JustRandy

Setting the valves is the first step because how the carb is set depends on how the valves are set. It's pretty easy. You have to get the piston to the top of the cylinder and the hardest part is being sure it's on the compression stroke and not the exhaust stroke. There is a timing mark on the left side of the engine under a plug but I always use a screwdriver in the spark plug hole to feel when the piston is at the top. First remove the spark plug and the intake valve inspection cap. I think it's a 17mm wrench. Then slowly pull the pull starter cord until you see the rocker arm move. The rocker arm moving means it's the intake stroke and the piston is moving down. The next stroke is the compression stroke so keep pulling the cord until the piston is at the top. You can feel it with a screwdriver through the spark plug hole or you can use the timing mark on the left side on the engine. It doesn't have to be perfectly at the top, but close is fine. Then wiggle the rocker arm and see if there is any gap. If it's tight and no gap can be felt, then that is your problem. If so, then grab a small socket (5/16 I think) and loosen the nut on the screw on the rocker arm. Use a small flat screwdriver to back the screw out some and tighten the nut. It doesn't need to be any set value because we're just diagnosing the problem now. Just make it so there is a gap and be sure the nut is tight or else it will come off and fall in the engine. Then put your carb back to stock and it should run great. Until the valve continues to wear. I'd be surprised if your stator is bad. It doesn't seem likely. Good you have parts bikes because you may need to swap heads.

Ran great for a few days then was hard to start when cold is perfectly consistent with worn intake valve. Hard starting when hot is electrical. Hard starting when cold is intake valve. Do you know how to check the intake valve lash?

It's odd that it ran better with a dead battery but maybe that was a coincidence. Is there any way you can try another dead battery and see if it runs better again? Assuming it's not electrical then the first thing to do is set the valve lash before tinkering with the carb. Another common issue with these suzuki engines is worn intake valves. Verify the intake valve lash is close to 0.001 - 0.003. If there is no lash then that would be your problem. Worn intake valves usually present as hard starting, so it's possible someone may have tried to compensate by richening the carb. Unfortunately the valve will keep wearing until it won't run at all.

Looks like you forgot to take your meds, Narcissus. You totally ignore the guy wanting help while you pout and cry. If it ran great with a dead battery that is evidence that the regulator is faulty. It's a known issue on these quads. The higher the rpms, the higher the voltage will be unless the regulator regulates it properly. Once the voltage gets to 18v the cdi will not function. Having a dead battery will act as a regulator and lower the voltage so the engine will run better. That's why Mech said to try turning the lights on to see if it runs better. I taught him that a year ago and he can't stand it.

Oh are we allowed to call people names now? It doesn't matter because slander is the tool of the loser. It's your narcissism score. 21 poor souls got terrible advice. It's a shame I could only save one.

If that were true then you'd have 22 solutions and I wouldn't have any. You may fabricate the past in your head but you can't do it here.

When I first got my king I backed over a small tree which wedged itself in the a-arm and tore the u-joint boot. I had to get my truck to winch the quad off the stump. Then I welded stainless plate to the entire bottom and all the a-arms. Now the quad is tough. But before.... not so much. A small tree required a 4000lb vehicle to free it. Just the other day I had a mess of vines wrapped around the rear axle and if I hadn't had the armor it would have ripped the boot to shreds. With the 250ex I don't have to worry because there are no boots to rip. And it will go more places, climb steeper hills, fit between more trees, bunny hop logs, and if I do get stuck I can pick it up. With the king I can't just go and not worry about a stick ramming into a boot or vines wrapping around or who knows what. I don't know what people consider to be tough but for me it's not having to worry about breaking anything while riding around the house.

This just popped in my email. Seems like every week the king quad is on that list.

Wonder where you learned that lol I guess the world can be changed a little bit.

Yep there's lots of parts that wear out but the fuel pump will never wear out on the 250EX because there isn't one It also doesn't have an oil filter so not much to take care of. I've never fixed anything major on it in 18 years, until now. Never changed brakes, bearings, filters,,,, nothing but tires, battery, oil and starter brushes. I think the spark plug is even still original. And I beat the snot out of it all the time because it's only 229cc and I'm always looking for a 6th gear lol. The only reliability drawback is there is no backup starting system so if the battery dies it will have to be push started. That takes a workaround because from the factory it will only start in neutral which makes push starting impossible. I was stranded on top of a mountain because of that. At least the King does have a pull cord. Love my king, but I've had to work on it a lot over the years. The one-way clutch is worn on it right now. When I let off the gas I coast instead of slowing down. Kinda neat actually. And seems like there are a lot of people on here asking for help with their kings and the 250 version. Seems like the email I get on sundays always has at least one in the latest topics. There's a lot too go wrong and much of it is made out of rubberish plastic like vacuum hoses, diaphragms, u-joint boots, cable sheaths. And the engine design is ancient. You could swap the cam, head and piston for that of the 1989 250S quadsport which is little different than a 1985 230 quadsport which isn't much different than the original 185.

Had a king quad for 12 years and love it, but definitely not a reliable quad. Any quad with a fuel pump can't be THE most reliable quad because gravity will work longer than any pump. In addition to a pump it also has a vacuum actuated petcock that most people disable and work around because it fails. Also the diaphragm in the cv carb is another point of failure. The regulator is a known issue with those quads, intake valves wear out commonly, and even the bore to stroke ratio isn't that great for reliability. All the gears are shifted by cable and cables fail. The drive axle has u-joints which fail faster than solid axles. It's a fun quad and will do lots of work on a homestead, but I wouldn't trust it with my life in the wilderness. Btw, the Honda 250EX after 18 years of flawless reliability finally let me down. I parked it one night and no spark the next day. Probably the pickup coil in the stator.

