xj700 does not like choke

xj700 airhead. 11530 miles. New plugs, oil, filter, carb clean, battery, rear drive fluid, brake fluid, tires.

Ok, now that that is out of the way...The mixture screw caps from the factory are still there. Bike runs, but does NOT like to be put on 'choke' Stumbles to 2 cylinders, and dies. Start sans choke, altho a bit difficult, and bike runs fine.

So, this is the second bike that has done this to me....Before this, bike sat for 8 years. I'm thinking a good old back road romp with a good dose of high test and seafoam might loosen her up, but what is causing this??

 

I'm guessing that if the factory mixture caps are still there...you didn't clean your carbs thoroughly enough :twisted: . "Choke" on an xj is an enrichment circuit, meaning fuel flows through it, which also means what's left of old fuel will clog it up. You might want to remove those pilot mixture screws (carefully! :wink: ) and clean that area too. But long story short, unless you remove and clean the enrichment circuit completely (including plungers and float bowl well) you can't expect it to start or run on "choke". Also, if the bike is already warmed up, putting choke on floods the engine.

Look for RickCoMatic's the whole 9 yards carb cleaning post.