Hi all, I'll try to keep this brief and to the point. I haven't had this '80 FLT running in 9 years but now I need to move it to our new house.

The weather has been extremely cooperative this winter which has allowed me to spend some time trying to get it going. After spending some bucks and time I've been able to get the bike started but I can't get it to run down the road without a lot of spitting, coughing and no throttle response. The bike has an S&S Super E I'd installed back in the 90's.

Here's what I've done:
Replaced the battery (obviously)
Replaced the fuel line (it was rotted off on each end)
Set petcock to reserve and drained the tank, put in fresh gas
Put in new spark plugs

I'm sure the carb was gummed up, I had the air cleaner off and sprayed in starter fluid and carb cleaner. I got the bike running although I couldn't turn the enricher all the way off or it would stall. After putting the bags, seat and cleaner back on I had the bike running again but it was way to jumpy to be ride-able. I didn't have any throttle response, it wanted to die whenever I'd gas it and let up on the clutch.

The next day I went back at the carb with the S&S adjustment instructions but the bike won't even run with the default idle speed, idle mixture and throttle response settings. It's frustrating!

Any experts out there that can provide suggestions or things I've overlooked?

 

Intake seals are probably shot and carb is still gummed a bit in the real small ports , only thing going to help is running gas through and maybe a bit of injector cleaner in the gas .

You can pull the carb a do a bench cleaning with couple cans of carb cleaner and try to get some through all the tiny holes you see & drop the float bowl and check all the setting in there , safety glasses or a face shield is recommended . Sounds like the air bleed circuit is still grunged up .

 

you have a dirty carb.. take it apart and clean everything with carb cleaner, spray cleaner or air through all the ports, especially the small one/ idle port.. the bike will run as good as new. and if it has sat that long, the oil is useless, time for a change

 

I'm certain you're right at this point, I'll have to pull that carb. The oil level was real low, couldn't even see any in there. I put the crankcase breather hose into a tub because after sitting all that oil spews out of the crankcase and I took new oil over there with me when I first started working on it.

Thanks for the advice.

 

I've been shooting carb cleaner in the carb and also bought more gas, octane booster and cleaner to put in the tank today on the way over there.

 

I'm not surprised you found the oil level low.
Unless you parked it in that condition the engine has "wet sumped" meaning you have a lot of oil in the crankcase and probably some has leaked over from the engine into the primary as well.

 

My book is over at the old house, shouldn't I probably put some 20w50 in the transmission as well? I was having trouble getting it into neutral when I tried riding it.

I kinda have a second option because I still have the original carb. I bought the S&S partly because the stock carb was ****ed up. It's been a long time but If I remember right, I found a loose screw in that stock carb and put it back where it belonged but I already had the (then new) Super E so, of course, I put that on instead and I have no idea if the stock one is functional or not. I'm thinking about putting it on to see if I can get the bike moved with that. At worst I suppose it wouldn't work and I'd just have to wait until I get the Super E cleaned out.

As a matter of course the bike has to go to a shop before I can do any serious riding anyway because the seal was shot on the rear rocker box cover back when I mothballed the thing.

 

I know when my late husband would buy an old motorcycle that was sitting for years, the first thing he's do, he'd spray a little oil in the sparkplug holes. Then he'd start with taking the gas tanks off, take the gas shutoff valve apart and clean them good. Remove and take apart the carborator and clean that also, replace all the gas lines with new ones.

 

Watch the octane booster , that stuff eats rubber & synthetic compound seals , o-rings and non rubber fuel lines . It softens and swells everything if you use too much or it sits and settles out of the gas . Run into this a number of times around here with our crappy gas and bigger inch high comp motors .

Carb has to come of to get the small ports that need to be shot with cleaner , thy are on the other side of the butterfly , sorry .

 

Well good luck. After 9 years all the rubber seals [not to mention tires] are all gonna be toast. Wouldn't trust it to ride till its been gone over. Brake lines and tires are 2 huge red flags. Be careful.