Do i need to return to having an airbox?

HNY folks.

I'm thinking of going from pods back to the standard airbox. Interested to hear from wiser heads than mine...

My Gen 1 Bandit 1200 runs very rough (only two cylinders i reckon) from idle to about 4,000 RPM, only for the first quarter turn of the throttle. Annoyingly, riding around town, that's where i spend most of my time; small throttle opening, low-ish revs. Opening the throttle further clears things out, but that's not always an option in traffic, or in the middle of a nice sweeping bend.

The bike came with cheap pods, and an alleged Dynojet kit installed. "There's yer problem" say most people, and perhaps they're right. I took the bike to Dynobike in Melbourne and the guy did the second run on the dyno with the pods removed and got a much cleaner/smoother graph. He told me to throw those pods away in his bin, and he'd have a good set to sell me the next day.

That all turned into a saga i won't bore you with. Suffice it to say that i now have NO filters at all. My options are either buy better pods, or buy all the bits necessary to go back to an airbox. I'm leaning towards the airbox route, and then having the carbs tuned by an expert.

I love this bike as a torque machine. I gather pods and other 'performance' mods are for more power higher up in the rev range. That's not what i want, i want torque, man. Lazy, sensual, ball-vibrating torque...

A penny for your thoughts?
And if anyone has the right airbox and bits for a 1997 1200 in the shed, let me make you an offer...

Cheers,
Matt

You don't mention balancing the carbys. Mine didn't run well below 4-5,000rpm until I balanced the carbies.

Nope, haven't tried that, maybe that's the problem.
I have neither the equipment nor the expertise to tackle that myself, so i guess i could tell whoever i get to 'tune' the bike that that's a good place to start.
I'll still need something to clean the air though, whether airbox or pods.

It's actually very easy all you need is this simple tool. http://www.powerchutes.com/manometer.asp

There are three adjustments, one balances cylinders 1 and 2, another cylinders 3and 4 and lastly 1-2 vs 3-4. So you only need to get 1and 2 the same then 3 and 4 then you connect your U tube to say 1 and 3 and bingo they should all be the same. I used auto transmission fluid which gives great sensitivity so it's very accurate. Just be ready to hit kill if it's way off before it sucks the oil into the vacuum port, not that I think it would do any harm.

Trickiest part for me was getting a fuel supply with the tank off.  I would probably have a fan or two blowing on the oil cooler as it seemed a bit hot after I was playing around for a while.

If you are interested I can do a full how-to.

Thanks Peter, i might just take you up on that sometime.

Meanwhile, does anyone know if the engine has to come out before an airbox can be installed?

You won't need to remove the engine, but the airbox will be split in half and need to be sealed back up when in. Huge job removing it. Nightmare to put it back in.

CV carbies need to be tuned from the top down (main>needle>pilot), that is no matter how shit the bike is running, take it out for a 20 min spin to get it all warmed up and find someplace where you can flog it (wide open throttle) in 2nd and 3rd gear. Do this with different main jet sizes to see what size jet makes the bike pull best. Once the main is sorted ride the bike on the hwy to get a feel for cruising, trying to see the progression from cruise to WOT to determine if the needle clip needs to go up or down. Last is the pilot to see how the bike runs at idle, how it progresses from idle, etc. Search the net for tuning cv carbies for more detail.

An obvious point from reading the above is each time you need to change a jet / clip, etc, you will need to take out the carbies. Part of the beauty of pods (propper fitting K&Ns or such) is that you can do a full rejet in 30 minutes.

Putting the airbox back in would be a silly and regressive bit of work. Buy some decent pods.

post edit: Pods are not just for high end power.

Thanks Rolls, sage advice.
Alas, too late. I bought an airbox this morning and dropped it and the bike at Midlife Cycles. Let's see how they go.

That could cost you a bit, although it shouldn't,
as they should just put all the jets and needles to factory settings.
You won't know what needles are already in it,so they may try and put knew ones in if they're different.
I think what you had, just needed to be tinkered a bit more to tune it right.
It sounds like you just needed to play with needle heights, and play with the pilot circuit to get it right.
Hope it turns out right for you.