Quote from: davipuI'd ride up there just to piss them off, but somebody better be buying my coffee at the dennys

I have a friend in Ventura County; I'll pass the word about this, and he just might be willing to join you. He's REALLY obnoxious; I think it was his "Army Sensitivity Training" that did it...

No, wait... On second thought, he's just an @$$hole. Right man for the job, and all that...

This thing the bike did seems like what happened with my bike when new, I didn't know there was an idle screw, and after warming up, I mean when the bike was hot, the RPMs would go high and I thought it was the carbs, then read the owners manual and knew it was a very simple fix. So, was the idle screw already checked??? I didn't read nobody talk about it so, just to cover the basics.

Flaming bags of poo usually do the trick

Quote from: GisserOf course, if you do want to perform your own fenderectomy, instructions are on the site.  

there's more here than that...

rejetting how to's:
http://www.angelfire.com/mt2/mikesgs500/rejetting/

http://electrovw.tripod.com/id17.html


maxwellf, did you pay by credit card? if so, dispute the charges. check? stop payment on it. you brought it in for a specific problem, and sure, they charged you for other work they did (fair enough) but they need to fix the problem, at their cost.

cut your losses and get your bike out of there.
pablo-

I heard that Pablo is buying the coffee....

I, also bought from a dealership. 99 gs w/ 12000 for 2600 + tx/lic. I had not rode for 11 years and the only thing I noticed about the bike was the front forks leaking. Asked them to fix that. N/P. asked if the bike needed anything else and of course they say it was fine.

First trip to my buddies house and they say my tires need replacement NOW! Took back to dealer, but they said remember that  signature I put down on a peice of paper with the words 'SOLD AS IS' on top? Anyway, they said they would make me a good deal on tires, RIGHT! This dealer is in Visalia, CA. Sander's motorcycles. It is pretty obvious they are only interested in how much money they make, not rider safety. I will never buy from them again.

I ended up taking to local bike shop here in town. Dinuba Cycles. He had a better deal on tires. He could not believe that sold me the bike in the condition that it was. I also needed brake pads as one of the rear ones was gone! No wonder it was sqeaking!

Noticed my chain had to much slack so I decided to tighten it.  After I did, the indicator notches are completely off the scale. So now chain and sprockets are needed!

I know now that I have severely overpaid for this bike. This is what happens when you haven't rode for 11 years and can't wait to get another bike. Take note that back in 87, I bought a new bike from Sanders. Now, in my glee to get another, I trusted the dealer. BIG MISTAKE!!!.

The upside is I have a gs 500. It looks brand new and I am not letting go of it any time soon.

You know if the dealership puts the stock jets back in it's not going to cure  the problem, at least I don't think. The stock jets are usually leaner than a rejet so maybe it's sucking air at the carb boots. Or it could be as simple as resetting the idle adjustment screw like someone mentioned. Or too tight exhaust valves. A lot of people on this board have had this same problem so you've got plenty of experience backing you. Check with Srinath about it too.

Yea you better get with davipu, he's have it sorted out in 20 mins ... yea if he suggests you to "tard" the bike give him another beer ...
Anyway ... rpm 4K is easy, turn idle screw ... should be free ... if it ides at 4K when hot, and barely starts and wants to run when cold ... as in 2 mins of choke and then ... then I'd say it may need an air screw adjustment ... get this ... that also should be free ...
Holes in the stock exhaust ... no big deal, its a sewing machine wihtout the holes and a vacuum cleaned when they drill them ... BFD ... We lose the hole can and swap in whatever we have laying about with a fist sized hole in it ... that can be loud ... Do not fix your exhaust.
Better figure out davipu's favorite beer, cos that SOB will ride to you for beer, fix it and ride back ... heck He'd do it if he lived in NC ... he's in SD ...
Also hook up with the rest on the So Cal guys ... pantablo - wannabe GS'er, The_good_guy - now awol in Sac for school, chimivee - excellent mechanic, but now at large, lots more ... You bought a bike to belong to the elite group of bikers and for the life style (bleeeeh) didn't ya ... part of that life style is beer and food ... so roll it out and your problems will vanish ...
Cool.
Srinath.

