After making some mods, I rejetted and got start and idle working well, and WOT more-or-less OK. But the bike was really sluggish off the line, like a car with a burnt clutch.  I had to goose the throttle and eeeease the clutch out to start, or risk killing it.

So the next thing on my list was shimming the needles.  I thought shimming would fix it (2 4mm washers under each clip).  After putting the tank back on, I found that starting was really difficult.  Even after returning the mix screws, it starts, but lugs at low RPMs and often dies. If I try to give it a little throttle, it just dies altogether.  I have to wait until it run for about 20 seconds to give any throttle at all.  Also, it idles rougher; I have to set the idle at ~1800 now to get it smooth (before shimming, it would idle well at 1200).

This surprised me; I thought that shimming the needles whould have no effect on starting or idle, where the pilots and mixture screws are important.

Sorry to say this, but it's probably not put together quite right. I did the shim thing on my carbs and it did wonders. It runs much better. Things that can go wrong would be:

1. shims and spacer not flush against circlip on needle.
2. needles or slide not seated properly in carb.
3. o-ring of diaphram not seated properly in groove of carb top.
4. God forbid, the diaphram is torn.

There are probably more things that can be wrong, but these are things related to the carb shimming. Good luck.

Did you synch the carbs by eye? One of the needles not go into it's hole, so it's stopping the slide from rising?

Ed had it right: it was not together correctly.  I hadn't actually removed the tank to get at the needles; I just turned the tank sideways (I am using some urethane hoses that are a little longer and very flexible).



Anyways, the "ON" hose was pinched a bit.  The key symptom (had I been more observant) was that the bike would run on idle, but would die if I turned the throttle... fuel starvation.  Once I corrected that, I was good to go.  Nice to have my ride back in action.

when i put my k&n pod on, (removed stock airbox), i put 140's on, keeping my 37.5's inplace, cleaned for good measure, put back together, after a lil difficulty, she runs like a raped ape. didnt shim nuthin, after results like that didnt feel the need to. but hey, at least you got er' goin :mrgreen: