Hey Savages,
I bought my 1987 Savage about 3 months ago with mileage in the low 18,000's and have been casually riding it around. It's my first bike, and first carb-based engine, but I'm familiar with engines to a point and one of the reasons I bought it was to get better with them.
All was well until earlier last week, when a storm came through and I wasn't able to cover the bike in time. I get up the next morning and the bike wont turn on, but after shifting the battery around it started and so I drove to work. The bike putted a lot on the ride to and from work almost like it was running out of gas. I tightened the connections when I got home, and everything ran smoothly... for a bit.
On Monday, the bike started chugging along again like it was low on gas, and actually almost died on me. I barely got it home. No wet connections, no loose connections, but when I checked this by removing the battery, the positive terminal looked like it had melted a little bit?!?! I reconnected the battery after leaving it alone for a day because I was going to drop the oil and needed to get it warmed up, and the engine started right up. Quick test drive and it runs fine... I don't trust it...
The bike is 10 miles shy of 20,000 and I am about to do a ton of work on it this weekend, because a ticking sound has also begun to arise and get louder. Since I bought the bike used I was planning on doing a whole shakedown (cam-tensioner check, valve clearance check, change the oil and oil filter, etc.). Since there are so many experts on this forum, I thought I would at least get a consult on the issues I've been having in case I need to do something else while she's torn down.
I uploaded a video of the engine running to youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ho05kFVsf0AFirstly, does the idle seem a bit high to anyone? I'm not familiar with these bikes, but it seems like it's thumping away a lot faster than others I've seen (on youtube). Is there any way to diagnose that ticking? I figure its either the valves needing adjustment or the tensioner about to conk out and turn my bike into a paperweight. Lastly, does that odd behavior I experienced before sound merely like a loose wire somewhere, or paired with the ticking a bigger problem?
Thanks for any help you guys might be able to give. I look forward to learning all I can from all the Savage gurus out there.