenance free) or the one with the caps to top off with distilled water.  If the one with the caps, check the level of each cell and correct levels if needed.  Then trickle charge it again.