2008 Buell xb9sx, hawk exhaust, k&n filter with airbox delete, crank breather re-route, re-mapped via tunerpro, bike had previously been running fine as far as I can tell.
Okay to start with, one reason I was thinking I might have an issue with the stator is that I'm a great big moron and put redline in the primary. I read after purchasing the redline(which was one of the more recommended lubricants to smooth out a blast's shifting) that it was not good for xb's because the stator is down in the oil. I for some reason decided that since i already bought it, i was just going to go ahead and use it. I think in my mind I had rationalized that it wasn't likely to cause an issue right away, and I'd swap it out with mobile1 after a while. It did make the bike shift more smoothly, which was nice. I think that was about middle of last summer. I've only put probably 1000 miles on the bike since then.
I need to look up some diagnosing steps, but this is what is happening. I started the bike saturday, and it was running absolutely terrible. The bike had been sitting for a couple of months since the last time i rode it, when it was totally fine. I reckoned gas had gone bad so I went straight to a gas station to see how much room i had for fresh gas. On the way there i couldn't let it go down to idle or it seemed like it was about to die. I added some lucas oil injector cleaner(about 1/4 of the bottle) and 0.55 gallons of gas. I was headed to a party but since i was having issues I went out a country road instead and tried to burn up some gas to get more fresh gas in there and see if it improved. I couldn't even get over 55mph and it feels like it has about 10hp. There was also some backfiring going on, not just poping on decel. The exhaust note is decidedly different, it doesn't seem rough like it's misfiring or anything but it just sounds odd. So i burned off enough gas to make space for another 0.73 gallons. After that it would get up to 60mph, so I felt more sure of the gas having gone bad/stale. After getting most of the way to the party I filled it back up with another 1.2 gallons. I thought that would about do it, but no, it was still running terrible. I got to the party and told some people about it and so we ended up using a hose to drain as much as we possibly could from the tank. When i went to leave the party it died on me once in the driveway, and i was still having to keep the throttle up to prevent it from dieing. It seemed like the lights were dimming too when the rpms got low enough. I got to the next gas station and filled it up the amount we had drained which was about 2.2 gallons. So any bad gas should be pretty diluted at this point, and on the way from the party to a friend's house it wouldn't go over 70 or so still. I parked at my friend's place and locked the steering so hopefully nobody would steal it(i hate apartment complexes). In the morning when i came out it didn't have enough juice to turn over and was just clicking. An older guy passed by me and mentioned last night he saw my brake light on. I forgot there is some parking light setting past the locked position. My dad brought a battery jumper box and we got it started but i could barely keep it running, i had to put my helmet on ahead of time and have my dad disconnect the battery box after i started it, while i held onto the throttle to keep the rpms up, and then put the seat back in place, so i could get on the bike and take off, and i managed to ride it home without letting it drop below 1000rpm and die. Still barely any power. My dad mentioned something about the stator and it dawned on me that I had left the redline in it for a rather long time, and the stator not putting out enough current could make the bike run bad(a combination of stale gas and the stator maybe) and is something that could go wrong with the bike while it's sitting(like i said last time i rode it, it worked fine. It sat for a bit, now it's not fine.)
So unless anyone has a better idea, I have to test the stator, which I know i can do with a multimeter, but i'm not sure of the exact process.
Okay to start with, one reason I was thinking I might have an issue with the stator is that I'm a great big moron and put redline in the primary. I read after purchasing the redline(which was one of the more recommended lubricants to smooth out a blast's shifting) that it was not good for xb's because the stator is down in the oil. I for some reason decided that since i already bought it, i was just going to go ahead and use it. I think in my mind I had rationalized that it wasn't likely to cause an issue right away, and I'd swap it out with mobile1 after a while. It did make the bike shift more smoothly, which was nice. I think that was about middle of last summer. I've only put probably 1000 miles on the bike since then.
I need to look up some diagnosing steps, but this is what is happening. I started the bike saturday, and it was running absolutely terrible. The bike had been sitting for a couple of months since the last time i rode it, when it was totally fine. I reckoned gas had gone bad so I went straight to a gas station to see how much room i had for fresh gas. On the way there i couldn't let it go down to idle or it seemed like it was about to die. I added some lucas oil injector cleaner(about 1/4 of the bottle) and 0.55 gallons of gas. I was headed to a party but since i was having issues I went out a country road instead and tried to burn up some gas to get more fresh gas in there and see if it improved. I couldn't even get over 55mph and it feels like it has about 10hp. There was also some backfiring going on, not just poping on decel. The exhaust note is decidedly different, it doesn't seem rough like it's misfiring or anything but it just sounds odd. So i burned off enough gas to make space for another 0.73 gallons. After that it would get up to 60mph, so I felt more sure of the gas having gone bad/stale. After getting most of the way to the party I filled it back up with another 1.2 gallons. I thought that would about do it, but no, it was still running terrible. I got to the party and told some people about it and so we ended up using a hose to drain as much as we possibly could from the tank. When i went to leave the party it died on me once in the driveway, and i was still having to keep the throttle up to prevent it from dieing. It seemed like the lights were dimming too when the rpms got low enough. I got to the next gas station and filled it up the amount we had drained which was about 2.2 gallons. So any bad gas should be pretty diluted at this point, and on the way from the party to a friend's house it wouldn't go over 70 or so still. I parked at my friend's place and locked the steering so hopefully nobody would steal it(i hate apartment complexes). In the morning when i came out it didn't have enough juice to turn over and was just clicking. An older guy passed by me and mentioned last night he saw my brake light on. I forgot there is some parking light setting past the locked position. My dad brought a battery jumper box and we got it started but i could barely keep it running, i had to put my helmet on ahead of time and have my dad disconnect the battery box after i started it, while i held onto the throttle to keep the rpms up, and then put the seat back in place, so i could get on the bike and take off, and i managed to ride it home without letting it drop below 1000rpm and die. Still barely any power. My dad mentioned something about the stator and it dawned on me that I had left the redline in it for a rather long time, and the stator not putting out enough current could make the bike run bad(a combination of stale gas and the stator maybe) and is something that could go wrong with the bike while it's sitting(like i said last time i rode it, it worked fine. It sat for a bit, now it's not fine.)
So unless anyone has a better idea, I have to test the stator, which I know i can do with a multimeter, but i'm not sure of the exact process.
