taking apart and cleaning carbs

[flair.14]

I am having some issues issues with my carbs that is making my bike unrideable. The bike was working fine until a yesterday, when the engine could not stay on without any throttle. The bike would even stall if I attempted to use some/all choke. Of course, I played around with the idle screw to make up for this but now the engine seems to stick at high RPM if I give it any throttle (vacuum leak?).

I would like to take out the carbs and take it apart. My goal is to clean up any problems remove any gunk on the jets. If I do decide to go this route, is there any way that I can take apart the carbs and put it back together without replacing anything such as gaskets?

[scottpA_GS]

yes you can 

ust be VERY careful 1. not to loose the tiny o-ring in the cap 2. Not to tear the bowl gaskets 3. dont get carb cleaner on the gaskets... Clean em well and re-assemble 

[The Buddha]

What year is the bike ... and when you say it wont stay running ... what exactly is it doing/sounding like.

Your problem probably is in the intake manifold, not the carbs.

Cool.
Buddha.

[flair.14]

Tne bike is a 97.

Funny you say that because I just replaced the gaskets on the manifold! this afternoon I wonder if old, died up gaskets would cause me any problems. I should have checked for a vacuum leak but I cannot get this bike started today!

The bike was running fine until Friday afternoon when it just would not want to stay on while idling. I noticed this when approaching an intersection and the bike stalled and I had trouble starting it...I had to give it a ton of throttle while spinning the starter motor to get it going. Even then, I had to give it some throttle to keep it from stalling again which was challenging to me during the rushhour traffic on Friday.

I tried driving the bike a bit yesterday and it sounded horrible....like it was running on one cylinder. I pulled the plugs yesterday and the left one was black and wet while the right side was dry and running a little lean (whitish/brown).  It did eventually run on 2 cylinders but it was sluggish and I couldn't maintain anything over 3-4k RPM.

I have the carbs off now and I am taking them apart. I have no idea the size of my jets and I was wondering if there is any way to identify the size of them by any markers on it. I have doubts the previous owner(s) keep it stock...

[Dr.Sparkie]

could be a stuck float valve causing the one carb to drown in gas.

anyways, when taking apart your carbs, use a tray or pan, and two bowls. put all the parts from one carb in one bowl, the other and the other, and never remove the carbs from the tray.

[The Buddha]

Put some pics up and I'll tell you what they are, and see if you can read numbers off them ...
stock on a 97 is 122.5 mains, 37.5 pilots 5DH bla bla needles ... no multi groove needles.
Put up pics as to what come out. I'll identify it in a sec.
Cool.
Buddha.

Tne bike is a 97.

Funny you say that because I just replaced the gaskets on the manifold! this afternoon I wonder if old, died up gaskets would cause me any problems. I should have checked for a vacuum leak but I cannot get this bike started today!

The bike was running fine until Friday afternoon when it just would not want to stay on while idling. I noticed this when approaching an intersection and the bike stalled and I had trouble starting it...I had to give it a ton of throttle while spinning the starter motor to get it going. Even then, I had to give it some throttle to keep it from stalling again which was challenging to me during the rushhour traffic on Friday.

I tried driving the bike a bit yesterday and it sounded horrible....like it was running on one cylinder. I pulled the plugs yesterday and the left one was black and wet while the right side was dry and running a little lean (whitish/brown).  It did eventually run on 2 cylinders but it was sluggish and I couldn't maintain anything over 3-4k RPM.

I have the carbs off now and I am taking them apart. I have no idea the size of my jets and I was wondering if there is any way to identify the size of them by any markers on it. I have doubts the previous owner(s) keep it stock...