my bike overheated today and cut out on me, it didnt seize luckily.
what is the correct amount of water to put into the radiator and how do i go about it? is it right to fill it ALL the way to the top? as i filled it all the way to the top when it overheated, this is the first time i changed the fluid in the bike since i had it
Gotta keep on eye on temperature gauge. The bike is designed to cut out way before the engine becomes desparetely hot! It's the heating and fast cooling that can cause serious problems. Heat seizures too but like I said engine is designed to cut out before this happens.
First we need to establish what is causing the problem. (Especially in this weather!)
The coolant should be kept topped up and the expansion bottle should have water in it too! Excess water goes through the overflow.
Many things can caust overheating so it's best to establish the problem first.
Have you got any coolant in the bike. Water is okay for temporary but it's best to have a ratio of coolant in there.
If you haven't got any coolant then obviously you'll need some.
If you're finding that you're always topping up the coolant then you've got a problem.
If the coolant is full and you're still overheating then you'll need to find out why.
Is there a blockage in the system? For this you're going to have to be fairly manual. Going through all the pipes making sure there isn't any blockages. You'll also want to know whether or not the water pump as failed.
Systamtically work you'll want to strip the coolant system down to check for blockages. First drain the coolant via the water pump. Then work your way around starting from the radiator and check for blockages.
If it's not losing water. The Pump is work and there are no blockages then it could be a faulty temp sender. Easy way to test is to drop it into boiling water and watch it open up. Something like that i'd have to check the manual.
im saying it overheated, i dont even know if it did tbh.. it started making that gargling noise... like its about to run out of fuel, that kinda noise
then it was hard to start again, petrol was full and on so it wasnt that, when i turned the choke on it started back into life again
I left it for about 20 minutes and it worked again and i rode home, didnt happen again, not sure what happened to be honest, ive replaced the coolant expansion lines, topped up with fresh anti freeze mixed with coolant and it seems okay but it could happen again
water pump seems to work fine as the radiator is warm to the touch
you mean the thermostat that opens at a certain temperature? i had a feeling it might be that...
are they cheap to buy brand new? as id like brand new if i need to replace it... or do i really 100% need one? i know there job is to make sure the engine stays warm enough, but are they 100% needed? like will i run into problems without one? as some bikes dont have them at all
I don't know. It's not worth not having one. One day you'll have problems with the bike and you won't be able to determine it. Also it's best to have the temperature of the so you know what it's running like. Also it'll kill the bike if it overheats.
I don't have mint connected to anything any more since i have the vapor stealth.
i think i may know what it was, the exhaust is extremely oily, this could be because it is running rich and causing the spark plug to foul?
i have a dep pipe and it leaks and blows where the silencer joins to the spanny, where can i get the rubber bit that seals them together? will the standard one fit on the dep?
will have to give the bike another blast see if it happens again
id take the expansion chamber off and have a quick look up the exhaust port to see if the cylinder is scored, sounds to me like it could have overheated and seized up
what spark plug have you got in it? when i had a br8es, on long journeys my bike would get hot, did 150 miles one night and temp light came on and it started boiling the coolant and blew the head gasket :/ was in central london too at about 2am hahaha
Yeah regardless what you say two strokes require Miticulous maintenance. 4 months is a long time. Piston and rings is just maintenance on a two stroke. I wouldn't ride my bike until I knew why it over heated and stopped. That would mean take 30 minutes to take the expansion chamber off and have a look up the exhaust port for signs of wear.
i think im going to just have a fresh rebore, with new piston, genuine head gasket, new powervalve seal and orings, clean the PV itself, clean the carb, clean airbox and change the filter, put some carbon fibre reeds in which ive got, ive got some brand new samco hoses too, then stick a new plug in, maybe iridium!
should hopefully rule out the problem then, i bought the bike with 23-24 thousand miles on it anyway so for peace of mind the piston would be a good idea, dont know how long its been in there for and it could be one of them cheapy £20 pistons!
