TOPIC:

does the single pingle petcock use vacuum or gravity?
if you switch from the stock to a pingle, are there any changes that have to be made to the carbs as far as capping the vacuum port?

Post edited by: kswilliams333, at: 2005/11/21 13:54

Good talking with you again on the phone Kevin! I suspect Pingel makes a wide variety of petcocks; both vacuum and gravity. A gravity petcock will say ON/OFF/RES while a vacuum petcock will say ON/RES/PRI... a gravity petcock never has a PRIME function...

Once you start hooking your carburetors up, if they are gravity fed via a gravity petcock, keep the vacuum port capped using a 3/16" cap and make sure the vents are NOT capped. They should have hoses connected and the hoses routed over the swingarm in the event the bike falls over. Otherwise gas would pour out on your hot engine.

The carburetors pictured are not like the ones you have on your bike but the illustration is intended to convey the idea of how to hook them up...

Thanks again George. You are the coolest. The Master of the KZ Carbs. My petcock has ON/RES/OFF. So that tells me I got the gravity, which should be the same as the stock petcock. I will be sure the vacuum port is capped. I imagine it is since you did my carbs. I haven't changed anything on them.

I do need to put in the vent hoses for the draining. What kind of hoses do I use? I am going to guess black fuel line hose, since it is gas.

Thanks again,
K Williams
Austin, Texas

The hoses on the vent spigots are a good idea. If you drop the bike, the holes in the top of the bowl chamber are attached directly to these spigots and the gas will flow out... when I test carbs and then drain them, I just take them over to my drain area and turn them upsidedown and the gas flows right out of the vents... anyway, if the gas did drain out of the vents onto your hot engine, it could grow uncomfortable; especially if your leg was trapped under the bike and your jeans were also getting soaked in gas. A fire at this point is a possibility otherwise.

The vent tubes can be most any material. Vacuum hose is a decent choice as they seldom will carry fuel and will not deteriorate in this application.

What would happen if the vents were capped? I'm just curious because the carbs on my bike has these capped when I bought it. Incidentally it ran crappily!

Sam

wiredgeorge wrote:

Good talking with you again on the phone Kevin! I suspect Pingel makes a wide variety of petcocks; both vacuum and gravity. A gravity petcock will say ON/OFF/RES while a vacuum petcock will say ON/RES/PRI... a gravity petcock never has a PRIME function...

Once you start hooking your carburetors up, if they are gravity fed via a gravity petcock, keep the vacuum port capped using a 3/16" cap and make sure the vents are NOT capped. They should have hoses connected and the hoses routed over the swingarm in the event the bike falls over. Otherwise gas would pour out on your hot engine.

The carburetors pictured are not like the ones you have on your bike but the illustration is intended to convey the idea of how to hook them up...

If the vents were capped, the floats work erratically. They stick open or shut a lot of the time. Gas will not flow or they will overflow. The vents MUST be open else the float just won't work. The one vent on the 2nd and 4th carburetor joins to the adjacent carb by the small rubber hose that connects them just under the vent tube. This tube leads to a hole in the top of the bowl in that carb. The other side of the bowl is generally a blind hole or has a bb type thing pressed into it. The reason you just don't leave the hose off is that if the bike were to tip, gas will flow through the vent hole and across the gas/vent line to the vent on the adjacent carb and run out through a hose to somewhere away from the hot engine.