Overheating Ec300

[normanator27]

Originally Posted by mtnmanseth

It sounds like your bike only overheats occasionally, so this may be moot, but considering the year of your bike (but depending on age/use of your current top-end) you may want to check for evidence of a slight base gasket failure/crack/leak at the base of the cylinder. The one and only time my EC300 boiled over I happened to notice some staining around the base of the cylinder, indicative of a significant air leak (leading to VERY lean condition). Other guys may know better than I, but it might be that higher revs causes greater vacuum, which may bypass a failed/failing base gasket. Just a thought...

Photo in this thread: http://www.gasgasrider.org/forum/sho...=failed+gasket

thats interesting, i had the power valve cover off not so long ago and where one of the bolts are on the bottom left hand side is seems to have a small leak. I wonder if this would be a problem? would such a leak if it was making it run lean affect the plug colour, as the colour looks good.

[rosco]

If it had a bad enough air leak to make it overheat as easily as you describe it would run like crap. I would replace the radiator cap with the stock 1.8 cap before I did anything else.

[GasGasDreamer]

Originally Posted by rosco

I would replace the radiator cap with the stock 1.8 cap before I did anything else.

agreed.
remember going to a higher psi cap, like a ktm, raises the 'highest' operating temp, if you get into that range.

[normanator27]

when i'm putting the water pump cover back on do i just bolt it on or do I need to replace the gasket? the gasket looks fine although it looks more like a seal than a gasket. a silly question i know but i want to get it right. cheers.

[normanator27]

Originally Posted by normanator27

when i'm putting the water pump cover back on do i just bolt it on or do I need to replace the gasket? the gasket looks fine although it looks more like a seal than a gasket. a silly question i know but i want to get it right. cheers.

A silly question deserves a silly answer (or no answer in this case, sorry fellas, mr impatient didnt want to wait for new gaskets to come). Any way ive put it back together (with new gaskets) and a new 1.8 bar radiator cap and while i'm not sure about the overheating issues (as ive only taken it for a short test run) the bike is definitely running better. It used to have a flat spot before it came onto the pipe which no amount of jetting seemed to fix (which i just assumed was the nature of the bike), but that seems to have gone. Id actually say that this is the best this bike has run in the 2 years ive owned it.

[Jakobi]

Originally Posted by normanator27

A silly question deserves a silly answer (or no answer in this case, sorry fellas, mr impatient didnt want to wait for new gaskets to come). Any way ive put it back together (with new gaskets) and a new 1.8 bar radiator cap and while i'm not sure about the overheating issues (as ive only taken it for a short test run) the bike is definitely running better. It used to have a flat spot before it came onto the pipe which no amount of jetting seemed to fix (which i just assumed was the nature of the bike), but that seems to have gone. Id actually say that this is the best this bike has run in the 2 years ive owned it.

Good work mate!

Reusing gaskets is one of those things. Some do, some don't. Sometimes it works, other times not. Generally I weigh up the cost vs time/effort/impact if reusing doesn't work.

[gnilrub]

So is it still running as it should? What do you think the reason for it was?

[normanator27]

Originally Posted by gnilrub

So is it still running as it should? What do you think the reason for it was?

Replacing the radiator cap with a new 1.8 bar one seems to have been a very good thing for the bike. Unfortunately, I havent had many opportunities to ride it since I last posted due to work commitments and a ridiculous amount of rain in this part of the world recently. The few times ive got on it it seems ok but i havent had the opportunity for it to get hot enough to potentially overheat as it was previously. Unfortunately this is the latest in an ongoing list of problems Ive had with this bike in the 2 years ive owned it. I'm very hopeful (rather than confident) that ive sorted its issues and i'll have a good period with the bike from here on. I'll keep you posted if I have any more drama's with it.