Colortune for different power bands

First off, what a great tool. I've held off the past couple of years thinking my ears and nose were good enough but wow.

Curious if it is reliable for assessing the mixture at higher rpms. Obviously not for pilot screw adjustments...

Any opinions on the colortune at higher rpms?

 

Just Say No!

Although the colortune will certainly give you a "picture" at higher rpm's, it's a worthless picture, because there is no load on the engine, and thus the mixtures and combustion process ("color") is meaningless.......except for a no-load situation at high(er) rpm's, which has no real-world benefit.

Also, realiize that these plugs are very sensitive to overheat conditions, and you can cloud or fracture the clear viewing window easily.

 

Thanks Len, good stuff!

 

The ColorTune Plug is a TIME Saver.
NOT a Fine-Tuning Device.

The ColorTune takes the guesswork out of FINDING the Optimum Air~Fuel Mixture for IDLE.

It's great.
You "See" the Color change.
BLUE. Idle.

AFTER you ColorTune for IDLE, ... you Performance Tune by PLUG Coloration.
PLUG Chops.

Adding more Richness to the ColorTuned Idle to avoid Hesitation.
Then, tweaking the Mixture to be more Rich or Lean within the window of tuning that will cause the engine to run hotter or cooler depending on the amount of supplementary fuel you adjust to flow with main fuel supply.

High revving the ColorTuner will wreck it.

 

Lou627, I'm taking your question and responses to help myself out. I'm in the process of syncing the carbs and have already done bench sync with paperclip. then the next step would be to use a mercury manometer I have and tweak the vacuum open or closed with the same screws to do the bench sync or open/close the mixture screws under those plugs removed? I'm confused which screw needs to be open or closed when using the manometers.

then once they are balanced across the board I need to re-bench sync again? or will I be done? then when do I use the colortuner? I understand this is all for balancing the carbs at idle but the order of operation is confusing me as well as which screws to adjust, and my carbs run lean so I need to fix it right. thanks in advance guys

 

To clarify: The synchronization is performed (with the manometer, and the YICS blocked off) by adjusting the throttle position screws on the #1, #2 and #4 carbs. As each individual throttle is closed slightly, vacuum will rise, and fall as it's opened.

The method is this: #3 is the "base" it has no adjuster other than the main knob, and the linkage is such that #2 will "carry" #1 with it.

SO: You sync #1 to #2. Then you sync #2 (which will drag #1 along) to #3. Then you sync #4 to #3. At this point they should all be in sync, so henceforth you adjust the main idle knob to achieve the specified idle.

THEN you begin "ColorTuning" the mixtures. Once you've got your mixtures right, it pays to go back and re-check the vac sync. It won't be thrown off too much unless you had to do some serious mixture-tweaking.

Make sense? The ColorTune is simply a way of letting you "see" the mixture as it burns at idle, vacuum sync is done with throttle position.

 

Fitz, I know you probably get tired of me thanking you but... Thanks!!
Your Sync process works great and can be done in less than a couple minutes the first round through.
I know to sync, check mix, and sync again and got the bike running great!!!

 

You're welcome, but it's not "my" sync process, it's THE sync process as outlined in the factory book. The book just isn't as clear in explaining it is all.

Glad it worked for you.

 

Also, when you do a sync search on the forum you find many "methods".
This is the one that works.

 

Go figure.

I'm living with the rash assumption that Yamaha pretty much knew what they were talking about since they designed the bike.