SR4 1200 Cold Starting
Discussion
Anyone got any tips on getting these to run from cold, I'm finding mine is always a real pig to start, particularly when the temperature drops. Couldn't get it going at all today before putting the battery on for a charge. I hope this is not a sign of problems as I'm at Snett this week for my first track day in it and don't want to confined to watching only with a car that won't start.
Nick
Nick
Give 3 pumps of the trottle and then press the start button.. the engine should catch and start to run, once running just apply a very very very small amount of trottle.. if you give it to much it will stall.. if this happens just repeat the process again etc etc.. after about 30-40 seconds of running you should be able to slowly build the revs to a reasonnable level to get ti to warm up..
Good luck!
Good luck!
Nick
Kwacker may be different, but with the Hayabusa engine, I use no pumps / throttle at all until it starts to show signs of firing: I usually reckon on say three upto 10 second gos with no sign of firing, then say another three where it increasingly starts to fire, catching the third and gently blipping it for about a minute, whereupon it will start to idle with no input from me.
Certainly based on my way of doing it, it's vital to have the battery 100% charged; I do that each and every time before I try to start it if it's stood more than a week. Recommend that as a matter of course you always get the battery fully upto charge before you try to start it.
It is certainly way way more effort and technique than starting a road car 'first time every time on the button', but with my way, I know that it is definitely going to start and that it won't be fouling any plugs.
I have a donkey's years (probably cost about £4.99 back then!) old car battery powered spark plug cleaner; via a grommet, puts the spark plug base into a chamber that fires cleaning grit at it as I slowly rotate the plug; apparently, these are frowned upon nowqadays (concerns about grit contamination) and as far as I am aware, no longer available nowadays; it brings every plug up like new in about thirty seconds, then I blow out any remaining dust with an airline; absolutely brilliant, so much for progress! Still I suppose they'd rather sell us carb cleaner and new spark plugs umpteen times a year rather than a tiny bag of fine grit about once every ten years!
As I said when we spoke the other day, have a great day at Snett; got my fingers crossed for your first being a dry day.
Kwacker may be different, but with the Hayabusa engine, I use no pumps / throttle at all until it starts to show signs of firing: I usually reckon on say three upto 10 second gos with no sign of firing, then say another three where it increasingly starts to fire, catching the third and gently blipping it for about a minute, whereupon it will start to idle with no input from me.
Certainly based on my way of doing it, it's vital to have the battery 100% charged; I do that each and every time before I try to start it if it's stood more than a week. Recommend that as a matter of course you always get the battery fully upto charge before you try to start it.
It is certainly way way more effort and technique than starting a road car 'first time every time on the button', but with my way, I know that it is definitely going to start and that it won't be fouling any plugs.
I have a donkey's years (probably cost about £4.99 back then!) old car battery powered spark plug cleaner; via a grommet, puts the spark plug base into a chamber that fires cleaning grit at it as I slowly rotate the plug; apparently, these are frowned upon nowqadays (concerns about grit contamination) and as far as I am aware, no longer available nowadays; it brings every plug up like new in about thirty seconds, then I blow out any remaining dust with an airline; absolutely brilliant, so much for progress! Still I suppose they'd rather sell us carb cleaner and new spark plugs umpteen times a year rather than a tiny bag of fine grit about once every ten years!
As I said when we spoke the other day, have a great day at Snett; got my fingers crossed for your first being a dry day.
Thanks Graham, Trevor
Trevor - Busa is fuel injected I think and the Radical manual suggests a different approach for carbs and injection. It's never been easy to get going and the pump 3 times and then try approach has worked in the past for me, think it was just that bit colder on Saturday and then I flooded it.
I've got a local car parts place getting some new plugs in for me today so should be ok to go. After waiting so long to drive the car and paying somebody to get it to Snett for me I don't want to be let down by some £20 parts so quite happy to fit new ones! I'll keep the old ones and have a look at cleaning them up for spares.
Just to add insult to injury the garage door broke as I was shutting up last night. That pretty much sums up my efforts to get a drive in this car!
Any reason why I shouldn't use a battery booster like the link below to help the battery, car has an Anderson plug ready for a booster. http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/...
Nick
Trevor - Busa is fuel injected I think and the Radical manual suggests a different approach for carbs and injection. It's never been easy to get going and the pump 3 times and then try approach has worked in the past for me, think it was just that bit colder on Saturday and then I flooded it.
I've got a local car parts place getting some new plugs in for me today so should be ok to go. After waiting so long to drive the car and paying somebody to get it to Snett for me I don't want to be let down by some £20 parts so quite happy to fit new ones! I'll keep the old ones and have a look at cleaning them up for spares.
Just to add insult to injury the garage door broke as I was shutting up last night. That pretty much sums up my efforts to get a drive in this car!
Any reason why I shouldn't use a battery booster like the link below to help the battery, car has an Anderson plug ready for a booster. http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/...
Nick
Yep, Busa is FI, so I assume the Kwacker is carbs....................I just about remember them(!), in particular that even the same engine with exactly the same carbs seems to need a different start technique which has to be 'discovered'; long time ago, I used to have a Lotus Cortina (twin 45 DCOE Webers I recall) , as did a mate; his started best after three full pumps, but mine preferred ten.
