toetoe

great, this all sounds like work i can do myself, the over oiled air filter is a strong possibility, i didn't know that i could over oil the filter.

Hi, I have had some trouble with my spark plug going black after just a few hours of riding,And the bike sound fine when I start to rev it but after it gets so far it sounds like a bag of nails, I can only explain it by saying it sounds like the choke as been left on or as if the exhaust is blocked, if that makes sense, this has been like this for a few months now but it's slowly got worse so what I thought I could do is ask you guys for any information that you know that can cause it to happen, I went to kevs practice day a few weeks ago and he suggested that it could be time to replace the piston and rings but I didn’t ask him why he thought that, I’m not disagreeing with him as my knowledge is very limited compared to someone like kev so could someone explain why it could be the piston and rings causing it, I thought that the more answers and ideas I get the better, this way I can just tick each one off the list if it doesn’t work. Today I decided to see what youtube could offer me and although a lot of the stuff on youtube is incorrect there is some very useful info, I clean my carb very regular but by watching youtube today I haven’t been cleaning it very good at all and after putting my bike back together after cleaning the carb, air filter and putting a different plug in, it did run really nice but that’s just in the back garden on tick over were as I need to ride it up a bank to know if it as done any good or not, also while putting it back together I noticed that the carb to airbox Rubber inlet manifold was a bit perished, it didn't look like their was an hole in it but i'v ordered one, it should be with me bye monday, so any help would be greatly appreciated. kind regards Tony

how as today gone for you.

Hi m8 and welcome, i am a member of earl Shilton which is about an hour from where i live in burton and probably about the same for you in wolverhampton, if you pay £50 and make your self a member you get a key to their practice ground for one year and the practice ground is for the novice or the more skilled riders, it's well worth the money, as most other places i have been are at least £5 for the day, another good point about earl shilton is their is always other riders their, just incase things go wrong.

i really do see where you are coming from, i actually enjoy cleaning my bike but i cant see the point in doing certain jobs after so many hours, the only thing i do that with is my engine oil but other than that, in the UK, the weather changes by the hour some days or we can have long spells of dry hot weather and then long spells of rain (not so much spells of dry hot weather) or all four seasons in one day so my bike gets cleaned according to the last ride, it will always have a clean and i always check everything over but sometimes a bucket of water will do it and others i get the pressure hose out, the other thing i have noticed is, since having a trials bike i seem to keep on top of my car maintenance, i used to be really bad with cars but now i seem to enjoy it, even cleaning it.

Hi Giles, i can't help you with knowing of any other clubs that organise a dead easy trial but i am a complete novice and i have entered two organised by manchester 17 and had a fantastic day out on both occasions, their as been well over 70 people at each venue so it is a popular trial, maybe you could ask your club to see if they are interested in trying one out, it certainly encourages more people to have a go at the sport and thats got to be a good thing.

do you know if they are water proof, i will be looking for some soon and would like a pair that at least keep water out if i have to put a foot down in water for a few seconds, unlike the pair i have got, as soon as my foot goes in the water my foot is wet.

I used copperslip on the back of the pads, like someone mentioned and it worked great but it didn't work strait away i had to ride the bike for 5 or 10 minuets before it worked.

thanks i will have a look at Trials tribulations, i have had a look through the ossa forum and there doesn't look to be a lot of people complaining about certain problems, just run of the mill, the same as most of the others, they certainly catch my eye when i see one at a trials or practice, very well thought out.

i have wanted a new sherco for quite a while now but recently the ossa as caught my eye, i am hoping to buy a new bike in around a months time, it looks very easy to clean and i quite like the idea of the easy start, i can't afford a new one but i have seen 2012-13 in my price range so i was hoping for some honest answers on the good and the bad points, things like are spares easy to get hold of and are the spares a reasonable price, are they easy to maintain, is there well known problems that you know of.

i put about 12 ml per litre but i have just realised that that is about 80.1 which could be a bit rich, i think i read it on this site when i first started and thought it would be better being a bit rich with it being an old bike, do you recommend putting less in.

thanks for the reply but you will have to simplify it for me, (Do you leave your cold start enrichment on for some time) does that mean the choke and if so i can leave it on for about 10 seconds when i first kick it up and then after that the bike will start up first kick for the rest of the day and how do i alter the carb settings.

i cleaned my bike today and as always after i have finished i start the bike and run it for a few minuets but today it ran for about a minuet and then started to pop and just cut out, i thought i could of got water in to some where with using a pressure hose but i have done the same thing every week and it has always been ok, after cleaning the carb, filter and air box i let the sun dry it out for a while but still no luck i then took the plug out and swapped it for an old one i had and it started on the first kick so i need to know a few things about spark plugs, first the plug i had in is about 3 months old so is that about the life of a plug in a trials bike, my bike is about 14 years old and here comes the silly question, can i kill a plug by water getting in from some where or was today just one of those coincidences, i took a photo of the plug almost as soon as it came out but it was wet with petrol and not dry like it is in the photo.

