[Alfow1]

Hi all,

I'm new to this forum and god am I glad to have found it!

Last week I bought an Aprilia TXR311 air cooled. Nice tidy bike, bought it for a good price as a "reluctant starter" Saw it running and rode it on the day, apart from the clutch slipping a little and being a bit rich all was well.

Got it home and set about kicking it over with no joy, went through all the obvious checks, it has a very good spark, so much compresion I can put all my weight on the kickstart, fresh fuel, and after taking out the dirty partially collapsed filter it's getting air. In my book it should run, even if it's rough and needing tuning.
4 hours of kicking, towing behind a car, changing the plug, plug gap, full choke half choke no choke, all throttle settings, stripped the carb to check the jets and float. All we had in that time was 2 hints of firing! Frustrating to say the least.

Can anybody give any advice on this please, i'm quite useful with bikes and my brother is a good mechanic. We're quite sure we've checked and tried just about everything.
Does anybody know what the the carb settings should be? I know each bike will differ but even a benchmark to work from would be good.

Please help me! If I sound desperate it's because I am

Thanks

[gjbiker]

Have you checked the woodruff key that holds the rotor timing in place ? Always a good place to start if everything else seems ok.

GJ

[bilc0]

Can't be the key,it's got a spark.
you could try a new spark plug i guess,otherwise im out.

[MIKEE]

gjbiker, on Mar 23 2008, 08:03 PM, said:

Have you checked the woodruff key that holds the rotor timing in place ? Always a good place to start if everything else seems ok.

GJ

This would be where i would start... you still get a spark but it would in the wrong place if the key had sheared..

[scorpa3]

Before you take anything apart, make sure that the crank case isn't flooded!

Turn off the fuel, put in a nice dry spark plug, kick it over a couple of times and see if it now comes out wet.

If it does, you may have flooded the bottom end. Get the fuel out but be careful that you don't set fire to the bike when you do it. When you can put the plug back in and kick it over and it comes back out dry. Then and only then turn the fuel back on and expect it to start.

[ZIPPY]

If flooded you could also try turning fuel off, choke on full, and hold throttle wide open. You will still end up kicking quite a bit before it catches and runs.

And a new plug gapped properly wouldn't hurt either.

This post has been edited by ZIPPY: 24 March 2008 - 08:12 AM

[Alfow1]

Thankyou for all your input so far.

Yes the crankcase was quite badly flooded so we took the plug out, got the piston to bottom dead then hoisted the bike in the air upside down. A fair bit of fuel came out, we then lowered it down and put a lighter to the plug hole to burn the last of it away.

We've had the right cover off to check points are opening properly etc, the rotor was fine.

What are the chances of the spark dying whilst under compression? It seems like that's all it can be when it's getting fuel and air. Didn't want to start messing with the timing as I have heard it run fine. Wouldn't be half as frustrating if I had bought it as a non runner!

What are all your techniques for starting your bike? The previous owner told me no choke which immediatley told me it was running very rich. Also what are peoples mixture screw settings?

I'd love to get this running as it's a cracking little bike.

[MIKEE]

Alfow1, on Mar 24 2008, 10:24 AM, said:

A fair bit of fuel came out, we then lowered it down and put a lighter to the plug hole to burn the last of it away.

are you mad ???????

[Alfow1]

Not mad, well ok maybe a bit. Just thorough, controlled domestic motorbike related explosions are a speciality!

Going to go back to it today and double check that the flywheel hasn't slipped, then speak to Peter knight tomorrow and order some points and condenser - would an iffy condenser cause the spark to weaken or break down under compression?

I will post results, if you hear a boom coming from the wiltshire direction you'll know it has all gone wrong.

[AtomAnt]

Take some pics and post them as well please. We would like to see the bike

[t-shock 250]

You should use the choke when starting a TX/TXR from cold, you can also get spares such as points/condenser etc from Martin Mathews at motoswm.com as SWM's used the same Rotax engine.

[Alfow1]

SHE'S ALIVE!

Went back to it with a slightly less painful foot and less frustration, kick kick kick - nothing. Scratched head. Took out the plug and heated it up, kick kick splutter. Took out plug, reheated, kick kick kick and off she went for 30 seconds. I switched off put tank back on. Kick kick kick - nothing and so on for another 10 minutes.
Off to the garage for a gallon of Shell V Power (any opinions?) mixed 80:1 with fully synthetic. Drained tank, carb and cleared crankcase using the trusty old method. Thought i'd try another new plug just incase. Heated plug, kick kick kick lowe and behold she fired, ran and continued to run, back on with the tank and off down the road in disbelief. I let her cool down for a good half hour and tried again, first kick and she went.
I've now adjusted the mixture to somewhere handy, she revs cleanly and ticks over fine, a little slow to come back down to idle but apart from that pretty good. I think a service kit for the carb may be in order. The clutch slips a little under quite heavy load, is there any adjustment on these or are new plates required? Also what plugs are you good people using in your Aprilia's?

So is this a freak occurence or will she start from cold tomorrow? Find out in the next exciting episode of "F*&^%ing 2 strokes, I thought i'd seen the last of them!"

[scorpa3]

Well done, although I'm amazed that you didn't set fire to the whole lot!