2 Questions To Start.

I got my '96 Trophy 900 home today. I've got two issues to start off with.

The PO replaced the fuel petcock as the old one was leaking like a sieve. To load it, I planned to drive it up on the trailer. It didn't want to start and we both noticed a heavy fuel smell. Guess what, the new unit is leaking just as bad if not worse. I'm pretty sure the crank case is full of fuel. What is a good source for a new unit oir can I rebuild the petcock assembly?

Second question is about the center stand. When I first looked at the bike, I didn't try to put it up on the stand. I rode Sport Touring bikes with these for years and never had an issue. I've had three C-10 Concours and you just stand on the foot peg on the side of the stand and pull upward. I tried that on this puppy and nearly threw my back out. It did NOT want to come up off the ground. Between tight space in my garage to begin with and needing to change the oil and such, it needs to come up. Any suggestions?

 

Thanks for the reply. First off, on the center stand, I attended the U of Y (Youtube) and watched someone putting a Trophy 900 on it's center stand. There was an arm going back from the stand to increase leverage. That is missing on my bike. I went through 3 C-10 Concours (GTE1000 in Europe) when I did LDR trips. There was a knack for sure to put them on the center stand. I learned to center the bike, stand on the foot peg on the stand and pull up letting my weight push down at the same time. I got home fairly late yesterday so today I'll head out to see what I have and start the dismantling to see what is what and where.

On the fuel leak, we use Ethanol here in the U.S. Most gas (petrol in the U.K.) is 10% Ethanol. It tends to eat rubber parts. I went through three fuel pumps on a Jeep once as the diaphragms kept failing. I'll bet when I pull the extra fuel tap apart, I'll find a failed rubber assembly.

I definitely need to change the oil before I try to start the bike again. When I looked at it the first time, the oil was dirty, but not overly so. Maintenance had been kept up. When we noticed the fuel gushing out, I pulled the dip stick out and it was wet half way up the rod but clean as a whistle. At least I know there won't be any gooky stuff (<--------fancy technical term) in the engine assembly.

Personally, I'm just shy of 70 and I retired from a roofing factory. 45 years of that puts some muscle on you. This isn't that heavy a bike compared to what I've dealt with before.

 

Well, drained the oil sump yesterday. With a capacity of just under a gallon, I drained 3 gallons out of it. That motor is clean as a whistle inside I'll bet. I've never seen oil foam like that before while draining. 2 parts fuel to 1 part oil will do that. I ordered some oil filters that should be here today. I'm going to pull the tank as I've got a rebuild kit on order and I want to pull the plugs too. It ran okay, but could have run better before the fuel leak.

I also found the smallest battery I've ever seen in ANY motor vehicle. It was half the height as the stock battery. I've got a new battery on order that is 240 AH. The one that came out was 120 AH. No wonder we had to jump start the bike.