85 Nighthawk 700S: Hours to Rebuild Carb?

[Danian]

I'm getting tired of the recurring fuel leakage I'm having, so I'd like to get my carb rebuilt.  I've found ONE place in San Diego that says they MIGHT work on my bike for $83/hour.  My question is:  What's the manual say is the normal hours for a carb rebuild?  I'd like to have an idea of what would be a reasonable charge.  I'm also thinking of having them install a DynaJet Stage 1 jet kit while they're in there.

You input would be greatly appreciated.  If you have a referral to a shop in the San Diego area that will work on these "old" bikes, that would be great, too.

Thanks!

[Tryvelcro]

Why don't  you just do it yourself?  It's not terribly hard, just need a little time and patience.  I did my own carbs because it was going to be $300ish dollars.  I learned a lot, and know exactly what was done and how.

Why do you want a jet kit?

[Danian]

Normally, I would.  I've had to replace all the choke valves before, so I'm not shy about taking off the tank and getting in there.  But in this case, I find the carbs pretty intimidating.  And all the adjusting that's gotta happen...I would just feel safer about letting a professional do it.  OR, if I had someone with me who's done it before who could mentor me through it (this is a better solution).

As far as the jet kit, I figured that since the carbs were coming apart anyway, this would be a good time to put something in to pep up the engine a little bit.  I think some of those parts are part of a normal rebuild anyway, so why not?  I'm no racer, but it'd be nice to get a little more punch to get out of bad situations.

How hard was the rebuild?  How hard was the removing and replacing and adjusting?  I guess another option for me would be to buy used and rebuild.

[Option13]

Laminar wrote a good how-to for a 550. The carbs should be very similar, and it will give you a good idea of how much work is involved. It's hard to estimate how long things take different people, so you're best off just seeing what's involved.

[Tryvelcro]

I have had mine off several times now.  Granted, mine is a 750, but carbs is carbs. 

Getting them off the first time is a bit more challenging, but the cleaning and adjusting really isn't difficult.  Take the jets and stuff out, soak the bodies in pine sol overnight, clean the jets, blow them out, bench sync them and put 'em back in.  There is a good bench sync guide that bumblebee wrote that will get the carbs dialed in before you put them back on the bike.  Then its just adjusting the idle.

Carbs aren't nearly as hard or intimidating as I thought they would be.  It's really just a few pieces in each one, since you don't need to take them off the rails.

Give it a shot.  I had zero help in person, but everyone here walked me through it.

[Danian]

Hmmm...everyone's saying to just do it myself.  I guess I'll look more closely at it.  I just assumed that there will be a lot of tweaking and precision needed and I'm not as mechanically inclined as I like to think I am.

[gammer]

If you haven't done so already, don't forget to check out the Pine-Sol carb clean thread too:
http://nighthawk-forums.com/index.php/topic,4472.msg54844.html#msg54844

[muttstang]

Don't be afraid of the carbs.  Just be meticulous in the teardown, have a shop manual handy, and be darn sure you leak check them before they go back on the bike!!!  (learned that one the hard way after getting lots of practice installing and uninstalling carbs)

If you seperate the carb bodies, you will want to do the bench sync at a minimum and it would be wise to do a vacuum sync once they are back on the bike.

If you have trouble finding the source of a leak, some baby powder works very well to help show where it is coming from.  Just clean them really well, let them dry, then sprinkle some baby powder around the leaking area and put some liquid into them.  I used the pinesol solution for leak testing since the carbs were off of the bike and it was much nicer to work with then gasoline!

[tomb raider]

All for doing your self, That inner fender must come off to get that air box back and use a strap or ?  to hold it. Gammer likes a hockey stick to pop off the carb's, I use a Axe handle. Make sure you loosen them clamps all the way, a trick on the 700's Is to take that left cross over bar off above the engine. I call it Sh_t in the way.. then roll out the carbs out the left and take off the cables. With me there the Bitch of this job, getting them back on.

I use a large needle nose pliers.    Hey, we have 3 Ladies on here, they all can do it so you Have to man up and Git-R-Done.....     Like Lisa said, if you have an issue there is many here to help you along the way......     

[muttstang]

Oh, and if you want to replace the worn out JIS (similar to phillips) screws on the top and bottom of the carbs, I have screws for that... just have to find them since all of our stuff is packed up.

[tomb raider]

Good call Muttstang, Ya change to S/S allens and a small washer on each top and bottom...