99 Starts, runs fine, but then wont re-start! Any advice?

[greenbarn]

I see this was posted in two places....   I saw it over in the "troubleshooting" thread, but I'll copy my response over to here, since it's already in progress here.....

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Hello Steve, welcome to the forum.  I saw this post over on the Delphi forum too.  You'll likely receive a lot more traffic over here, if we can get everybody awake!

When you say it "doesn't catch", what exactly do you mean.  I take that to mean it cranks (engine turns over) but doesn't start?  Does it crank a little slow at all?   Like Chief mentioned over on Delphi, the battery is always suspect in a case like that (on these bikes).  I've had it happen to me before with a battery that was good enough to turn the motor over, but the voltage was too low to run the EFI properly.   If it cranks really fast, like normal, your voltage is "probably" OK, but if it's slow at all, it's probably suffering.    I've had this problem a couple times - once after storage before I started using a tender, another time when I was running too large of driving lights - overwhelmed the charging system.  It doesn't take much drain on the battery to make it too low to start the bike.

[Troll]

Let's start here: Does it have a factory ignition switch? Do you hear the fuel pump run when you turn on the ign? Should run for 2 seconds to prime the system, if you don't start it right away, or it will run constantly once the engine is started. The battery is a very important part of the system, more so than with others...it MUST crank pretty fast and a weak battery might not supply the necessary power to run all the electronics.

[CDNRatMan]

 Once Troll or GB get here they can answer this for you......

[costeve1977]

I have a fair amount of mechanical know how and some experience with older carbed bikes but my wife's "new to her" Drifter 1500 has me a bit stumped. She recently upgraded from a Drifter 800 to this one and she absolutely loves this bike! Well until this past weekend...

So the bike cranked right up without hesitation after sitting in the garage for about a week, we rode about 2 miles to a gas station where she filled up (Bike Ran just Fine!). When she goes to re-crank it, it simply turns over but wont catch. We left on my bike and came back about an hour later and it cranked up with little issue at all, and again ran just fine! I replicated this at home a few more times through out the day - Same situation.  This happened once before a few weeks ago when it was cranked up and idling in the driveway but honestly I figured it was just a fluke.

So as we are turning it over at first (when we couldn't get it to start), I am smelling gas. No Problem! I take a look over the bike and notice the idle adjustment and the choke and immediately thought that a float must be getting stuck in the carb, keeping the bowl overfilled. I figured I would just get it home and pull the carbs and clean them out.

Well as I am looking online this morning to get some tips before I start, I notice that it appears that this bike is listed as FI only and doesn't have a carb? Now this ignorant old boy is confused and needs any advice that someone can offer! has any one experienced something like this before? I have NO experience with Throttle Body FI systems so I am absolutely lost!