My new beast has arrived!

Well folks, I have finally got my Thundercat delivered yesterday and I was itching to get out on it and find out how she would go. SO I DID!!!

I must must say that after owning the larger CC bikes from passing my test (the smallest CC was a CB900FA) I was expecting to find it a bit slower than the bikes I was used to but to my surprise I was very impressed with the low down torque for your casual overtake! Also I thourghly enjoyed dropping a couple of gears and opening her up and boy I was very impressed with the accelaration it produced! Handling was good and precise and the comfort was really good too. All in all I am really impressed with her! I can see me owning her for a long time.

The only thing/issue I have with mine at the moment is that it hunts a bit on tick over and a awful flat spot. Is this common? I think this is a carb balance issue but they did the 24,000mile service which is valve clearances so I thought this would have been done at the same time. If not it does not matter as I will have the dealer sort it as it is covered by a warranty. If anyone can let me know if this is a common issue or not. But it is annoying at low revs through town!

Aprt from this it seems to be a great bike! Hopefully she proves to be as reliable as everyone says on the forum.

Cheers
Sam.

Glad to hear you are suitably impressed.

The idle adjuster is black twisty thing above the oil viewy thing on the right hand side as you sit on her. You may already have had a play with this but just in case you didn't know it was there.

As for flat spot I've never noticed one. Under what circumstances does it happen?

Cheers
Rosco

Rosco wrote:Glad to hear you are suitably impressed.

The idle adjuster is black twisty thing above the oil viewy thing......
Cheers
Rosco

See i hate it when people get all technical and mechanical, completely loses me!!!

In all fairness, I can't help on tools side but glad to hear your happy with her and judging by the avatar you have you must have paid extra to get get the fastest colour scheme...good work!!

Glad to hear you are impressed. Both the symptoms you have point to dirty carbs, try some redex in the fuel it may sort it.

yamahamad wrote:Glad to hear you are impressed. Both the symptoms you have point to dirty carbs, try some redex in the fuel it may sort it.

Cheers for all the responses, yamahamad - I thought it might be carb related and as I have bought this from dealer with a warranty and the fact that they had done the 24,000mile service I would have hoped they would have given it a good check over! So they can have it back and sort it. But once this is sorted I will be a happy (not so little) chappy.

Thanks again for responses as I am new to the smaller higher revving engine so was not sure if it was me or the bike.

I beleive I have picked the right bike for what I need and as they say the research before the choice seems to have paid off.

JDM wrote:

Rosco wrote:Glad to hear you are suitably impressed.

The idle adjuster is black twisty thing above the oil viewy thing......
Cheers
Rosco

See i hate it when people get all technical and mechanical, completely loses me!!!

In all fairness, I can't help on tools side but glad to hear your happy with her and judging by the avatar you have you must have paid extra to get get the fastest colour scheme...good work!!

Cheers JDM, As for the tools side of things when you have owned not one but two FJ1200 you get to know your way around the tools as these old things need a bit of work. Especially when you need to change an engine out! not for the weak or faint hearted! the engine weight on one of those 1200 engines is not light!. That is why after my fourth operation on my knee I decided that the FJ's had to go and I needed a younger bike that was lighter could do more than one job and I could get serviced by the dealer when required with zero fuss. As work and kids commitments reduce the amount of riding time available to me.

It looks the biz and once the small issues have been sorted the smile will become as broad as mine was back in Feb.

Its a suberb bike and will happily tootle around but has the capability to keep up with bigger bikes. It just needs a capabale and confident rider.

Enjoy.

Well folks I have spoken to the dealer and they will be picking bike up on Saturday! They have also asked for the standard can as they say the hunting issue is due to the can I have on the bike! As it reduces the back pressure and the thundercat engine does not like this. (mmm... I'm not convinced). But when I asked about the flat spot issue and the lack of get up and go they said that no this was a different issue.

If you have any comments about the can issue please let me know as I would prefer to keep the non-standard can on.

Cheers
Sam.

Might depend on the can, but when I changed mine all I noticed (apart from a little more power) was can took a while to settle back to idle.

Doubt you should have a flat spot with an aftermarket can, unless it's radical and upset the carburation . Best let them fit the original and try it, am sure you'll still have the problem.

Have they change the plugs? what's the air filter like?

umm come to think of it I have a K&N filter in mine, subtle combo?

SteveCat wrote:Might depend on the can, but when I changed mine all I noticed (apart from a little more power) was can took a while to settle back to idle.

Doubt you should have a flat spot with an aftermarket can, unless it's radical and upset the carburation . Best let them fit the original and try it, am sure you'll still have the problem.

Have they change the plugs? what's the air filter like?

umm come to think of it I have a K&N filter in mine, subtle combo?

Thanks for the advice, They should have done spark plugs and filter as it had major service including valve clearances as part of the deal. So will let them fiddle and see what the result is. I think it may be a carb issue as she smells as though she is running rich. Could be choke problem i.e. it is not shutting off completely. But hey I have paid my money so they can sort it.

Cheers

Sam.

Just a update,

I started the Thundercat last night to see if would start to hunt on tick over but nothing? It ticked over as I would expect it to. So I contacted the dealer and had a chat to see if they could shed any light on this.. After a little chat it was recommended that they would supply me with a fuel addative to see if this would help the other issue of the hesitation. They did say that the bike had done very little miles in the last year. Also I noticed that the temp gauge only hit the 60 degrees mark when riding it so it was running quite cold.

So I am going to give this a shot to see if this solves the problem..

Cheers
Sam.

When did it start to hunt? Had you been out for a while, or was it pretty much from startup?

SteveCat wrote:When did it start to hunt? Had you been out for a while, or was it pretty much from startup?

Hi Stevecat,

It started after I had done a 9 mile run both through twisties and 'A' road but the temp never went higher than the 60 degrees. but when I run the bike in my garage the gauge raised just above the 60 degree mark.

So hey I'm off to Croatia on Sunday (work related) So the bike will have to wait until I get back.

Cheers