As title says, any advice on what might help my V1000 get a few more mpg, only getting 40 to gallon even on long weekend camping trips, roughly the same as around town/short journeys. I have been giving it some welly mind.
I’ve changed the air filter. Not yet tried carb balance, mixture or timing yet as it runs really well although right hand plug is a bit sooty. Where is best place to get tune up guide, Haynes manual?
cheers
Griff
V1000 should get 45-50+ mpg easily no matter what you do to it.
make sure air filter is working correctly especially if you are using the 'orrible paper OEM one, easy to swap to K&N type filters/Lemans breather
Check carbs are in sync and have the correct jets in them (standard +10% for K&N type filters)
Check tappets are set within the very big tolerance .23mm works I set mine to .20mm inlet and .25mm exhaust
check the points (If you still have them that is, or the timing on whichever aftermarket set up you have
Check plug gap is set correctly, nb some aftermarket ign need bigger gap than the points
“Tune up” on a V1000 Guzzi is a bit of an anomoly anyway the tolerances on a Guzzi are, compared to Jab bikes, HUGE.
That said the V1000 along with the 850 and other of the 1000 touring bikes should get 45+ per gallon the T3 style screen does drop it from the 50 mpg mark attainable on bikes like Spada and T3 etc
The 600+ miles we did over the 2 weeks either side of the V Twin on the V1000 with T5 850 engine Lucas RiTa and K&N type filters fully loaded attained 45-50 mpg covering back roads and Dual carriageways and Motorway at speeds up to 80+ and having to filter for miles on the M5
If you have a sooty plug, check that the choke piston on that side is not hanging up, this is a favourite.Cheers, Gerry.
another point worth looking into is how accurate is your odometer?
mines miles out, a gps tracker on my iphone showed 50 miles on the odometer was 60ish on gps
if its miles out your mpg calculations will be out too
I find keeping the revs up between 3 and 6 thou improves fuel consumption. All to do with the efficiency of the short stroke engine, or so I’m told.
The speedo’s are notoriously innacurate my speedo is slow by 8-10% the odo is alos lower than actual.
I put a Sigma pushbike speedo on it, very easy to do info how to set up on Greg Benders website, Not only is it very accurate, I can see it, although no backlight and it also has a 2nd display that can be set to one of the following:-
Trip miles/kms
Total miles/kms
Time
The time the wheels are turning
I checked it against the sat nav and made sure it is accurate, in these times of speed cameras, Camera partnerships, average speed cameras etc it is very useful to have.
On the older Tonti bikes with the Boranni spoked wheels the lip on the wheel rim makes a real easy way to fix the magnet for the pick up to them.
Put the pick up on the mudguard stay as there is a very convenient “shelf” there where it bolts to the fork leg.
The pick up has to be very close to the magnet as it whizzes past it, mind you will soon know if your wheel is buckled …
As an instance the trip on the speedo will show 160 miles to the reserve from full tank the ACTUAL miles are 210 that is abt 19 litres of fuel. over (just) 50 mpg UK REMEMBER later bikes with the trip 'puters use AMERICAN Gallons so not as much as the UK Gallon therefore 43mpg is about a UK 50 MPG
The other thing to check is the needle or atomizer jets in the carbs, these wear oval with the needles running through them all the time. Changing them on my 1000 SPIII made a huge difference to fuel consumption.I also disabled the accellerator pumps on the carbs which made surprisingly little difference to performance, but again a huge difference to fuel consumption. I could average 65 mpg on a run if the speed was kept down.
Some good points for me to work on, where to begin
Air filter was such I pig that I will assume it went in ok, consumption not worse afterwards, not planning to take it out for a few years until I can afford K&Ns.
I oiled choke pistons when doing filter, i think they return ok, a bit of slack in the cable, How can I be sure?
I fitted a Sigma speedo when original stopped working, didnt fit the sensor that came with it, instead used two of those tiny rare earth magnets on a disc bolt, no glueing needed. Checked speedo with satnav, accurate to 1 mph at 60
Will try tuning / replacing jets, spark plugs etc soon hopefully. How did you disable accelerator pumps Brian? Is it reversible if I notice a difference?
cheers, Griff
The OEM Square carbs do not have the same accelerator pumps as the Round ones as fitted to the engine on mine they do not really make a massive difference but then I DO have a higher ratio geared bike as it has a Convert bevel box and the extra oomph the pumps give is useful in the traffic.
On my round carbs, I just took the top off and removed the little plastic crank and spring (don’t lose the spring). It can go back just as easily if you want.
Brian UK2013-09-24 19:21:32
No such item on the OEM square carbs buddy
On the vhb square carbs the accelerator pump is at the bottom of the needle in the float chamber, a spring and plastic ball bearing make up the pumpguzzi-t52013-09-24 21:25:05
Yep it’s a hollow piston with a one-way ball valve inside it.
They also have a ‘rubber’ button in the bottom that seals the top of the starter jet, not unusual for this to go hard or permanently indented, then it don’t seal so well any more. New pistons will make sure. “Right plug sooty” could be this. HTH
if you draw a blank with the carbs a compression test may help, does it burn any oil? Sooty plugs can be down to low compression or oil consumption probs top