Ride report..
I raced the bike in two classes last night, 250 and GP. The bike performed as good as expected on the MX track. The track is sandy and supercross-style, it gets VERY choppy on the straightaways. The bike handled everything well, although I'm still trying to figure out the cornering techniques as this is my first four stroke and I've only got three rides on it previously, not on a track. The bike feels as light as my '00 KX250 did, the motor is definitely stronger. The bike keeps revving and revving, I'm in love with this motor..
There are two 60 foot triples and a 70 foot tabletop, I felt comfortable immediately doing the triples after a 2 lap practice, no funny stuff happening in the air. The suspension soaks up hard landings better than my KX did. The 70 foot tabletop is trickier than the other two, as it is on a straightaway after a small double and tabletop. It is very tall and steep, and requires excellent timing, you don't want to come up a hair short or a hair long on this one. (Or at least *I* don't.. I'm close to 300lbs.)
First lap I came up about 3 feet short, it bottomed out hard and stung the feet and wrists but not as bad as my KX used to. Every lap after that I hit it perfect, except I overshot it slightly one lap and it wasn't too bad. In my 250 moto after the tabletop, the bike felt like it was out of gas. It bogged and bogged until I was almost stopped, then it idled a bit. I gassed it to get back on pace and it bogged again.. I figured I misjudged my fuel level before the race. I slowly rode back to the truck and checked the level, it had maybe a half inch of gas on the bottom of the tank. This gas tank is different from what I'm used to, the bottom is very flat so it looks deeper than it is. I figured the gas was sloshing around and the carb ran dry. I topped it up and went out for my next moto, the bike ran fine but after 3 or 4 laps it did the exact same thing again, on the same part of the track. I know the tank was almost full, so this baffled me. I was about to pull off but figured I should just finish the moto carefully to gain some points as this was the first race of the series, and since I DNF'd the 250 moto I scored no points.
I rode around for two more laps slowly, making sure it wasn't going to starve for gas again on the face of a triple. It felt fine so I picked up the pace a bit, but by this time I was in near last place so it didn't matter much. I finished 8th, and the bike didn't miss a beat.
I don't know what's going on, I'm concerned about this bog.. If this happens on the face of a triple I'm, well, screwed. Any ideas?
I was thinking about getting a larger fuel petcock and fuel line, raise the needle two clips and go two sizes bigger on the main jet to see if this effects it at all but I don't think that the jetting is what's causing this. The bike runs very strong and this seems to be an isolated incident, it feels like it's getting plenty of gas the rest of the time.
Moto 1, 250, DNF. 0 points.
Moto 2, GP, 8th. 13 points.
Not the start to the season that I wanted, but at least I got some points in one of my motos.
Any ideas on what I should be looking for in the carb when I take it apart? Like I say, I'll try richening up the jetting but I really doubt it would cause this kind of symptom.
I raced the bike in two classes last night, 250 and GP. The bike performed as good as expected on the MX track. The track is sandy and supercross-style, it gets VERY choppy on the straightaways. The bike handled everything well, although I'm still trying to figure out the cornering techniques as this is my first four stroke and I've only got three rides on it previously, not on a track. The bike feels as light as my '00 KX250 did, the motor is definitely stronger. The bike keeps revving and revving, I'm in love with this motor..
There are two 60 foot triples and a 70 foot tabletop, I felt comfortable immediately doing the triples after a 2 lap practice, no funny stuff happening in the air. The suspension soaks up hard landings better than my KX did. The 70 foot tabletop is trickier than the other two, as it is on a straightaway after a small double and tabletop. It is very tall and steep, and requires excellent timing, you don't want to come up a hair short or a hair long on this one. (Or at least *I* don't.. I'm close to 300lbs.)
First lap I came up about 3 feet short, it bottomed out hard and stung the feet and wrists but not as bad as my KX used to. Every lap after that I hit it perfect, except I overshot it slightly one lap and it wasn't too bad. In my 250 moto after the tabletop, the bike felt like it was out of gas. It bogged and bogged until I was almost stopped, then it idled a bit. I gassed it to get back on pace and it bogged again.. I figured I misjudged my fuel level before the race. I slowly rode back to the truck and checked the level, it had maybe a half inch of gas on the bottom of the tank. This gas tank is different from what I'm used to, the bottom is very flat so it looks deeper than it is. I figured the gas was sloshing around and the carb ran dry. I topped it up and went out for my next moto, the bike ran fine but after 3 or 4 laps it did the exact same thing again, on the same part of the track. I know the tank was almost full, so this baffled me. I was about to pull off but figured I should just finish the moto carefully to gain some points as this was the first race of the series, and since I DNF'd the 250 moto I scored no points.
I rode around for two more laps slowly, making sure it wasn't going to starve for gas again on the face of a triple. It felt fine so I picked up the pace a bit, but by this time I was in near last place so it didn't matter much. I finished 8th, and the bike didn't miss a beat.
I don't know what's going on, I'm concerned about this bog.. If this happens on the face of a triple I'm, well, screwed. Any ideas?
I was thinking about getting a larger fuel petcock and fuel line, raise the needle two clips and go two sizes bigger on the main jet to see if this effects it at all but I don't think that the jetting is what's causing this. The bike runs very strong and this seems to be an isolated incident, it feels like it's getting plenty of gas the rest of the time.
Moto 1, 250, DNF. 0 points.
Moto 2, GP, 8th. 13 points.
Not the start to the season that I wanted, but at least I got some points in one of my motos.
Any ideas on what I should be looking for in the carb when I take it apart? Like I say, I'll try richening up the jetting but I really doubt it would cause this kind of symptom.
