Hey guys! first post here... wish it was under better circumstances.

My bike sat for a couple months because it needed a new rectifier and battery...
when i put them on it started right back up, but ran only for about a minute and over that minute the rpms dropped lower and lower with choke/ no choke and would die the second i hit the throttle at all. after a while it wouldnot restart at all.

The engine had a slight stumble from 4 to 5k before all this, so i went ahead and started tearing it down to clean the carbs...
well it all went well, went ahead and replaced plugs and fuel filter, and now that its back together i couldnt get it started. so i got some ether and started her up. It started ok with the ether after a couple tries but had a pretty bad tick sound. I tried to give it a little throttle and there was just a loud click and it shut off. I tried again, got the same result.

I went ahead and stripped it down again, but when i removed a couple of the float bowl drain screws nothing came out. (?) shouldnt there have been some fuel in there? (I DID check the fuel switch and it was on the whole time and the filter was installed in the right direction)

And as far as the noise while running and the loud shut off goes, im about 95% sure nothing got into the intake ports while i was working on it. had them all covered until i went to reinstall the carbs and i wasnt missing any screws or anything.

should i take the head off and look for anything that could have fallen, or have i screwed up enough already?

Any and all thoughts and suggestions are appreciated.

 

Check and see if your fuel pump is kicking on. Sounds like it's not if the fuel bowls are empty.

 

well i got it running... didnt have the gauges hooked up so i guess wen theyre not hooked up the fuel pump wont run. ran ok on the couple laps around the neighborhood, but now its super rough between 5-7,ooo rmps. and today (a few days later) i went out to let it warm up to change the oil and while it was running it started kicking out some killer smoke outta the exhaust. and as soon as i let off the choke or tapped the throttle it would try to die on my. Im thinking im in over my head. probably will take it to a shop once the tax money rolls in

 

Man I went through the same thing. Kept tearing it down to figure out what the hell the problem was after I did the carbs. Finally figured out that you have to have the gauges hooked up. I was so pissed.