First suggestion white spacer mod.

could be the air filter
but i'd clean the carb before you try anything after the filter.

Before leaping into carb tuning/mods ..you say it is bucking with throttle less than half open.  How about when idling? I'm kinda thinking sticky needle but am curious about neutral and idling.

Put a richer high and low speed jet one up from stock -- Should that be necessary if the Exhaust and Intake are stock?

How about when idling? -- Not a problem at the idle.  I may have it set a little high (runs about 7 mph at the ilde in 1st).  

Thanks all, I am off to get dirty.  I am going to pull out the white spacer also.  I'll let you know something when I get everything put back together

Before I would do a lot of mods, I'd figure out what is wrong. Run a tank or two of fresh fuel with seafoam (or whatever) to see if you can flush out the problem. Was the MC sitting for a while? Did you start with fresh fuel? Did you drain the old fuel? If so, was it clean - any signs of rust? If things are seriously gummed/plugged up, you may have to clean the carbs. I would get it working correctly before I made a bunch of changes (mods) that will just complicate the issue. Bucking and bouncing as you describe up to half throttle isn't standard issue with the Savage, so either someone else has already made modifications that were wrong, or something is "wrong" that is fixable without making modifications.

Trippah wrote on 10/15/08 at 20:29:30:



I didnt mean to make light of your troubles, I just didnt know the answer to Bucking & I really dont know what you meant by PMS. No one else has asked, so I guess I am overlooking something simple.
But, since bucking isnt part of the norm for these bikes, I would suggest finding & solving that before adding any variables into, like mods to the carb. Sometimes a simple mod can leave a little gremlin to find & the more changes made at one time, the more complicated it can be. There are some real carb knowledgeable folks here who can listen to the problem & if it occurs at a certain RPM range, they will know what circuit in the carb needs checked.
I hope your wife reads the responses that address the problem & learns a bit, so you can work together & learn & have fun.

I know Ill be following this thread, because this type of problem can be tricky to find.

Thanks everyone.  The carb was a mess.  A lot of crud!  Cleaned it out and did the white spacer mod.  Yes, I know that I shouldn't have done the mod until I got the bike running better but the carb was so dirty I assumed it was the cause of the problem and went ahead with the mod.

Bottom line, The bike is back to being a good little pony as my wife calls it, and if needed, it will take off like satan is after it.  We are happy.

what you meant by PMS -- someone else answered and called it a Pilot Mixture Screw, I knew it by the name of Primary Mixture Screw.  Samething as fas as I can figure.

so if the bike belongs to your wife -- It is her first bike in 30 years and a little nervous with this one.  The next oil change is hers and that is the way she wants it

Once again, thanks for being so nice to the new guy.  I have done my own work on my V-Star for the last 15 months.  I have gotten real comfortable with working on it and hope to get her the same way with her bike soon.