Make sure your valves are in spec and the carbs are clean. Set the idle a little higher than 1200 and she should purr like a kitten.

Quote from: Twism86 on February 07, 2014, 08:33:22 AM
... she should purr like a kitten.

What GS did you have?! Everything in tip top and stock - sounds like a singer sewing machine LOL 

- Bboy

Quote from: Twism86 on February 07, 2014, 08:33:22 AM
Make sure your valves are in spec and the carbs are clean. Set the idle a little higher than 1200 and she should purr like a kitten.

I'm not sure that I have the required tools to perform those tasks. 

Quote from: BockinBboy on February 07, 2014, 08:37:52 AM

Quote from: Twism86 on February 07, 2014, 08:33:22 AM
... she should purr like a kitten.

What GS did you have?! Everything in tip top and stock - sounds like a singer sewing machine LOL 

- Bboy

Had an '02. You're right, she never sounds THAT good, haha! Ok, purr like a diesel.....

Quote from: BockinBboy on February 07, 2014, 06:48:31 AM
The problem is not voltage, it is amperage.  The bike has a max of 20A while a car has a much, much higher max Amperage.  If the car is running, you are also running the car's charging system which charges at say 30A+ (not exactly sure, but it at least that if not much higher than that) while your bike charges at a much lower amperage... and therefore cannot handle the amperage a running car would put out - you will run the risk of blowing your charging system as I doubt the fuse would catch it before it damages the bikes charging system... and depending on the limits of the bike battery, that could also be very physically dangerous.  So, just because something is the same voltage, it doesn't mean they are compatible... in fact voltage is only a tiny a fraction of the story - and a story which belongs to an electrician to tell you about, not myself who just sold wires and electrical equipment for 5 years lol!

- Bboy

EDIT: Opps, I thought you where refering to my car battery reference...at work, have to read fast, sorry 

My point was...if you left a fully charged MC battery next to a fully charged full sized battery and left them for a few months, the MC battery would go dead from just sitting there, while the car battery would probably start a car. MC batterys...because of their size are whiny little attention whores that will go dead just sitting there, most bike noobs don't understand this, that was what I was trying to stress, and yes voltage is the highway of amperage   

Quote from: Suzuki Stevo on February 07, 2014, 09:42:47 AM.............................My point was...if you left a fully charged MC battery next to a fully charged full sized battery and left them for a few months, the MC battery would go dead from just sitting there, while the car battery would probably start a car. MC batterys...because of their size are whiny little attention whores that will go dead just sitting there, most bike noobs don't understand this, that was what I was trying to stress, and yes voltage is the highway of amperage   

That pretty well sums up the most likely cause if anyone is having a problem getting started in the winter.  I've been riding year around here in NE OH for 30 winters now on 4 Hondas and 2 GSs (one at a time) and have had to jump all of them at least a time or 2 every winter.  Most bikes just don't have enough battery for winter use in cold climates.

If your bike doesn't start on it's own, jump it first and most likely it will start immediately confirming the battery was the problem.  When it's cold out it takes more amperage to crank the engine (cold heavy oil) and there is just not enough voltage left to fire the ignition spark.  If you connect a jumper unit or a non running car battery parallel to your bike battery you just have one big battery if both are 12 V and you won't harm anything unless you hook it up backwards or something like that.  The big battery can't push any more amperage to your bike than the starter, lights, etc draw from it.

Examples, I had a CM400A with a kick starter and I could run down the battery to barely a growl was left and then give it one kick and it would start without the starter motor drawing all the amperage and dropping the voltage too low for spark to occur.  My GS wouldn't start one very cold day and I ground it down dead, with intermittent starter use Addy.  My wife had just left with the car so I pulled the battery, carried it across the street to our apartment, and put it on my 1 amp charger for only an hour and then put it back in the bike and it started right up.  Obviously it couldn't get much if any charge in an hour it only just got warmed up.  If you have a trickle charger use it in the winter, I don't have electricity in my garage.

If you have cold compression then the valves are not your starting problem.  Period.  Check compression with the finger over the hole and crank to pop method when you pull your plugs to look at or replace if the battery is not your problem.  And lean jetting is not your problem, the mixture is rich enough with full choke to start.  I've done all my year around GS riding with untouched completely stock carbs.

Quote from: Xevamir on February 06, 2014, 08:45:58 AM
Also, my front tire keeps losing air somehow. The valve stem is tight, there are no nails in it, and I sprayed water on both sides of the rim and there was no bubbling.

It never ends.

My not even half worn rear tire was giving me more than usual air loss problems last summer and not finding any possible leak point I finally fixed it the old fashion way.  Not the Smith Barney way, the fix-a-flat way and it hasn't lost any air since, frowned upon now it was a widely used way for shade tree mechanics to fix rim leaks a half century ago.  After run warm a time or two let the fix-a-flat out and refill with fresh air.  Rim leaks can be very hard to find even by submerging tire under water.