Any suggestions on what I can do to make my bike more likely to start on cold mornings? It was 20 in Pittsburgh this morning, and the good old GS500 wouldnt kick over.

Do you have a garage? One thing is to make sure is that your battery is fully charged and powerful enough to spin that cold, cold motor. Next is jetting. 40 pilots and turn those mixture screws out.

The reason I ask about the garage is because you want to keep the bike warm. Maybe an electric blanket wrapped around the motor for a few minutes before you ride?

I do have a garage, but not a heated garage. It is separate from the house and not very warm. Maybe 10 degrees warmer than exterior on a ver ycold morning. What about trickle charge over night, every night? Is it the battery that needs to be warm, or the engine?

Quote from: CraigIs it the battery that needs to be warm, or the engine?

Preferably both, but sometimes you can't have everything....

Start with the battery.  The engine is going to be cold in any case (unless you do the electric blanket thing), but if your battery can keep cranking it, it will eventually start ... right?  

My bike is stored in a shed in the back yard.  It gets plenty cold in the winter at our 4850 ft elevation, but as long as there is nothing physically wrong with the bike it will always  start with a strong battery.

if you dont have an elec. blanket, just put an old comforter over the bike when it is parked. dont know why, but it works good for cars, (mine anyway), but a fully charged battery helps a great deal also

60Watt light bulb under the engine works well for me, park the bike in garage, make sure carbs dont leak, put a lamp or cheap shoplight, with 60watt bulb under the engine, the heat will absorb into the engine cases keeping things alittle better. make sure when you park, no snow, or melting snow falls on lamp.

[quote="Kerrybut if your battery can keep cranking it, it will eventually start ...

Kerry's exactly right.  I too have an unheated, detatched garage.  My truck has the benefit of having the block-heater pluged in, so never any worries there...but the poor GS has shivered thru quite a few nights (no riding for a few days either) that went down into the low 20's, even high teens.  Went to start her 2 days ago, and the battery just didn't have enough oomph.  A 5-minute charge fixed things just fine.  

"if you dont have an elec. blanket, just put an old comforter over the bike when it is parked. dont know why, but it works good for cars, (mine anyway), but a fully charged battery helps a great deal also"  

I'm puzzled about this.  Inanimate objects with no heat source eventually become the same temperature as the air they are in, so, the air, comforter, and bike ought to all reach the same temperature eventually.  Even if you threw a blanket over a "hot" bike right after riding, eventually, sitting in frigid air overnight, the heat would be given up to the atmosphere, and the bike would reach ambient temperature?  No?

Get a battery tender and keep it on the bike at night.  This will insure a fresh, strong battery (assuming it doesn't have any bad cells).  They're cheap and available at lots of places.

Something i've seen are these little solar cells that constantly recharge your bike,car,boat,ect.  Never got it but the concept would work to keep your battery warm if there's light.  Just thought this was cool.