I booked a place last week, great price and only about 15 miles from home.

i clean mine after every two rides, hot water with washing up powder in it first and let it dry and then i use the spray but as soon as the can is empty i will start using the liquid, the spray can does seem very wasteful.

great stuff, see you their Tom.

Great, thanks very much, now i have the details it fits in perfect with my weekend plans so i will be going, if you do make it, come and say Hi, my name is Tony and i will be on my 1999 bultaco sherco 250, i'm all excited again now.

yes, thanks very much, it sounds right, i'm sure he said that it would be sign posted from off the A515, do you have the details, time it starts and what day or a contact number, he did say that their isn't a club i can contact but it could of been he didn't know the club who are organising it.

I was chatting to someone, last sunday at earl Shilton and he told me about an easy trial somewhere near Ashbourne this weekend but by the time I got home I forgot where he said it was, does anyone know the details, I think it is an evening meeting but not sure what day.

I have entered two dead easy trial meetings know, out of 4 laps of 10, the first meeting i managed to do one lap and on the second meeting i did much better and managed to do two full laps, to me it was 100% improvement and on both occasions i went home with a great big smile on my face so to actually get to the finish is a great achievement for a novice rider, i get most of my advice from a friend who i ride with or from off this site, you can learn a lot from reading through the posts, the most important thing is to have fun, i am thinking of going on a training day at the club i am a member of, it's £20 and i think that is for about 5 or 6 hours, from what i have read most clubs do a similar thing so i would have a look at some local clubs first, £20 is no money at all compared to what you would pay if you went for one of the big names that are advertised, it's the basics you want to learn first, i noticed at some of the trials i have been in or watched that some of the guys who could get over some of the bigger obstacles where dropping points all over the place when it came to the slow riding and balancing techniques.

I had a great day at the dead easy trial yesterday, organised by Manchester 17 trials club, i was out to beat my personal best which was to do more than one lap and i made it to the third lap but to my disappointment i had ran out of time so officially i did two laps but unofficially i did two and a half but i was done for by then, i don't get nervous as a rule but for the whole of the first 10 sections i couldn't shake the nerves, i ran over pegs and i started on one section and ended up wandering on to another section but then i calmed myself down and started to think things through and did the next 9 sections clean and even on the tenth section i only dropped one point so i left once again with a great big smile on my face and now have two or three more friends, i hope they have another one next month because they are perfect for my skill level, i think it will be down to how many people show interest but this is my second one and at both of them their where more than 70 riders, so fingers crossed.

I have read a few posts about re-greasing the swing arm bearings but how do i do it, do i have to take the bearings out to do this or is there a way of doing it with the bearings still in.

thanks, i think the culprit is me, spraying oil my chain and then on other things i see that look like they could do with some oil but not being to carful about spraying things i shouldn't so lesson learned, i will take a bottle of water with me the next practise, some time this week and if that doesn't work then it's a set of new pads.

this helps a lot, can you advise me on what brake fluid to use and the other thing is the brake doesn't have a week feel, it feels hard but their is a fare amount of play when i press down, before the brake starts to work. it's not so bad now after i adjusted the little bolt but their is still some play, thanks for a fast rely.

yesterday i noticed my back break was doing very little, it will slow me down but i have to push hard on the peddle, i took the wheel off and me and a friend had a good look to see if anything was stoping the pads from closing and cleaned everything with break cleaner but they where no better, we did notice that their was quite a lot of oil/grease on the disk but we cleaned the disk with cleaner, then someone else suggested riding the bike fast with my foot on the break and then riding into the small river which did work for a short amount of time and was great fun to do but then they went back to how they where, although there is plenty on the pads can pads degrade with time, i think i will change them first but any other suggestions would be helpful.