Cold Winter Mornings - Bike wont start

[jrewing]

My Xciting 500r struggles to start in the mornings in winter. 

Its parked outside and it can drop to almost freezing where I live.  There is also alot of humidity.

Can any one help?? would an oil change to an oil better suited to the cold help?  should i get a new battery and spark plug??

I need the scooter for work and had a nightmare last winter.

What can I do??  I cant put it indoors unfortunately.

cheers

[de dee]

  Batterys lose a lot of poop in the cold,  can you keep a charger on it outside, that will help a lot, low battery makes for hard starting,.  turns over but wont fire,  with low spark,   

[xsel777]

My experience has been similar re winter starting issues. I would suggest the absolute best battery money can buy. I fitted a Motobatt, and it really works well. I have never had another startup issue since it was installed.

BTW, just recently I learned these scoot's have a start decompression cam that is supposed to reduce the effort required to start these monsters,and they can wear down. Just a thought.

I also keep my scoot outside, and have it on a trickle charge every night.

I have tried the 5w40 (for you, 0w40) and it did help some.

Sent from my Samsung Note 3 with Tapatalk

[jrewing]

Unfortunatetly I can do trickle charge due to the distance that bike is from the House.

I can however take the battery out in the evenings if i have to which is not ideal but better than nothing. 

I actually live in Spain which is extreme weather all year round.  We have just had a 3 month heat wave (really really hot), and in the winter because I live in land the temperature can drop to near zero centigrade in the winter.   On top of that we can get torrential Atlantic rain in the winter and have year round dampness and humidity.

Ironically I never ever had any issues with start ups in any other country I've lived in nor with any other scooter ive ever had.  I've had a Kymco before in spain without issue but Im having issues with the Xciting 500.

will try the oil change and new battery option when it gets cooler, as Im desperate for a solution.

[de dee]

  the oil is a good idea!   look up a charger - booster       schumacher PSJ 1812 DSR proseries 1800         peak AMP jump starter    this is some thing you can plug in to the scoot in a few seconds, and take it in and keep it fully charged ,  good luck

[beermak]

Get an iridium plug makes starting a lill easier also...

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[jrewing]

will try to get an iridium plug.  im not sure they are freely available where Im from though.

[ce]

Difficult cold start is symptomatic of the exhaust valve gap closing up over time.
I think the valve gap is .004 inches for both intake and exhaust, it's in the manual, and is relatively easy to do, once you get all the plastic off. There's videos on you tube on how to do it, open up the variator cover, put a wrench on the nut and turn the engine to top dead center, check the valves with a feeler gauge, et voila.

My 500r starts pretty easy after I adjusted it, but my 500ri left me stranded a few times because I don't think it has a heated element for the fuel injection, so if yours is fuel injected, that may be the problem. I just ride the carb model now, and it's fine in the cold.

[TeamTEOR2]

Here in Arizona we get some extreme weather as well, I've seen it drop to freezing at night and go to 85F in the same day! Also in the summer it regularly gets to be 110-120F outside and if you are sitting in the sun it is even more. So I'd recommend the same, get a good battery, iridium spark plug, but also get a portable jumpstart battery pack. The new lithium ones will fit into your backpack with ease and add minimal weight. Plus they can charge your phone if you need it to.

NGK Spark Plugs should be available worldwide. Depending on your model bike I think it would be the CR8EIX or the CR7EIX iridium spark plug. If not there is always online services like Amazon.
http://www.amazon.com/NGK-CR8EIX-Iridium-Spark-Plug/dp/B000VZJ712

My other vehicle is a Toyota Prius. Just this past winter the 12v battery went out on it, but I was able to use a Lithium Jump-starter Pack on it to start the car until I was able to find a replacement battery. It uses a specialized battery that has a vent on it which makes it expensive. In any case, I was using a simple Lithium Battery Jump-starter Pack and it was great. I also used the same one recently to jumpstart my battery on my Xciting 500. Here is a link towards information on some good battery packs, hopefully you would be able to find one like them where you live in Spain.
http://www.autodeets.com/top-10-what-is-the-best-lithium-jump-starter-on-the-market/

Ride safe my friend!
Tom

[Zurg1960]

Meanwhile in Finland....it is a known problem here that fuel injected Xcitings are hard to start on cold mornings. Some fellows have had a power commander installed just to be able to rich the mixture during start-ups when temperature drops below +5 C. Basically the reason is that to meet Euro 3 qualification you just have to have the mixture very lean on engines not originally designed for it. Luckily the carburated variant is not affected.

[sissy mary]

Try a lithium battery. They are more powerful than a standard battery, don't lose power when cold, and are a lot lighter to boot. They do cost a lot though.