Its still way fat. YOur plugs are sooty. Knock down your ECU CO at least 2 points. Clean those plugs before you reinstall them. Sandblast is best.

 

SG,

You check the plugs at an rpm first. Get fresh plugs, near the freeway, and install them on the entry ramp. Take the bike up to the rpm you want to check (where you suspect a problem, or 3 reads, spread over low, medium, and top rpm). Ride the bike at constant rpm for the range you are checking for 10 minutes, then hit the KILL switch and pull to the shoulder without reving down. Take the plugs out and read them right there on the road. You get a true read for that rpm, look for the nice tan on the electrode. Do the same for the other rpms. When complete, and if each rpm produced a nice plug, then the plugs will look tan across the rpms, and should look nice anytime you pull them.

 

Hey church, I haven't messed with the ECU, I have a power commander. Last time I checked I cleaned the plugs with a wire brush and they came clean real easy. Is sand blasting really necessary? Also, do I have to remove the right side and clean those? I would hate to have to take the tank off and the airbox just to clean a plug, it I don't have to.

I see that they are black and sooty, but what about at the top where it's white. That's what I didn't know, what part I was supposed to be looking at.

 

How did you last ride, and where and when did you check them? when i first checked my plugs, I waited til i got home. The problem with that was, I have a stretch of road before i get to my house that i am running abut 35 -15 miles per hour. I thought that I was running rich, until i cheched them again on the side of the highway. Pursuvant is right, check them in different rpm ranges and cut the engine, don't idle, try not to vary your rpm to much. It looks like the one is layered!

 

Hey Sang, You probably need to start with some fresh plugs. You have mail.

 

Sangathor, are you running the Dynojet supplied map for the Propipe and the stock air intake system?

 

Thanks guys. My bike has been sitting in the garage for a few days, it's been raining this week. I don't remember what kind of ride I had last. Usually I am beating on it pretty hard, but I do seem to remember a short run to the corner store recently, that may have been my last ride. It's 48 and raining again, so when I find some good weather I will take her out and tear up some pavement then take a reading.

Stilleto, I am running a propipe map from Darkstar. I had a richer map in there for a week or so and it seemed to run a little better (less backfiring) put the plugs were black as midnight when I checked them, so I went back to the leaner map. The map is also for a BAK, which I don't have, so I am probably running rich. I will let you know what happens when I try this the right way, next time.

Thanks

 

Another good method used for checking your plugs for proper jeting is look at the electrode the outer curved part. You should have color at the base near the threads but not past the curve. Color past the curve is an indication of being rich. I could see a good reading on a couple of your plugs.

 

My take is that in all of your photos, you are running rich. The first and second set of photos, the plugs on the right side are beginning to show the tan on the center ceramic portion ,which is indicative of correct heat range. All of the other pictures are showing an overly rich condition, thus overwheming the reading of the center electrode. So, when you saw the tan starting to show at the center, you should have gone a bit leaner and started looking at the top of the threaded portion of the plug, (the flat ring surface) to get rid of the sooty or fluffy appearance. Still too rich. What you are looking for is twofold. 1. a light tan color on the center ceramic to indicate correct heat range. 2. a nice dry dull metallic color on the ring to indicate a good air/fuel mix. If you start heading towards too lean, the center electrode will start turning plaster white and perhaps show some blistering and the outside ring will be very dry looking. So, to wrap this up, the outside ring will indicate rich/lean and the color of the center electrode will indicate heat range. But the two will interact. In your case over richness overwhelmed the reading of your heat range.

Hope this helps

vlow
Napa, Ca

 

I've been playing with my ECU and checking the plugs on mine and I keep getting the same white spot on the insulator just on one side like in Sangs pictures. I find this very confusing and I've never seen any other engine do this. Does anyone have an expanation for this?

 

Zen, took the words right out of my mouth. In addition, depending on the speed and RPM range of the last ride, a minor ECU adjustment (1-2points) might be in order based on the left plug in all 3 pics.

 

I bet your gas mileage is really bad! That's pretty rich according to the pictures. Like some have said, you want a tan color on the ceramic insulator. It probably won't be all the way around but just a partial covering (sort of a spot) with the rest being its normal white color. A very small amount of soot on the ring is ok but on the rich side of optimum. You can fine tune the soot off by adjusting the mixture in it's smallest increments. If your map is correct, the plugs should look pretty much the same no matter how you run it (fast, slow, hard or easy)which means the mixture is consistant throughout the rpm range (no fat or lean spots). This is checked by doing low, mid and high range roadside chops. If it were me, I would lean down the entire map until all or most of the soot is gone and then do the plug chops to see if the map is correct. This is just one man's opinion. Hope it helps a little.

