First off, Hello! I am new to the boards. I'm glad to see a forum just for my bike! I bought a brand new 2007 gs500f as my first bike and it's been lots of fun. I have had it for about a year and a half now and already put 15,000 miles on my bike. I basically rode it everyday except in snow, ice, or HEAVY rain. After a not so fun service from the dealership, I have decided that I'll start working on my bike myself. I also have a few noob questions. Sorry if these answers were covered elsewhere and failing to use the search function properly.

Sometimes, as I am riding, the bike will start to choke up as if it's out of fuel. The tank will have plenty of gas left and I'd still have another 100 miles before I'd normally fill up or change the knob to reserve. This made me believe I have a clogged fuel line for the "ON". I checked it and it seemed fine.

Every time I come to a stop sign, the bike will want to cut off. If I'm unsuccessful at restarting it up (which is rare) the battery dies quickly and I won't be able to start it up without a jump or push. I have to blip the throttle constantly or hold the throttle a little to keep it rev'd up. I have attempted to adjust the idle, but I don't think I did it well enough or something else is broken and interfering. Once the bike is fully warm, the idle is at 3k (it's supposed to be at 1.2k i have read elsewhere?). However, the idle will start to slowly come down after 5-10 seconds at a stop and die unless I blip it.

I think what I want to do is clean my carb, is this the right thing to do at this point? Or should I check other things out? How do I clean the carbs? Do I just add a fuel supplement in my next tank of gas or do I take them apart?

and here are some noob questions with pics too.
what is this hose coming out of the battery? It was disconnected when I started working on my bike so I slipped it back on.


Is it normal for this to be that dirty? (these are hoses on the right side of the bike, I'm guessing oil??)


what the heck is this hose for? It doesn't connect to anything on one end.



Should I have to remove the carb to clean it, I'll have to get rid of some hoses in the way. These hoses have these weird clamps on them and what kinda tool do I use to move the clamps?


thanks for any help and input.

Hey, welcome to the board!  That hose is the vent tube for the battery.  It vents the gases released from the battery that are corrosive to metal away from the frame.  It does sound like a good carb cleaning is in order for your bike but before you do that try running with your petcock in the prime position.  If it runs normal in the prime position then you have a bad diaphragm in your petcock (that just sounds perverted...).  If you encounter the same problem then clean the carbs and see what happens.  A good carb cleaning can't hurt anyway.  You will have to remove the carbs to clean them properly, additives are not a substitute for real wrenching.  A basic carb cleaning is not hard to do, search this site and the wiki site and I'm sure you will find a tutorial.  Take your time and be thorough about it.  Good luck!

-Jessie

And that hose that goes over the air box is a carburetor vent tube.  Connected to the top Tee on the carbs, and nothing on the other end.

Those dandy little hose clamps can be squeezed with needle-nosed pliers (or your fingers, if you are desperate or really manly)

I would check the water level in your battery if it doesn't hold up well to much cranking.  the 1 time my battery got ran low, the bike would act starved for gas, until I gave it a proper charge with a battery charger ( not to be confused with a battery tender ) I would give that a try first, as it wouldnt cost anything