I'm BACK!

Reason for my absence: All this time the XT225 has been at the shop. In fact, I just brought it home yesterday, late afternoon... FINALLY!

It was a long and sordid story of sorting issues. Fortunately, I've known the owner of the shop for decades (having purchased several Yamaha's from his dad that owned the shop at the time), so he took it in, and worked on it when practical (used it as filler work, not assigned/dedicated work) because he figured tracing the issue would be lots of trial and error so was trying to hold down my costs. (i.e. In other words, he would work on when he could and not assign one of his commissioned mechanics, thus avoiding me being dinged with the $$$ hourly shop rate as one of his commissioned help experimented and invested a lot of time trying to find all the issues.)

He did good keeping me informed with calls, and amid him being gone for a total of three weeks (2 for vacation and a business type trip), he kept chipping away at it when he could.

Several things were found that were contributing to the issue, and a couple weeks ago they were oh-so-close. He called me again at that time to let me know they had the top end running clean and it would pull good to the top, but he wasn't satisfied with the way it felt off-idle and suggested I come ride it to see if I concurred.

I rode it around town for quite a while, and yes, the load-induced miss was gone and it would pull good to the top, but it was a bit hesitant off idle and at times felt like it wanted to die. I concurred with his estimation and left it with him. I told him no rush, work on it when he could, but get it as good as he could get it before I pick it up.

He then disassembled the carb (again) and started spec-ing the air/fuel idle circuit. When it was all said and done, a previous owner/whomever had wallowed out not only the main jet (replacing it with a new UNTOUCHED jet was what cleaned up the top end) as well as modified the pilot jet. Once he determined this, a new pilot jet went in, some tuning, and presto: Runs like a top. Idles nice and smooth, immediate response off idle... pulls great and runs clean to the top.

SO... there you have it!

Once the weather gets more agreeable (my region is in our 100+ summer weather right now) I will start riding it in the cool of the mornings for extended periods to insure that all is good before I start going on rides out in the mountains.

BUT... it's home... FINALLY!!!

All fer now.

V-man