LITTLE ROCK — With hunting seasons approaching, many of us will use our all-terrain vehicles a lot in the coming weeks.
Or at least we’ll try to use them, but many of our quad bikes won’t work because of neglect and shoddy maintenance.
I have a love/hate relationship with my 2005 Suzuki Eiger. I love it when it starts and runs right. I hate it when it doesn’t.
Most of the problems I’ve had with my four-wheeler have been fuel-related. Nobody told me when I bought the thing that it doesn’t thrive on a diet of 10-percent ethanol. If you let ethanol sit in your tank too long, your bike will develop a host of problems, including hard starting, excessive warm-up time, rough idling and erratic combustion at high rpms.
If your bike is idle for long periods with any kind of fuel, it will gum up your carburetors and mess up the floats. You might have to rebuild the carb, which can be time-consuming and expensive if you hire out the job.
The first thing I did was to quit using ethanol. I use only pure gas, which I get from a Citgo station in Benton. Then I treated my fuel with a product called StarTron, an excellent fuel additive that stabilizes ethanol. It took care of immediate symptoms, but repetitive periods of prolonged idleness ultimately affected my carburetor. The bike would start and idle, but it died with any amount of load, often with a theatrical burst of coughs and backfires. Everything pointed to a carb overhaul, but I was willing to try anything before resorting to that extreme.
That’s when a found a product called Sea Foam. This stuff is the bomb! It’s a lot more potent than StarTron. It burns all deposits from the fuel system, including varnish in the carb jets. It took a full afternoon of idling the bike before I could finally feather the thottle into mediumrange revving. Eventually I got into high revs. The 400cc engine fought tooth and nail, but with one giant backfire, it finally got over the hump.
The fuel filter in this bike is very crude. It’s a fine mesh tube that covers an opening in the fuel line inside the tank. The mesh was obstructed, but the Sea Foam cleared it. I went a step further. I bought a small inline fuel filter from O’Reilly and installed it between the fuel cutoff switch and the carb. It was an easy job. I slit the fuel line open with a razor, slipped the open ends of the line over the intake and outflow nipples on the filter and clamped them tight. The filter bulb is clear, so I can visually inspect fuel flow and supply to the carb. It runs better than ever, and it warms up faster than when it was new.
I recently learned a nasty lesson about original equipment tires. ATV manufacturers equip new bikes with the cheapest tires available. My quad came with 2-ply tires with a tame tread. Because of these tires, my quad often got stuck in mudholes it should have handled with ease. I always got out with a short burst of four-wheel drive, so I didn’t worry about it. If I got hopelessly stuck, I could always rely on my electric winch.
A few weeks ago, I ran over a really ordinary pine log that was only about 6 inches in diameter. The next morning my tire was flat, with a big pine shiv thrust deep in the shoe. I pulled it out with channel locks, but the tire was unsalvageable.
A visit to a local dealer got me a new pair of 6-ply Gators on closeout for the rear. The tires have a wider profile than the originals, and the tread is very aggressive. The price was outstanding, less than $100 per tire, and my quad doesn’t get stuck anymore. I’ll also put a pair on the front.
Now I need new shocks. I have used my quad to pull utility trailers piled high with firewood. I use it to pull a disc harrow, and it’s always loaded down with chainsaws, loppers, chains, corn, deer attractants and who knows what. The result are trashed shocks. I can bottom out the shocks by pushing down on the rear basket with two fingers.
ATV shocks are expensive, about $125 apiece for the Suzuki Eiger. I looked into replacing them with small car shocks, but an ATV isn’t heavy enough to push them down. It’ll jack the bike up so high that it’s unsafe to ride.
I’m trying to convince myself that ATV shocks will be money well spent.
Sports, Pages 32 on 07/29/2012