Don't actually know about using that Halfords booster, but from the gut, I feel uneasy; compared to those for cars as you know, bike batteries are absolutely tiny; too much 'whack' for a tiny battery? By the way, if you do decide to buy, Halfords are expensive for these: I've seen exactly the same product (all made in China I think) with a sometimes different case colour moulding and labels for anything from £29.99 to £19.99. Why not hook up (engine not running) the tow vehicle's battery if necessary?
Sorry to hear 'bout the garage door; chin up, you'll get there.
Don't actually know about using that Halfords booster, but from the gut, I feel uneasy; compared to those for cars as you know, bike batteries are absolutely tiny; too much 'whack' for a tiny battery? By the way, if you do decide to buy, Halfords are expensive for these: I've seen exactly the same product (all made in China I think) with a sometimes different case colour moulding and labels for anything from £29.99 to £19.99. Why not hook up (engine not running) the tow vehicle's battery if necessary?
Sorry to hear 'bout the garage door; chin up, you'll get there.
Hi Nick,
We had a similar problem with the 1100 Clubsport.
As soon as the plugs get flooded with fuel it would not start.
We found that the easiest way was to increase the idle a little on
the idle cable adjuster and turn over with no pedal throttle at all.
If all else fails - replace all four plugs. Seems to work every time
Tim
We had a similar problem with the 1100 Clubsport.
As soon as the plugs get flooded with fuel it would not start.
We found that the easiest way was to increase the idle a little on
the idle cable adjuster and turn over with no pedal throttle at all.
If all else fails - replace all four plugs. Seems to work every time
Tim
splitpin said:
Don't actually know about using that Halfords booster, but from the gut, I feel uneasy; compared to those for cars as you know, bike batteries are absolutely tiny; too much 'whack' for a tiny battery? By the way, if you do decide to buy, Halfords are expensive for these: I've seen exactly the same product (all made in China I think) with a sometimes different case colour moulding and labels for anything from £29.99 to £19.99. Why not hook up (engine not running) the tow vehicle's battery if necessary?
I know what you mean, could be a quick way to blow an expensive ECU. I've already bought one of ebay just in case, £18.99 off ebay just to have hanging around the garage in case it could help.Battery is on an Optimate at the moment so it should be fine for Wednesday.
splitpin said:
Sorry to hear 'bout the garage door; chin up, you'll get there.
Thanks Trevor, couldn't believe it when I went to pull it down and a cable snapped.Nick
tprocket said:
Hi Nick,
We had a similar problem with the 1100 Clubsport.
As soon as the plugs get flooded with fuel it would not start.
We found that the easiest way was to increase the idle a little on
the idle cable adjuster and turn over with no pedal throttle at all.
If all else fails - replace all four plugs. Seems to work every time
Tim
Thanks Tim, will have a look for the idle settings tonight. We had a similar problem with the 1100 Clubsport.
As soon as the plugs get flooded with fuel it would not start.
We found that the easiest way was to increase the idle a little on
the idle cable adjuster and turn over with no pedal throttle at all.
If all else fails - replace all four plugs. Seems to work every time
Tim
Got your race licence yet? I'm toying with the idea of sharing the car with a mate from my kart racing days, if so we will probably dip the toe in the water at SEMSEC/Lydden as Gary did. Come and join us if we book our ARDS and you haven't done yours yet.
Nick
Agree with this: "Give 3 pumps of the trottle and then press the start button.. the engine should catch and start to run, once running just apply a very very very small amount of trottle.. if you give it to much it will stall.. if this happens just repeat the process again etc etc.. after about 30-40 seconds of running you should be able to slowly build the revs to a reasonnable level to get ti to warm up.."
Yep, patience is key. If you try and rush revving it once you've got it ticking over, the engine will stall and can flood.
Another tip to avoid flooding is: run the fuel pump before trying to start it for about 10 secs, then turn the pump off, get it started per the above, then turn the pump back on - but wait 20 seconds after you can first blip the throttle before doing so.
cheers
Geoff
Yep, patience is key. If you try and rush revving it once you've got it ticking over, the engine will stall and can flood.
Another tip to avoid flooding is: run the fuel pump before trying to start it for about 10 secs, then turn the pump off, get it started per the above, then turn the pump back on - but wait 20 seconds after you can first blip the throttle before doing so.
cheers
Geoff
SportsLibre said:
after pumping before the start NEVER touch the throttle until the engine has fully cought, or waited a while and started the process again...
..and a fully charged battery/and a new (or at least clean and dry) set of plugs works wonders. Also mine was prone to flood/oil up on a restart if it had just been trickling round the paddock. The solution was to give it a good blast before killing the ignition.
Thanks for everyone's help on this. New plugs sorted it out to let us have a fantastic day out at Snett yesterday. After waiting about a year to drive the car for various reasons it was definitely worth the wait. Quick spin in the middle of the day brought a probably needed reality check!
Anybody thinking about buying one of these cars should do it.
Nick
Anybody thinking about buying one of these cars should do it.
Nick
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