I’ve been rebuilding a set of carbs for my 1980 GL1100 GoldWing. I’ve followed Randakk’s manual. In it there is a recommendation to remove the flag gaps from the idle mixture screws for full adjustment. The factory caps limit the amount of rotation. These caps can be easily removed by heating up the glue inside with a propane torch and pulling them off.
I removed the caps, and threw them away since I didn’t anticipate needing them. Then I installed the carbs. The pilot screws are almost impossible to reach and adjust. Motion-pro makes a tool, but most reviews say it doesn’t work well for the GL1100. Others have created tools with bearings and machine tools, but that didn’t seem like an efficient choice.
There is a post from 2011 where a mechanic drilled holes in the adjustment screws and put roll pins in. Seemed like a good idea, so I tried it. Didn’t work well on the first one, the 3/32″ hole was almost as big as the screw head and I mangled it in the process. The same post mentioned using epoxy to secure teh roll pins. Hmm… why bother drilling the holes and putting roll pins in? Wouldn’t it be simpler just to use epoxy? There’s no load on the screws and the epoxy should stand up to the heat and vibration fine.
So, that’s what I did. Grabbed some wingnuts and epoxyed each one to the end of the pilot screw. So far so good, they are easy to reach. Will they hold up long term? Who knows.
