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I spent hours saturday and sunday working on the carbs. My vat cleaner wouldn't touch that chit in the bowls. I ended up taking a small screw driver and chipping most of it out first then scrubbing each one with q-tips soaked in carb cleaner. I'm not even gonna try to get the drain screws out, I can tell that would just be asking for trouble. The pick up tubes and jets were just solid hunks of crud. My vat got the outside stuff off but the tubes were completely plugged solid. I ended up using really small drill bits, twisting them between my fingers and drilling the junk out, piano wire got the side holes open then lots of spray carb cleaner finished the job (went through 2 cans just to clean the parts in the bowls). The soaking, spraying and scrubbing on the carb bodies had gotten the dirt and crud off but they were still covered with corrosion. I brass brushed off what I could get to then gave them several washes in Navel Jelly to clean the nooks and cranny's. I'm still waiting on my new needles and seats. I've got one choke valve that I haven't been able to free up yet. I can't get too aggressive with it since it is made out of brass and where the tang fits it is only about an 1/8 of an inch thick. Heating, tapping and twisting haven't worked yet. I set it so that I could soak it in penetrating oil yesterday so maybe that will start to work. Used a piece of nytral glove and super glue to patch the small slit in the one slide, a little stiff in that area but being close to the outside edge where it is already stiffer I think it will work. I'll have to keep my eyes open for a replacement. Got my clutch master cylinder kit in finally, we got that all put back together. The little plastic window had turned to dust so I just filled the hole with liquid steel epoxy. Took a heap of pumping to get all the system bled out but we finally got the clutch to working, I hope that it will loosen up the clutch plates once they get a coating of the new oil on them, the are dragging really bad right now. May need to make sure that the front brake is working really well before we put it in gear on the pavement! Took one of the bulb holders out of the dash to make my oil light out of then made a bracket to hold it up on the neck, ran the wires back into the loom and squished the whole mess back into the headlight housing. We still need to get a battery. Damn parts stores want 74.00! As much as I hate to sounds like I may have to hit Wal Mart. Getting closer each day to having her ready to try and bust off.

Got the keys that I had on order in the mail today, they fit and worked! Tank opened right up, took alot of wiggling and penetrating oil for the ignition but it finally busted loose and started working, I was sure glad to see that. Tank looks not that bad, considering, I expected solid rust but it just has the usual rusty spots. I shook some nuts around in it till I got bored then washed it with kerosene. I'm gonna hook it up on the battery charger for a few days and see if I can't get some more of it out of there but for the most part it looks very usable. Now if my damn carb parts would just get here!

Freebryd posted the technique when we were over at Slicks and I think he posted it again here, I remembered it from my high school chemistry days. Plug the drain holes on the tank, or find a container big enough to completely submerge the tank (trash can) can't be a metal container though. Fill or submerge the tank in a solution of sodium carbonate (1 tablespoon per gallon of water) get a battery charger that puts out at least 2 amps and no more than about 6. Connect the negative lead from the charger to the tank (or part) and the positive lead to a large piece of steel (new and clean) and hang the steel in the solution making sure that it doesn't touch the tank or part then turn on the charger and let it do it's thang. The process will put off hydrogen gas so use a well ventilated area and don't smoke around it. If the water gets real red and murky, change it and add fresh solution. The rust areas will turn black and the part is done when you can see no more red rust. It's not a fast process and I'm expecting to have to leave the tank in the solution for 24 to 48 hours. When done wash the tank or part out with clean water, dry it really well, hair dryer works great. If you are not going to use the part or tank right away then you need to give it a coating of oil because the steel is down to bare steel again and will rust again. I would suggest checking the tank for leaks before you use it again, any pin holes that were plugged with rust will now be open so a re-coat of the tank will be required.