Not so many hills here so I can get right next to the tree and saw it into logs then load them into a trailer. Then I stack the logs until summer when I split and stack them up. They're easier to split after they dry a little. Then by November they're ready to burn. The hardest part of the whole deal is getting the tree on the ground without destroying other trees. That's where the winch usually comes in. I'm trying to cut down the sweetgums without destroying oaks, poplars, maples, fruit trees, or anything else. Sweetgum is the most worthless wood. Good for nothing except firewood so I'm trying to be rid of it a little more each year. When I cut a tree it doesn't fall to the ground but instead leans on another tree because the trees are so densely packed. Sometimes the tree doesn't come off the stump so I'm prying with long prybars or pulling with winches. When I finally get it off the stump I cut about 4 ft from the bottom until it rocks over and stabs itself into the ground while ejecting the log. I repeat until it falls over onto another tree on the opposite side. I keep going like that until nothing is left but a stack of logs. The New Zealand Nannies would have a cow if they saw what I do LOL! I also ride without helmets and I roofed houses for a decade. Sometimes life isn't about safety. And I'm glad in this country I'm allowed to take all the risks I want. Even if I weren't allowed I'd do it anyway.... it just adds that much more risk to it

I ordered some from ebay from someone in WV and planted it around 2015. Should be making some nice roots by now.

You use synthetic line for that? Oh I been meaning to ask if you had any ginseng up in those hills. I used to watch Appalachian Outlaws. Too bad they only made 2 seasons of it,

I have wedges. Glad I don't live in New Zealand.

I use it to pull down trees then winch the cable from under the debris. I could see a cable made from fabric getting snagged like that. Also if a tree sits down on my chainsaw bar I use the winch to tug on the tree. I'm also worried about the stretch of synthetic. The steel has no stretch which makes it easy to make small adjustments to the force I'm applying. I also use a lot of snatch blocks. I have a way of keeping it reeled up nice so it doesn't have too many hand pokes, but I'm used to it if it happens. My biggest gripe is my hands get dirty because I keep the cable oiled.

Would you use synthetic again or go back to steel? I'm rough on cable. It's not just for getting me unstuck but pulling trees down and anything else that needs pulled.

Bayou was my first also. I did a lot with it. A lot more than I should have lol Yours looks a heck of a lot better than mine did. My was green. I should probably post some pics. Been meaning to just been busy lately. Hey how does that synthetic winch line work in logging? Does it get snagged on branches or anything? We were just talking about which winch line to use a couple months ago on here.

Adjust the gaps according to the amount of heat you expect. My quad pushes a plow in summer so although it's not nitrous or blown it generates a lot of heat without any air movement. Plus I have a high compression piston. Once the rings expand due to heat and the gaps close then it has no where to go except to expand into the cylinder wall. Once that happens the rings won't seal and it will burn oil. So then you have to hone it to roughen the walls and that roughness is used to cut the new rings so that they seal well. That's why a lot of guys say to ride it like you stole it when you first put it back together in order to seat the rings. Of course that is an issue with a lot of debate and no clear right answer. There used to be an optional cooling fan you could buy for the King:

The directions that come with the piston specify the ring gap to make according to the type of engine mods you have. I just take it a step further to be absolutely sure the gaps never close. Big gaps won't bother anything with an engine with such a long stroke. Here's Wiseco:

A buddy was riding my bayou and couldn't make a turn so he jumped off and grabbed a tree and sent the atv flying off the side of a mountain. When they didn't show up at the nest split I went back looking for them and seen him standing there with a bloody nose and no atv. I'm like "what happened to the quad?" He pointed down the mountain and was pissed I cared more about the quad than him lol. Well I could see he was ok but I couldn't see the quad at all! Some strong chain and a bottle jack will straighten a frame. I think we all have cracked plastics. Join the club lol Mine smoked so much it burned 4 qts of oil then screwed my cam and head a few years back. I honed the cylinder and put in new rings. Good as new now. But make sure you put WIDE ring gaps. What happens is the engine gets too hot and the rings butt together, so now I make the gaps huge. I also installed a 6 inch fan from ebay. All the weight is in the back so I guess they decided to put the battery in front. I upgraded to a lawnmower battery and wedged in 2 bigass chunks of lead behind the front bumper. Think they weigh about 50 lbs. Helps to balance it out a bit. Friend of mine had a raptor with holeshots on the back. The traction was so crazy I couldn't keep the front wheels on the ground, so I stuffed those lead weights in the front bumper so I could steer the thing lol Yup, but hate getting that on my hands. Seems like once it gets on my hands it gets on all my clothes and everything. Works good for electrical connections too since it has aluminum in it. I've heard copper works too. I have some in a spray but only ever used it for copper head gaskets.

I'm jealous he has 4 too. I'd like to have one setup for the trails and one setup for work.

You could make a lot of trailers with all those quads. I had a 2 car train going for a while. A little hard to backup though. I made a jig to hook to a trailer ball and pull another atv by the a-arms. That hooks to the camping trailer so I can take a sport quad camping with me. It's a bit like a train.

This happened to arrive in my email: How to Install Valves in your 4-Stroke Since almost all modern valves feature some form of a thin coating or hardening process on their exterior faces, lapping valves using a lapping compound should never be considered due to the risk of wearing away the coated or hardened layer. https://www.thumpertalk.com/articles/how-to-install-valves-in-your-4-stroke-r1069 Go tell them they are wrong. I'd love to see that.

Pretty impressive you got it down to the frame like that. I remember having trouble getting the gas tank out. I think I had to cut it out. The rest of the quad I turned into a grader. Put a trailer hitch and blade under it. Works good for smoothing out trails.