GL1200 GOLDWINGS

Full Version: CRANKCASE BREATHER
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Although this concerns the crankcase breather system, if it is poorly maintained (not drained), it will have a detrimental effect on your engines performance and the carburetors/injectors.

I recently was experiencing difficulty with cold starts, more so overnight than 9 hours of sitting in the parking lot at work.
There was a reluctance of the rpm to drop when getting off the throttle when in the area of 2000 rpm.
The idle had dropped and the engine was running hard.

I first added some Seafoam and that helped but not enough.
I then installed new spark plugs, and that helped but not enough.
Air filter and fuel filter are on order so I decided to take the air filter element out for a look see…..
On the floor of the carburetor assembly (where the flame traps are located) there was a combination of a liquid (turned out to be water), some grim, and something which smelled like oil, felt like oil, but wasn’t as thin as oil, deposited in the vicinity of the left, rear carburetor.
Almost like the crankcase breather was full and needed emptying.
The PO had drilled a hole in the storage tank, so I knew, I knew it wasn’t the breather.

Long story short, the breather tank, the one which sits between the gas cap and the air filter, was full of gunk and had overflowed out the tube to the air filter and dumped a load of junk in front of the left, rear carburetor and the junk was making its way into the engine!

Time hasn’t allowed a proper cleaning, (Sunday will be my first chance) but the bulk of the gunk on the floor, in front of the carburetor was cleaned up and the tube leading from the air filter to the breather tank was emptied of the gunk.
The difficult cold start was vastly improved, the enriching circuit is working again and the idle came up.

I have emptied the breather tank (and it was full!!) and run some paper towels through the three holes of the tank (the tank cleaning done in the parking lot on my lunch hour today) and I will see how the bike performs after the 32 miles commute home.

Bottom Line:
Just because there is a hole in the storage tank (which I need to close) doesn’t mean the breather tank if empty!

I have no record of the PO ever cleaning the system unless it was done as part of the tune-ups he got at the dealer.
I never looked at the system because it had a ‘drain hole’.
The PO put 104K mikes on the bike and I have put another 41K.

This has now been added to my maintenance list as I would like to see 200K out of the bike, if not more.

I hope this give some food for thought.

-Ride On
Yeah.... the short cut method isnt really the best.

Regular maintenance is the key. Glad you figured out the PO's screwup
Long story short, the breather tank, the one which sits between the gas cap and the air filter, was full of gunk

I didn't know there was a tank on the Goldwing. How do you empty it?
As is shown, drain more often if riding in rainy weather.

Check every 4000miles
I checked it and it had about 2 oz of water in it. On my CB900 it has a drain hose attached with a plug in the end of the tubing. That is much easier you would think Honda would have used that design on the Goldwing.

I heard something about a charcoal filter that is supposed to be replaced on the Goldwing, do you know anything about that?
I think that Honda realizes that the goldwing riders prefer not to have things dripping from their machines, it sort of reminds them why they don't ride Hogs Smile

Seriously I think the tank is looked upon as a collector of contaminants that should be disposed of in the correct manner
My cb900 doesn't drip anything because the hose has a stopper in the end that you remove when you want to empty it. Just a lot easier to maintain
They could have at least made it translucent so that you didn't have to remove it to see if you need to remove it to empty.
The hose leading from the breather tank to the storage tank can be replaced with a translucent hose (what I plan to do) as I still need to plug the hole in the storage tank.
I am still having a performance issue and I think it stems from the hole in the bottom of the storage tank.
Removing the storage tank and plugging the hose will allow me to ride the bike and fix the hole in the storage tank at the same time.

I don't know if it is related, but after replacing the front, main oil seal, I was getting a lot of engine smoke from the storage tank, presumibly because the breather tank was clogged with stuff.
After the breather tank was emptied and cleaned, no more smoke but I think I am getting moisture in the air box because my breather system is not a 'closed' system. (hole in storage tank)

Other symptoms are; 1. breif, white smoke at the tail pipes after a long run, a short break, then a restart
2. what appears to be oil in the radiator overflow tank
3. hard cold starting, again

I am aware of the sysmptoms of head gaskets, but the breif, white smoke may have been due to the fog rolling in very fast and the temperature dropping. I replaced the head gaskets, July 2011 and the spark plugs do not show signs of 'steam cleaning'. Oil in the water may be a water pump issue. The cold starting issue may be the 'open' breather system.

I need time to look into these things but my wife and I are raising our 7 month old grandson while our daughter (a single mom) works.