Finally got my new needles and seats in the mail friday. Jeremy snatched them up and installed them. We set the float heights as best that we could, the manual wasn't really that clear so we measured them all and set them to the average. It was a real bitch getting the carbs back on the bike, kinda like trying to get the intake bolts started on a car motor, everything has to go in at the same time yet nothing lines up. A piece of lumber laid across the intake helped with leverage to get them down. Then fought the air box to get it back in place. Hooked up the battery, hit the starter button, nothing, oil light would dim, had no lights. A few minutes passed and the silicon rectifier fried and started smoking, dead short somewhere. Pulled that out and broke that circuit, started checking fuses, main blew, replaced that, wasn't getting power to the ignition, went directly to the solenoid and jumped the circuit, she started to turn over, hurray. Needed more power so pulled my truck battery and hooked it up as a jumper, got her turning over a little faster but was getting no fire to the coils. Pulled the solenoid, it was trash, one of the main posts just flopped around. Dug through my parts till I found one that I had already rebuilt for the 750, put that in, still no start or fire to the coils. Called it a night. Spent the rest of the evening tracing the schematic in the manual and making flow charts so I wouldn't have to keep looking at the manual to see what color wire L/O was and refreshing my memory as to the current paths and points of contact on the ignition. Saturday morning, I started at the solenoid, I had it plugged in 180 out, I say plugged really not much left of the original, four wires with a piece of plastic around the end! Got that wired right, now I was getting power to the ignition but not out. Pulled the switch, it was a basket case from water just running down in it all those years. Took it all apart, cleaned the contacts, freed up the ball bearings, lubed it up, repaired the plastic holder with some super glue and added a screw to replace a missing tab and hooked it back up, now I was getting power in and out. Made a jump wire for the burned out rectifier. Still no luck from the starter button but I was getting power cause my home made oil light was on, had lights to the tach and a brake light. Hooked up my truck battery as a jumper again and jumped the solenoid, now I was getting fire to the coils. Hooked a plug to one of the spark plug wires on each coil to check the spark, not the best but looked hot enough to fire. I wasn't getting fuel to move through the fuel pump so I hooked up my aux. tank directly to the carbs hoping that gravity would be enough fuel pressure, just on a whim I tried the drain screws and I'll be dammed if they didn't turn and open! I was getting fuel to the bowls anyway. A little more cranking and I heard that I'm trying to fire sound. My son noticed a loose plug on his side, hmmm he installed them, so checked all the plugs again for tightness. Each time we cranked her over she would spin a little faster and and I could hear the plugs starting to try and fire, oil pressure light would go out too so I felt confident that oil was staring to move in the motor. From all the oil, kerosene and rust buster that I had put into the cylinders and valves over the last couple of weeks I knew it was a tough environment for the plugs to try and fire in, time for the ether! A quick shot and she fired and died, this went on for several rotations. Then she caught and went! Rougher than hell but she was running! A couple of minutes and smoke was pouring out the exhaust and rust was falling from the pipes, even though I had three fans going in the shop, a big commercial fan on the bike, one pulling air in from a window and another pushing it out the shop doors we had to bail! You almost couldn't see in there! We let it air out then hit it again till it got too smoky. By the fourth try we were able to stay in there and let it run for a bit. She would die if we let the RPM's drop below 2500 but from there to red line she sounded good and smooth and was starting to be able to hold set RPM's. We shut her off for the day and I was glad to see the fan come on on the radiator right when we did, that at least let me know that I was getting power to the fan and switches and that I wasn't going to have to replace that. Yes it was a very satisfying day. Got lots of wire tracing to do, tedious electronics checking and parts to replace but I know she runs so all the rest is just details.

I couldn't get the needle to seal on number four, kept flooding it with gas. Got lucky and was able to pull the bowl with it on the bike, still was a bitch to do though. The pilot tube had a hunk of trash stuck in the end of it? I had to stop and clean the shop, I had shit from one end to the other, half the tools I owned were scattered everywhere, wire, connectors, meters, shop rags, cans of oil, parts, I couldn't even see my table or work bench, it was a pit! While cleaning off the table I found a small plate that hadn't gotten put back on the top of the carbs, duh, got lucky again since I had to pull the airbox anyway, it's made up of three pieces and I just wasn't getting a good seal between the bottom of the box and the carbs, heat and time had warped it just a little so had to do a little careful bending to bring it back into shape and patched a small kink in the gasket. I got the starter button working but the tail light control box is burned out (it makes all the lights come on when you hit the brakes) I've got the power I need coming into the connector so I'm just gonna bypass the box and go directly to the brake, running and tag (no turn signals). I've got power to one leg of the head light and still no power to the horn so I'm thinking that the left controls on the bars need a good cleaning. I've got to pull the fuel pump and see if I can repair that, I've been running it off gravity feed but not sure if I will need increased pressure on the fuel at higher rpms under a load, I may just be able to use the principal of a larger fuel tube to a smaller inlet tube to bring the pressure up, the outlet on the tank was a transfer tube just to move fuel from the tank to the lower tank where it was then pumped back up to the carbs so it is over a 1/2 inch outlet, working in a filter and a cutoff in the one foot of distance may be a trick? Ok, here's where I gotta admit that I pulled a dumb ass. When I over hauled the carbs I failed to remove the plugs from the pilot screws and clean them, don't ask me why, I guess I had hoped that the soaking would clean them, well guess what it didn't! I'm sure that's where my idle problem lies. Manual says that I can do it with the carbs in place, guess I'll find out. These are some of the hardest carbs to work on, cables have to be attached while putting the carbs in, head rubbers are opposed to each other so it's tough to get them set, even the idle set knob is buried so far center that you can only reach it with needle nose or a wrench, so I really hope I don't have to pull the bank again but won't be surprised if I do.

I put it on to "COOK" yesterday, I'll try to get a pic of it, in the trash can. :)