JoeSene Posted March 14, 2014 Posted March 14, 2014 Hello all, I came across this forum whilst searching for some help with my '81 XS250. Having ridden scooters for the past few years I thought it was time to make use of my full licence and finally get on to something with gears. I bought the XS just last Friday. The previous owner seemed very knowledgeable, had three old gleaming bikes sitting on his drive and a stack of paperwork relating to the XS. I meanwhile must have been displaying waterfalls behind my ears as I've had nothing but problems (in just six days!). Sadly I'm not very mechanically minded but the seller spent a lot of time talking me through various bits and pieces. He warned me, for example, that I would notice some "chugging" when the petrol was starting to run low. On the ride home on Friday night (30 minute ride from cold), as I got to within five minutes of home, the bike suddenly lost a lot of power, it could barely pull away from idle. This did not please the other road users round Hammersmith Broadway during Friday evening rush hour! I thought this was the "chugging." We limped slowly home where I then left the bike until needing to go out on Tuesday (thinking it was running low on fuel I wanted to get it filled up along the way). It wouldn't start on Tuesday. Called the RAC out who discovered the plugs were completely gunked up. A quick clean up later and it was running again. I have subsequently bought new plugs to fit (a job for tomorrow after this afternoon...). I headed out on the bike today, a 20/25 minute journey, it ran like absolute clock work. Basking in the London sun this afternoon I thought that perhaps this was the bike for me after all. However, after leaving the bike for a couple of hours and then jumping back on to head home, I encountered the same problem again. Not immediately but after a while, ie: once the bike had really warmed up, much like my journey home last Friday evening. I have asked the previous owner if there is absolutely anything I should know about the seemingly lemon coloured thing now parked outside my house and he swears there isn't. So here I am, looking for clues online. It seems a number of XS owners on here have experienced the same problem but it seems nobody has an exact answer as to what caused it (or have I missed it?). So I limped home on the bike again today. I've since been out to move it after a neighbour had gone out in their car and it's back to not starting again. Clearly I need to get those plugs fitted first thing. My dad is a biker (Honda Gold Wing) and is very knowledgeable but sadly lives a couple of hours away. Seeing as I don't seem to be able to go any further than a 25/30 minute radius from home I fear I'll never get it all the way down to him. I am loathe to chuck it in the local shop and ask them to investigate in case they see that as an open ended invitation to hammer my credit card! I truly would appreciate any help or suggestions. I am insanely keen that my first foray in to geared bike ownership doesn't end in complete embarrassment in the space of a week, particularly as my wife felt that I should just continue to enjoy the relatively hassle free ownership of scooters! At the same time my dad appears to have gone from a state of pride that I've finally moved up the biking ladder to now being convinced I bought a complete dud! More history on the bike itself, the previous owner said he bought it for his son (who owns a 400/4) as he wanted to encourage him to not use his Honda through the winter. Said son decided he didn't want the XS so it has hardly been used for the past few months. It was MoT'd in January and passed with a couple of advisories, all of which have been sorted out. One other thing I have noticed is that a small amount of oil keeps appearing on the top of one of the engine fins (after the extended usage - or should I say the only usage the bike has had in my ownership!). Is this related? (Please remember I am an absolute newbie, I apologise, but we've all got to start somewhere right!?). Thanks in advance to anyone who takes the time to read this and post a reply (I know it's a long winded post but many of you seem to appreciate intros etc - as do I!). Joe
busyeddie Posted March 15, 2014 Posted March 15, 2014 Best get the new plugs in and see what happens. Did you turn the fuel to reserve on the tap when you felt like you were runnning out of fuel? Could be that a load of crap got pulled through into the fuel lines and or the carbs. It's best practice to learn how many miles you get between fill ups and try not to run out of fuel. Not a massive XS nut, does it have points or CDI ignition?
JoeSene Posted March 17, 2014 Author Posted March 17, 2014 Hi Busyeddie, appreciate your comments. Yes I did switch to reserve. New plugs are in and it started straight away. I had the loss of power issue again but only after it had been used for a while. It's booked in for carb clean out and adjustments and a top to bottom check over/service tomorrow. I've collected together various comments to take down with me as I got the usual "stroke-of-the-chin" response I expected when I described the problem!
Xs400sh Posted May 11, 2014 Posted May 11, 2014 I had an issue on my xs where the rectifier failed and it meant a total loss of engine while the lights were on, Might be worth checking if it's still functional, also the coils can be iffy if it was stored in the damp, mine had to get 2 new coils when I got it, coil fail symptom is that there's no power after the engine warms up, best future advice is watch the timing, timing is very easy to slip on these bikes, not difficult to reset though.
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