Marcarl

Always interesting to think about, not that I think much, I usually just do things off the top of my head, and sometimes that gets me trouble in the butt, not that I have much of a butt, but what I got is mine so it comes along. Where are we going?

Having good compression may not have anything to do with a noisy rod, but sometimes it might, in other words: inconclusive. But a compression test is always interesting enough to do.

94% maybe

Start with the carbs. After all they have been through and the story you shared, I bet something isn't right in there. Take them off, open them up, throughly clean them and make sure the right jets are in the proper ports, then set the floats and check all linkages and connections. Don't go by what you see when you take them apart, go by the specs.

I really like the look of the first picture, those swirly marks are an awesome design. Oh well, guess it's not my scooter. Next pictures look more traditional, nice work.

Maybe one of the floats is loaded?

If you have a known issue, then clean that up first, then you can go looking for more without having to wonder if maybe, just maybe one issue plays on another.

Add to all that, if you lower the pressure because you ride all highway you might find that very comfortable until you decide on a whim to do a twisty or two and find out that the rear gets squirrely,,, yep, now you have too low a pressure for that exercise.,,,, so somewhere in-between maybe??? always a bit of a guessing game.

Hey!!! now that's a picture,,,,, bet I'll be old sometime as well when I get grey hair!!

If there are progressive springs in the front then they suggest no air needed, but i'm with Spencer.

So now that you have all that info, dig deeper. Accurately measure your tread in 3 places around the tire, center and sides. Write it down and maybe even mark the tire were you measured so that down the road you know exactly where to measure again. Sometime from now, re-measure and see what that tells you what the contact patch is. That might come into play as well.

Each one of us has an angel watching over us, you had 2 angels present and were aware enough to listen. Don't discount the angels, we may not see them but they are real.

Don is no long haired hippy,,,,, how dare you??!!

Consider: The faster you spin the tire the more it will stretch out, so the rounder it gets, and the less contact patch. Max psi on the side wall is posted in conjunction with the load bearing rate, also on the side of the tire. Also the speed rating is on the side of the tire. Wear on the treads indicates the amount of contact patch mostly used. IMHO: The pressure indicated along with the other numbers helps one figure out what pressure should be used, so if your are only loading to half the specified rating the pressure can be reduced to maintain a contact patch that is at a safe and operable range. You can't go half pressure for half load though for when you reduce pressure then more spec's come into play such as heat and flexibility. I have been informed that it is never a good idea to over pressurize a tire because as you use them heat builds up and may then rise to a higher amount than what the tire was designed for and cause failure. Hot pressure is never mentioned because that can be very variable, so measure cold and run with it, but stay below the speed rating.

Good point as well.

Seems to me you have extra air coming in from somewhere. It seems again that with the air box off it's easier for the air to travel through the carbs rather than from the other direction, and once you install the air filter etc then the other source becomes easier. If it were here in my shop I would be taking a real close look at how the carbs are seated and if the clamps are seated properly all the way around and tight. At the bottom of the carbs there is what would insert into the boots and right above that is a flange. That flange needs to be flat against the boots and I would check all 4 carbs to make sure they are in proper position. It's hard to trouble shoot from a distance, darned hard. Could you take some pictures from both sides and post them?

Bet you turned your blind eye to all the goings on as well.

Something wasn't quite right.

That's always good news... now we wait for Monday and make supplication in the mean time.

Take off the air box, squirt some carb cleaner or brake clean into each cylinder and then turn it over. If it fires then you know you have spark and your issue is fuel related. If it doesn't fire then check out why it doesn't spark.

It's not me that was confused,, it is the rest of the world. 😃 It's not easy being me, but somebody has to do it!! 🙃Glad to be of help!🤪

So now you admit you are confused,,,, welll, that's good news! You know of course that the first step into getting better from something is to admit you have a problem in the first place. Good for you!

They are called that way because they first became popular on the first gens, because they passed everything in sight and it was best to have lots of light on the scoot so those whose were being passed had enough time to notice what had taken place. Later they were used on the 2nd gen and then became known as driving lights, for reasons that should be self explainatory. At least that's what I heard and I got it right from the internets mouth so to speak.

Are you saying in a round about way that Ben was going squirrelly?? I noticed you had the Spyder part right anyways.

Another issue, along with the wind factor, would be the length factor: Drivers sees MC, wait for it to pass but never even considers the length of the trailer. Might be a sad day for the canoe and anything attached to it, even if the other driver only caught the last 2" of it.