Okay, I'm sure your bike needed a tune up, oil change, spark plugs, brakes etc... If you are learning to ride these things will make it easier. However the problem with the throttle has nothing to do with carbs. I just bought my 04 brand new and it does the same thing. There is a throttle stop screw located right above the oil reservoir. If you are on the right hand side of the bike then you can reach your hand in just above where the oil cap is and there is a small screw that you can turn. On my bike, turning it clockwise raises the idle and turning it counter-clockwise lowers the idle.
The purpose of this wonderful screw is that it keeps the throttle partially open so that the engine is getting gas at idle. However, as it is called the throttle lock screw, it also keeps the throttle from closing all the way. When I got my bike it did the same thing as you are describing. It really made shifting gears a pain in the butt, and made me feel like the workst motrocyclist in history. However, once I let out the screw a little bit then the throttle worked fine.
The only side affect of this is that my bike is a little tuff to start. Pulling in the Choke all the way helps, but sometimes it doesn't start unless you give it a little throttle too.
As an aside, I also experienced the same problem you are describing if the choke is on when riding. When you first start going the engine is cold so the extra gas doesn't cause a problem. Once the engine warms up, it's getting to much juice since the choke is on, and that causes the RPM's to stay up too high.
Try warming up your bike for 10 minutes of easy riding in 1st/2nd gear. Then pull over (and make sure you have good gloves on) adjust the screw. Start the bike, in 1st gear. Roll on the throttle till the RPM's go up around 6K. Leave it there for a few seconds. Now roll off the throttle and see if the RPM's come down. If they do not then turn the screw some more. Play around with it until the RPM's drop down immediately and don't stick anywhere. If that doesn't work for you, then you will have to try something else, but that's exactly what was happening to me when I first got my bike.

I got the bike back from the  :nana: ing bastards at the Suzuki honda place of north hollywood <-- yes, thats the evil place.  They charged me another $165 for the rebuild of the carb.  

I will say to their credit, the bike runs great, much smoother, and without the throttle sticking.  I'm thrilled to have it back, and I'll just chalk it up to a learning experience with taking a bike into a dealer.

Thanks to everyone who posted tips!!  

Really sorry to hear of your woes with the bike. I know you took it in the ass pretty hard but if there is any silver lining, your bike is running great and in time youll laern to wrench on it yourself and you will enjoy it more when you do, "Do it yourself"  Chock this up to a learning experiance and always feel free to ask for help on here, all of us are willing to share with you what knowledge and experiances with you.  Your not the first to be reamed and you wont be the last, but you are in a good place here for learning the do's and do not's of your GS.

Mike

another newbie here I was struggling with getting my bike in shape for a while, but the more I work on it the more I get a feeling I am no mechanic. I started thinking of taking it to some sort of dealership or a shop and just stumbled upon this thread. I am in downtown los angeles and I need to get my bike running. I am no Bill Gates, just an international student, and I'd really appreciate if somebody would give me some pointers to good places to take my bike to, or better yet if somebody would agree, even if not help me fix it, at least to come see the bike and tell me just how much is there to be done. Would appreciate any help and... this site and all of you guys ROCK!   I learned soo much from people here already!

Peace

Sorry to hear that man...I had a somewhat similar experience with my ninja 250.

You should share the name of that dealership so that none of us ever set foot over there...  :guns:

As a word of encouragement...I will say that I am the least handy person you will ever meet and I have managed to do a lot of wrenching on my GS. It's a very easy bike to fix up....and cheap too...parts cost nothing.

To give you an idea..I was quoted 175 to replace clutch cable...bought the cable for 15bucks and replaced in 30minutes.  High performance brake pads are about 30bucks...you get the ideal.

Don't let those bandits deter you from riding...

Good luck

where did you find a pdf version of the clymer manual?

Sorry to hear about that. I've heard nothing but bad things about Honda of Hollywood. Like many others said, the GS is great for learning how to wrench. If you still need a mechanic, there are some good independent shops in LA. I went to Moto Tecnica a couple times, and they did good work.

Well I'm glad you learned your lesson.  I was lucky and learned that the dealer was a big scam back when I was 16.  8 years later and a nice collection of tools in my garage, and I'll never take any vehicle to the dealer again.  BMW tried to charge me $500 for an oil change and lube job one time.  They got cussed out with as much tact as I could muster. 

Side note, took a truck of mine to a mech once to get a problem diagnosed.  Came back the next day and found him drunk as a skunk saying he'd replaced the heads and I owed him $1,200.  I went home, got my spare key, waited till it was dark and boosted my truck off his lot.  He called me the next day and I told him I did it and get bent.  I specificly told him not to fix anything when I dropped it off.  So the moral of the story is don't trust anybody. 

You guys DO realize that this thread is over a year old, right?

Blame the guy who brought it back from the dead, not me. I'm just a lemming!

I got all excited when I saw Roastergal posting again .. then I noticed the date