97 Triumph Trophy | 2K Miles | Idle Issues

[jasonk]

I just took possesion of a 97 Triumph Trophy. The bike only has 2K miles on it so obviously it spent some time sitting around. I fired the bike up the other day and it didn't run so good. It doesn't idle consistently and it stalls out every-now-and-then when I come to a stop.

I'm not mechanically savvy and I've always ridding fule-injected bikes, so I'm having trouble diagnosing the problem. I thought it had bad gas & just needed to be blown out on the highway. I spent an hour or so cruising down the highway but the problem still exists.

I called a local mechanic and they suggested a full tuneup and a carb cleaning. They way $300+ for the tune up and another $300 for a carb-cleaning. He also said this might not correct the problem. I'm not sure how much money I want to put into this bike. The tune up I'm sure I could do on my own. But I don't know what's involved with a carb-cleaning.

I thought maybe someone out there might have some ideas for me; thoughts & opinions...
I would appreciate it.

[chornbe]

Carb rebuilds. Might try "Sea Foam" carb cleaner first.

[Shadowfax]

I thought maybe someone out there might have some ideas for me; thoughts & opinions...
I would appreciate it.

I'd first run some Techron or SeaFoam through to see what that does as you've already been advised.  If that doesn't work though I'd head over to the Trophy Owners group on Yahoo.  There's a wealth of information there and much of it discussing carbs and fueling.  There are a couple of things you can easily check on that bike before you tear into the carbs that are common on the Trophy.  Namely pinched vacuum lines and fuel lines if the tank has been removed in the past.  Even if you do have to remove your carbs it's not difficult with a little patience and the shop manual.  Here's a link to the owners group, after a little research there you can decide how much effort you want to put into it.  I'm in the middle of getting a '98 running that's sat for awhile also -->

http://autos.groups.yahoo.com/group/TriumphTrophy/

Best of Luck...
--
Scott
Triumph's Daytona and Trophy

[davenay67]

The bike is running and that makes things a bit easier compared to a bike that won't start or run at all. As you have already been told, perform a complete tune-up (air filter, oil, oil filter, spark plugs, coolant flush and change) and use this as a benchmark. This may help a little, but I'm fairly sure the carbs are a bit gummed up and likely to be the main cause of the poor running. The quick, cheap and easy route is to use a carb cleaner (i.e. sea foam) to see if that helps at all (and it may well do so), but be prepared for a carb service on a 10 year old bike that has sat around idle for so long. It is worth perservering as the Tropy 1200 is a great bike....

Dave.