Triumphrat

Haggis · 05-01-2007, 12:18 AM

I presume there's no idiot light whe you're low on gas, 'cos I didn't see one, and I ran out of gas 1 block from home!

Also, what's with the reserve tank? And what does that little lever switch thingy do next to the choke? Is that the petcock? :???: (Avoiding the obvious jokes....)

vertwrks · 05-01-2007, 12:43 AM

When the petcock is on "on" the gas drains from a bit higher up in the tank, when you run out you switch to "res" or reserve and it drains from the very bottom of the tank hopefully getting you to a gas station. Hope you didn't have to push too far!

[ This message was edited by: vertwrks on 2007-04-30 22:44 ]

karamazov · 05-01-2007, 12:44 AM

this'd be a good time to skim your owners manual. you probably had a gallon left in your tank when your engine died, unless you had the petcock in the "reserve" position the whole time.

same tank, two lines at different levels. when you run low, you can switch to "reserve" and tap into the 1 gallonish that the higher line can't access. it's kind of an old fashioned idiot light.

Haggis · 05-01-2007, 12:54 AM

Yes - it's time to read the manual. I only read the map when I'm lost!

karamazov · 05-01-2007, 01:14 AM

and, if it makes you feel better, it's not exclusively a newbie mistake. quite a few of us on the forum have forgotten to switch back to "on" from "res" after filling up. not a good feeling when you reach down to switch to reserve only to find you've already tapped it dry.

pushing blows.

pabonne · 05-01-2007, 07:11 AM

Best thing to do IMO is to reset the odo to 0 when you fill up and then refill and reset at 100 mi for a few tanks until you get a feel for your MPG. Then you can "stretch" it from there. Reserve will get you a few miles but (Murphy's law) probably not as many as you need. :-D

Mattrat · 05-01-2007, 09:10 AM

Don't worry - I've been riding for 20+ years and I recently did worse...

Had the bonnie in for first service last fall - left the dealership and got about half a mile down the road and the engine died. I cursed and yelled for about 10 minutes until I realized that the petcock was in the "off" position...

luckily nobody was around so I wasn't too embarassed :hammer:

Baltobonneville · 05-01-2007, 09:51 AM

Yes, use the odometer as a fuel gauge. And don't leave the petcock on reserve unless you're intentionally using it that way. And shut it off when the bike is not in use.

Haggis · 05-01-2007, 11:06 AM

Thanks everyone, now I feel less foolish! Well, not really, just not more foolish than everyone else :-D

Question: If you leave the petcock on after turning the engine off will that allow fuel into the cylinders?

lindsayt · 05-01-2007, 11:14 AM

Quote:

On 2007-05-01 09:06, haggis95 wrote:
Question: If you leave the petcock on after turning the engine off will that allow fuel into the cylinders?

Yes, it probably will. There's about a 50% chance that one of your two intake valves is in the open position when the engine is off, and if so, a petcock in the "on" position will result in that cylinder filling with gas. Good news is, in warm weather it's not likely to cause you serious trouble starting; but at the very least you're wasting gas and could have trouble starting the bike, so be sure to turn the petcock to "off" when you park.

I tend to leave it "on" when I'm just running in to a store - but if I'm leaving it for more than about fifteen minutes, I turn it off.