[sherwiner]

I bought my 2002 Ninja 250 used, cheap, and probably abused. Lots of obvious things to fix.

It has a Muzzy muffler installed. Were the carbs jetted? How to tell??

When I drove it home last fall on a cold 50 degree day, it needed choke (about 1/3) to help it accelerate...about an 8 mile ride ...until it warmed up enuf that the temp gauge showed a bit upscale. then it ran ok. Is that normal? or too lean?

Should it need choking for that long? Or maybe it wasn't ever re-jetted - that's what I am afraid of. I hate to take it to a shop and spend $$$
What do you think?

Also - is driving it with a bit of choke harmful to the engine?

Comments?

 

[KURT]

Only one way to find out... pull the carbs apart to inspect the jets. I'm guessing they didn't, and probably shimmed the carbs, if anything.

Run the engine for a bit, sans choke, to clean it out... and then pull the plugs to see how it's running.

Lots of info here... Directory of all DIY threads on Ninjette.org - ninjette.org

 

[spooph]

sherwinner, this sounds like a project bike. We'll help all we can, but you're going to run into a lot of issues, and a lot of headaches. You will want to do as much research on ICE (Internal combustion engines) as you can - a good place to start would be howstuffworks.com. Concerning your issue however, yes, as Kurt mentioned, you'll have to remove the carbs and check the numbers on the jets, then find out what the stock jets are for the pre-gen, which I'm not familiar with, and compare them. Considering you don't have a good baseline to go off of,you might want to just pay the $300 to a shop to have the bike dyno tuned. Then at least you know it's right to begin with...