The power of Pine Sol

While I wait for Pine Sol to work, my neighbour brings over his 2005 Ninja 250 for winterization.

The legendary EX250

My first bike was a 2009 EX250R so I have a soft spot for the little 250cc machines. This was my first time workingn on the older ones and my neighbour was kind enough to let me ride his bike around the block. The 2005 EX250R was a little more powerful than my stock 2009 EX250R but was much weaker than my 2009 after it's carb needles were shimmed. *sigh* I miss my 250

I return to the carbs

The Pine Sol cleaning came out with mixed results. My 4 part Pine Sol and 1 part tap water solution had some positives and negatives. Lets start with the positives.

For starters, the gunky parts came out pretty much spotless

Before ...

... and after

Before ...

... and after (from a different angle)

Now for the not so good. To begin, it looks like the Pine Sol took off the finish on most of the screws and bolts. I suppose if I were to do this again, any finished parts need either a much weaker solution or less soaking time.

Another not so good thing is that I noticed some white residue on some surfaces. Not sure how serious this is. I plan to disassemble the carbs again and take a rotary tool to it, probably with a buffing or abrassive tip.

The white crap even stuck to the inside of the cups ...

... and my hands!

Lastly, it appears some of the REALLY tough stains didn't give up the ghost.

Some crud comes off with a bit of rubbing ...

... but Pine Sol is no match for the REAL tough shit

For a $2 cleaner, Pine Sol did great but a tad more work with a rotary tool will do wonders, I'm sure. Some more pics:

All dried up and ready for assembly

One carb at a time

Sexy holes; carbs are full of em

A little grease helps make a better seal

For screws too!

Done!

I'm gonna really focus on cleaning up these carbs. Partly because I want good control over properly atomized fuel but partly because I want to explore potential problems before I start working on any other parts. Come to think of it, the carbs really should have been the LAST parts I tried to clean. Oh well. Onwards and upwards!

You can see more pics of my carb cleaning on my photobucket account here.