New Valkyrie owner with some questions to get valk ready for touring.

[..]

I can see going from a full tank to needing reserve in 100 miles if you have been doing lots of idling and stop-and-go riding, or on the highway at high speeds and/or fighting a stiff headwind, but my experience is more like 125-145 miles to reserve.

I usually get way more than 100 miles to a tank, too.  I was thinking that since the bike may have been sitting for some time and he's doing a lot of catch up maintenance, he could be taking lots of test rides to evaluate his work.  When I do that mileage drops like a rock.

Yeah I guess I was idling it alot.  I also realied that I had a clamp on the vacuum line from cylinder 6 to the petcock from when I was syncing the carbs.  oops. 

UPDATE I also checked the valves.  They were all a little tight, but not way off.  It might be just the way I measure with the feeler gauges.  I adjusted them all and checked them twice.  The the ticking is much louder.  I don't know exactly if that is normal.  It kinda sounds like a stock ticker machine or a sewing machine. 

If you have a screwdriver with a hard plastic handle you can place the tip of the screwdriver where you think the ticking is. Place the end of the handle next to your ear and you will hear the ticking much more clearly and this may help you isolate where in the engine it's coming from.

[rug_burn]

Seems like just about everyone's chimed in-  'course a lot of us come and go when we're working on our bikes, or not. 
  If your carbs are good-  don't mess with them too much-  in my experience, they are interesting, but a ton of work to get synched up with the correct mixture once you disassemble them.   Once you do the rebuild (6 times) you'll nearly be an expert on them, and the intake system.    Mine still ain't synched as good as from the factory,  but it runs pretty sweet, still.
   But the thing with the carbs is not to let it sit, or rather, let the gas go bad, like a few of us have done.

   Also-  those splines on both the rear wheel, and drive-shaft-to-pinion cup are critical items-  you gotta lube and assemble them in the right order, which is:  when installing the rear wheel, torque down the rear axle all the way with the 4 shaft tube-to-rear drive nuts loose, I always jiggle the rear drive to free it up a little before torquing.  If you don't do that, the splines on the rear wheel will wear out rather quickly.
   And clean and re-lube the drive shaft splines every time you replace the rear tire.
   And welcome to the tech board-

[big_adv_rider]

Sooo...  the bike has been running REALLY hot and the fan doesn't turn on.  The radiator cap is venting coolant. 

I have been looking everything over and what happened is that when I replaced the right head cover after checking the valves I got the electrical wire pinched in the cover.  After looking at the service manual I think that this wire is either for the "engine coolant temperature" or the "thermostatic switch."  Once my engine cools down I am going to pull the head cover off and inspect the wire. 

Hopefully I haven't screwed things up too much...   

[big_adv_rider]

Wire to the oil pressure switch ended up being ok.  The ticking stopped when I took the covers off and re-adjusted the valves again.  I must not have adjusted them correctly. 

I ended up kinda using the "no go" method this time.  I tightened down the intake using the .007 (honda calls for .006) and then it is easy to slide the .006 through with just a little resistance.  The exaust valves I did the same using the .010 and then it was just wide enough for the .009 to slide through with just a little resistance.   

Tomorrow I am going to ride the bike and see if the temperature is ok and that the fan works. 

[big_adv_rider]

Finally got this girl running pretty good.  I had to adjust the valves like two more times and that seemed to minimize the volume of the ticking.  I also synced the carbs again.  I also put some more good gas in.  

I think I made a mistake putting in a whole bottle of chevron techron.  It says to put the whole bottle in but I didn't realize that is for cars with like a 15 gallon tank.  

Fan ended up turning on.  I started to put a house fan in front of my radiator now so it doesn't get so hot idling.  I bent the tabs on the radiator cap so it is on pretty solid now.  It doesn't seem to be venting anymore.  I also checked the gases from the coolant with some of that blue stuff to make sure there was not exhaust gas in there (there wasn't)

I noticed in doing all this that my radiator fins are pretty bent up.  It looks like the P.O. may have tried to wash it with high pressure or something.  Think I should take it off and try to bend them all back or try to do it on the bike?  Or should I try to find a radiator that is in better shape?