 

hmmm.....my plugs look much like yours, sang, especially the one on the right in the first two pictures. my co settings are 5 and 7. i've got the thunder round and only a bub's slip on...fuel mileage...low fuel light didn't come on til 140 last tank of gas.

thanks for the help on reading plugs

 

Just a little more background. All of those pics were of the 2 left side plugs. The one on the left is the front plug and the one on the back is the rear plug. It's still raining and cold here so I can't really do much right now. [/emoticons/emotion-6.gif]

 

Sang,
Thanks for a good thread. I find if I have my bike set correctly by tan plugs, I get a lot of loud backfiring on deceleration using engine braking. If I set them rich, the backfiring goes away and the bike seems to run a little stronger.
Love to hear solutions, otherwise I'm going to keep running it rich.

 

I think JF made a good legitimate statement today in another thread. We all know that running an engine too lean is bad, just the same as JF stated that running too rich can bring it's share of problems. Too much fuel cleaning the oil off the side of the cylinders leading to premature wear. I'll buy that. Not to mention the likelyhood of carbon build-up. Rich is dirty and I think a dirty engine is not a happy engine. Food for thought.

 

At the beginning of this thread, Sangathor mentioned that backfiring on deceleration is a sign of the bike running lean. I thought it was a sign of richness?
Would someone please confirm.
Thanks

 

I'll be the first to admit that the mysteries of backfiring (through the exhaust) elude me. I am led to believe it is a sign of richness as well due to the fact that mine backfires more before it warms up completly. After it is warm the problem is minimal. I also think that backfiring takes a back seat to adjusting for a proper plug reading. It seems that the people using some sort of fuel tender have less backfiring than those of us adjusting the stock ecu, therefore the problem may be due to a spot on the stock map that causes the backfiring upon deceleration even though you might have an otherwise optimum mixture overall. Adjusting the stock ecu is like changing the main jets on a carb, we cannot change the pilot or idle mixtures independantly as of right now unless someone finds a way to tap deeper into the computer. Just pondering. Maybe one day we will have a clear answer to the Warrior flamethrower.

 

back in my old auto racing days, the train of thought used to be as follows:

backfiring thru thu carb or intake = too lean of a condition
backfiring thru the exhaust = too rich

i'm like you guys, i'm confused at this point. my personal opinion is that since the bike runs richer during the initial warm up because of the different a/f ratios at start up as compared to at normal operating temps, that's the reason for bacfiring thru the exhaust (too rich)

when i adjusted the ecu way too rich, the exhaust constantly rumbled and popped upon deccelration.

but i'm no expert

 

Back firing on decel is ok. The problem is timing, not fuel mixture. Your plugs Sang, indicate you're running way too rich. I have a map for you to try if you're interested. I run with a propipe, BAK, and have blocked the AIS. My plugs are all golden tan all the way around the insulator too. It may work for you. Initially I ran someone elses map and it was waay rich, when I had this one tuned it turned out a 0 map was actaully better than the one I had, just the dyno facts. As the tuning progressed it became evident that leaning out the low RPM settings improved throttle response as well as the numbers on the dyno. There are a few plus numbers on this map but not far from 0. It works for me and daytonawarrior. send me an email so I can send you a copy.,shawn
PS the guy that did it is in your neck of the woods, Dynotek is the name. Phone # 440-942-3349. ask for steve. otherwise I'll send you my map.

 

Shawn,
Interesting because you were kind enough to give me a copy of your map. My plugs are showing very rich. I have the same propipe, bak, blocked AIS, and even the same weather and altitude conditions as you. I'll take another look this weekend.
Also, I've heard rumors that Dynojet may have a separate unit to allow us to adjust timing(not the pciiir)for the warrior by the end of summer. Could help with backfire/timing issue.

 

Thanks JP, you've got mail.

 

Twisted, I have not messed with my ECU. Did the map take when you uploaded it to the pc3? I can't explian your problem. I can however say that my plugs are fine and that Daytonawarrior took his bike to a proshop and they made no adjustments to the map because it was dead nuts on; couldn't make any improvements to it. I'll double check my disk and the pc3 to see if they are the same. My computer crashed and I had to have the map sent to me so I could share it with daytonawarrior and you. I sent you both the same map so I'm not sure what happened. The map should read "steve403.map" or something to that effect.

 

Jpwarrior,
The map you sent me does read "steve403.map. I think what I'll do is try reloading it this weekend. That was the first time I ever tried loading a map and frankly, I don't know for sure if it loaded or not.
I think there's a procdedure for uploading the map on the pciii. I'll compare that to the actual steve403.map. Thanks for all your help. I'll keep you informed of my adventures.
Tom H>