My son came over for Father's Day and we finally got the GT550 out of the workshop and up front to the garage. All my plans for photos and videos didn't happen as I was too excited to finally fire it up.
We hooked up the accessory gas tank with some light pre-mix. Turned the valve on and checked for leaks. Flipped on the key and hit the starter button. After 6 or 7 seconds of spinning, she came to life. It took quite some time to get it to idle well. It kept dying like it was starving for fuel. I came off the stock air screw setting of 1 1/2 turns to 3/4 turns out. It liked that al ot better and sat there idling for a good 10 minutes. Oil pump proved out right away, so we ditched the pre-mix, hooked up the fuel line to the petcock and ran most of the time that way. Oddly there were no huge clouds of smoke at start up and practically no smoke after just a few minutes. Got out the voltmeter and checked the charging system. I didn't rev it real high, but you can clearly see the voltage rising with the rev's. I need to clean and re-wrap the baffles as it continued to smoke after shut down. I think they are somewhat clogged. That may be why I had to tweak the air screws to smooth out the idle.
Next I need to do something to the silencing wedgies to make the fit again. The engine is quite noisy. I guess I didn't notice that on RedZone as I had chambers barking at me.
I was born with nothing and still have most of it left.
Great, good that she started up o.k.,nice looking bike..please don't re wrap the baffles,cause more harm than good,they get full of oil,fall apart,trap water,just my experience of the wadding
Cheers,
Roger
I'll try to get them out in the next few days. I would bet good money that they have never been removed. Might be a double tough job getting them out.
Do you put them back in without wrapping or just leave everything out? It's a shame. As far as I can tell, the baffle plates are sound. I'll know when I pull the baffles.
I was born with nothing and still have most of it left.
If they haven't been removed in a while,be a bit carefull when trying to remove..slight sideways motion left to right with the pliers,you don't want to break them off inside the pipe Once out discard the wadding..if it has any clean baffle & re install,don't run the bike without baffles,sounds terrible & two strokes need the back pressure created
Cheers,
Roger
Good news, enjoyed hearing of the great progress, well done!
Mike
ps: yes, take the baffle screw out, try first to rotate the baffle rather than heaving on them. If stuck, ride it very hot before trying again. If super hard, leave it for a 1000miles and try again. If needed, a propane torch fired into the tail pipe until the MF is REALLY smoking (even with the gas off) will often have them out and not damage chrome.
pps: I like the muffled roar of a wadded baffle myself, up to you. Cheap, easy and quick to try and see what you prefer. Some wadding and soft iron wire plus a few minutes is all.
ppps: those baffles once taken out can have a habit of going AWOL and they're expensive, so do take care on the quality and fit of the single, baffle-retaining screw.
yeadon_m wrote:If stuck, ride it very hot before trying again. If super hard, leave it for a 1000miles and try again.
Amazing how that works.
True story. I attempted to get the baffles out of my T500 about 2 years ago. Stuck but good. I must not had replaced one of the screws that hold them in place (after all, they weren't going anywhere, right?). Last week, went on a ride, and about 5 miles from home, the bike started getting real noisy. I pulled over, and the baffle was barely still hanging out the end of the left pipe.
Of course, I didn't have the screw to put in place. Tried a couple of cable ties, but they lasted only about 10 minutes. My key ring thus made the ultimate sacrifice, straightened out, fed through the screw holes, then twisted back together.
Hi,my baffles have "gone missing" before...now have good quality screws & cable ties just to be sure They sure ain't cheap to replace a lost one
Cheers,
Roger
Great story. I had the same on a really oily mess of a GT550A, which spat its RH large baffle about 10miles from home. After nearly losing the thing in the bushes, twice, my solution was to shove it up my shirt. After all, the shirt was a bit tired and I can take a shower, right? much cheaper than loosing the MF
My wife was *less impressed by my ingenuity. I mind have gone to bed early that evening, no supper!
Mike
*she later reminded me 'I bought you that bloody shirt, remember?'
ps: I hadn't
Great, good that she started up o.k.,nice looking bike..please don't re wrap the baffles,cause more harm than good,they get full of oil,fall apart,trap water,just my experience of the wadding 
Once out discard the wadding..if it has any 
clean baffle & re install,don't run the bike without baffles,sounds terrible & two strokes need the back pressure created 
They sure ain't cheap to replace a lost one 
