Bike dies when I give throttle

I have a kawasaki kz440 that starts up great and idles smoothly, but when I give it any throttle, it dies. I have taken the carbs apart a few times and cleaned them and they seem very clean, so I don't know if that is it. Can anyone give me some troubleshooting tips?

I am assuming that this is an 80's model?

yes, it's an 82.

I work with a guy that has one of these. I will ask him for some input this morning when I get in.

Chucktx, yes, that bike is fitted with the CV carb.

I looked at some other forums and just a place to start is that to make sure the air box cap is installed properly. I will post more as I learn more

Did you make any changes to the bike before this started? Is the fuel petcock vacuumn operated?

Here's a few things that can cause this condition:

Improper float setting in fuel bowl, or fuel inlet jet is sticking.
Atmospheric vent tube on carb or fuel tank is pinched.
As Chuck said, accelerator pump not working.
Torn diaphram on carb slide or accelerator pump.
Bad seal where carb mounts to engine.
Hole or crack in the vacuumn line to fuel petcock.

Remove your air cleaner, start the bike and look into the carb. Does the slide move up when you throttle up? There should be a brass accelerator pump tower in the throat of the carb, when you crack the throttle it should squirt gas into the carb.

And last but not least, check the end of your mufflers, one of your friends might have stuck a potato in there when ya had your head turned away. :roflmao:

Hope this helps. let us know what you find.

I bought the bike not running from a guy who said it had sat for 5+ years, it only has 9000 miles on it so it is in good shape overall, I just can't get it running. I think that the vacuum slides work, but I will take out the air filter and check.

I replaced the diaphragms, how do I check if the petcock vacuum is operating?

What is the accelerator pump? Is that the slide in the carb?

I will check the float height, I neglected to check it each time I had the carbs open. I also think I will check to make sure all the jets are the correct size, which I also should have done the last time I had them open.

Checked the exhaust, no potatos

Another thing to check from the things that I have read is that determine which kind of main jets you have. there are two different styles, a large slot and a small slot.

Also I had heard that make sure that your cap for air box is on securely as well.

Hey there,

It would be very difficult to explain the whole process here on YA so I'm going to ask you to please find a Shop Manual to help guide you.
But I will help in the first three major steps.
One- empty the fuel tank (or at least, turn off the petcock) and remove.
Two- remove the battery (- ground first).
Three- loosen and remove the throttle cable at the handlebars, than from the sync-bar at the carbs.

All the best.. Cheers..
Anthony Martello.

Stupid question I know but before you do all that other stuff, how much gas do you have in the tank?
If you have plenty of good fresh gas the the carb prolly needs to be rebuilt.
The bike was sitting for 5 yeras so the carb is prolly gunked up.

Check the fuel filter! A bike sitting that long may have rust in the tank (check around the interior of the gas cap, too). The symptoms are the exact same ones as I had on my KLR-125. The gas cap was rusting and re-filling the filter (I had cleaned the tank - twice - but missed that the cap was actually the problem). Good luck!

Yep, this all makes sense........if you're stoned off your behind.
Why do I think this is a spammer that had his link blocked?

After 5 years sitting.I would think complete cleanout would be the first step.Tank, lines ,carbs if it had fuel in it.If it was dry that long looking at dryed out rubber parts and cracks.