Very nice job. Looks good.
Part 4. D’oh!
As part of the cleaning out of the tank, carbs, fuel pipes and the various fuel filters, I approached the LHS carb of the 750T with some trepidation. I hadn’t touched that carburettor before now, and so I was loathe to possibly upset something else. But I had to clean the little filter at the petrol inlet, as I was sure that there’d be some more dead Petseal remnants in there. Looking at the carb it seems to be the same carb as the RHS one, but that means that the fuel inlet and it’s attendant filter is now on the inside, rather than the outside, of the engine area. Unfortunately that means that I had to remove the carb from its inlet stub to gain access to the screw.
So usually this means undoing all of the 4 jubilee clips which secure the carb - 2 for the intake manifold and 2 for the inlet tube to the air box. However, when I get down to have a close look, I can see that the carb doesn’t appear to be connected to the air box any more. Lightbulb moment! Could this be the cause of my poorly bike all along? Too much (and unfiltered) air….There is a gap between the face of the carb and the air inlet tube, and the air inlet tube looks rough and damaged at the carb end. After a lot of jiggling and unbolting, including the engine side inlet manifold, I managed to get the carb out. As expected the filter and the housing on the fuel pipe side of the fuel attachment is full of yellow fibres, up to about 50% of the filter area. So that all got cleaned out.
The inlet pipe to the air box (part number GU19114460) is in a bit of a sorry state. The flange into which the carb face fits is fractured, and the rest of the tube looks like it has been hammered all over with a little help from a screwdriver or a small chisel. With the retaining jubilee clip loosened right off, it should be a firm sliding fit into the air box, but of course it is well and truly jammed in there.
The inlet pipe:
Oh dear. I scanned the usual sources for a replacement, but didn’t find any. I got some advice from a guy called Barry on the MGCGB forum, but the ones he found on eBay were in the USA, and the p&p price was twice the price of the tubes themselves. So I decided to have a go at hot welding the inlet tube myself. The tube appears to be made of a hard plastic, so I set to with some wire to pull the broken part together, and an old soldering iron.
The result doesn’t look great, but it was effective and looked better when cleaned up with a craft knife after I took the photos:
I greased the tube and re-inserted it into the airbox, drank a lot more tea, and put the bike back together.
So now the bike has a cleaned out tank (mostly), cleaned out petrol taps, pipes, filters and carbs. I gingerly poured about a gallon of fresh super unleaded into the tank, and to my relief there were no obvious leaks. I turned on both petrol taps to RES, and apart from the sound of the carbs filling themselves there were no other unexpected events.
The bike started with a bit of choke and them ticked over happily enough. I rode the bike around the lanes for a few miles to make sure that it wouldn’t spontaneously combust, and then filled up at the local filling station. Still no leaks, and a fairly even tick over.
As things appeared to be going well, I thought I’d chance my arm, and give the bike a quick burst along a local jewelled cabbageway. The bike was now happy to rev into the yellow part of the rev counter in the lower gears, and to hold 75mph without complaint. So I’m calling the engine work done for now. There is the little matter of a leaking fork seal though. I’ll look into that in the winter, before trying for an MOT.
Cheers, Bob.
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Update: although Gutsibits didn’t initially have any of the inlet tubes available, they got one of their people to have a good look in their warehouse, and they found 2! So I ordered them. Great work guys, and colour me impressed 
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Hi Bob, I see you are having some issues with your 750 T, I have a 750 Strada 1994 and not dissimilar to yours. I too had a tank that serve better as a cullender than a tank, having made many attempts to braze the holes up it finally cracked so I gave up and purchased a Snell Bobber fuel tank raw for £68,99 , it comes with a locking fuel cap but only one outlet, if you are handy with a blow lamp fit another outlet, I added some u shaped fittings and extended the skirt to match the original, I will try to send a picture, if it doesn’t work send me your email address and i will send it that way.
I found that using BPR 6ES plugs work so much better, they are the ones with the extended electrode. Does you bike have electronic ignition or points ?, timing I found very critical.
If it has electronic ignition then you need to properly earth the pick up plate at the front of the engine at the end of the cam shaft, you may need to give me a call as I can explain it better. My bike is now sorted, in fact it goes better than when I had it new, i took it out the other day and it easily topped the ton. Bob Smith 07989 612877.
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Hello Bob, as you may have already realised, I am your new member at the Somerset Branch 
, and I came along for the first time last month. It was good to meet you all.
My primary objective has been to get the bike back on the road, running at least as well as it was when I bought it. At that time the bike was happy to bowl along up to about 85mph, which, for a first ride on a very different bike, was enough. Since I embarked on the whole oil pressure switch debacle, it hasn’t been so happy. As you may have read, I am now happier to have got it back to the point where it can maintain 75mph without misfiring, but the engine performance isn’t exactly sparkling, even for an older design 2-valve pushrod twin. My experience so far has been that small changes do help, but that I haven’t found that one thing which will suddenly improve performance to the levels you have with your Strada, given that our bikes share pretty much the same engine.
I am quite interested in your choice of spark plug. My bike came with B8ES plugs which I cleaned and gapped at 0.6mm (from the 750 owner’s manual), and that does seem to be quoted by suppliers as the replacement plug. However you have a pair of BPR6ES in your bike : two-grades hotter plugs with the fine central electrode. I am tempted to try a pair myself. Did you re-gap them to 0.6mm, or leave them with the default 0.7mm gap they are usually supplied with? One other thing: are your spark plug caps the type that are fitted with resistors (e.g 5Kohm) ?
I think that my bike has Lucas Rita ignition, but I haven’t done any investigative work on that at all. I’m tending to ‘leave well alone’ at the moment.
As far as I know, the carburettor on my bike is as standard, inasmuch as the main jet is 105 in both carbs. Do you have any jetting or slide changes in yours?
Regards, Bob.