I had been having intermittent problems with backfiring and choppy acceleration while driving.  Also bike tries to die at stop signs when warmed up.  I have cleaned the carb and petcork, checked the vac line for gas etc.  Still getting the weird lurches.  It is an 86 with a 155 main and a 47.5 pilot and a jardine slip on.  Could this be sticky valves??  Also, I'm new to bike riding so I know I occasionally over rev before shifting and it is hard to know what gear to be in around town.  Last night I got it home and cranked down on the throttle it it revved up and then started to backfire repeatedly.  It sounded almost as if I was twisting the throttle repeatedly but I was not.  Where do I keep looking??

I don't mean to be dumb but where is the slide???

It's in the carb, you access it from the top...4 screws hold  the top on, they can be boogers to remove, gotta' pull the gas tank to get to them...

Double check that vac line first, ...even give it a little suck,..make sure there is no gas coming down to the carb,..could save you a lot of work...

good luck,

What kind of shape is your air filter in?

Is the plug black and wet, or black and fluffy/dry?  

To answer your question of how to lean it out at WOT, you could try a smaller main jet size.

I'm still not clear on one thing.  Is the bike freaking out at wide open throttle, or at high RPMs?  We need an expert in here, but none has shown up yet.  If the problem is at high RPMs regardless of throttle position, I wonder if it could be a timing issue?  It being an '86, if it has a bunch of miles on it, the cam chain is likely to be growing.  That affects timing, although to what degree I'm unsure.

I'm speculating on that one.  Don't put too much stock in it.

I replaced the cam chain in May.  the tip of the plug was dry and black.  How do you get high rpm's and not open throttle?

Misunderstanding. I never said "opened" throttle. I said "wide opened"   . Pedal to the metal. Floored. You can easily have very high rpm with only half a throttle, or less, as Charon said. In low gears, per se, or the extreme case - in neutral.