Greetings all.
First post from an excited new Xciting 500i owner which I picked up today. (Well, new to me but the scoot itself is not new - its an 08 model). I bravely (stupidly?) rode it 100 miles back to Farkem Hall after picking it up, and apart from a bit of popping and banging on the overrun caused by (I believe) an over rich mixture as a result of a rusty and leaky exhaust with no baffles, it went very well. It certainly pulls well from rest and reaches 60 pretty quickly. I also saw a smidge
over an indicated 75mph with bags in reserve so the engine seems good although there is a rather unpleasant occasional misfire at very high sustained revs (over 8K) which I suspect is due to it running rich. All this I aim to sort out in the fullness of time back at Farkem Hall as these are tuning matters. (I'll have a good look at the plug condition to assess the mixture for example).
More frustratingly, there is a bit of an issue with the instrument panel it seems (apparently not uncommon from the number of posts in the forum) whereby not only is the odometer/clock display illegible (due to almost totally faded pixels), it fades further to nothing at all over time, and the oil service light won't go out despite suitable ministration of pointy objects on the mode switch (after the rubber bung has been removed to ensure accuracy).
I first suspected an iffy battery or a dodgy stator however, the battery at rest without the engine running was showing 13V and with the engine ticking over at about 2k it was generating 14.3-14.6V across the terminals. So my question to all you aficionados of all things Kymco, any ideas as to what might be causing this? My initial thoughts are:
1. The stator could be dodgy - more tests with the multimeter to come on a more clement occasion (when it isn't pissisting down). Not convinced about this though, although possible.
2. The regulator/rectifier could be on the fritz - again not fully convinced without further analysis.
3. The instrument cluster might be fubar and could need replacing - I'm leaning toward this but will bend to better judgement than mine based on the balance of probabilities.
4. There might be a dodgy earth/short which is causing the errant display. - Not convinced but eminently possible as there are some rather naff aftermarket LED running lights that have been added which could be causing a drain - I'll be removing these as a matter of course when I tear the scoot down for a refurb).
Apparently the seller said that he did try another battery (allegedly known to be iffy) which had a lower CCA rating than the one which is installed and oddly, the screen behaved itself far better - this account may be apocryphal and I suspect it is.
One other symptom of weirdness according to the previous owner is that when first switching on the bike ignition, it has been necessary to wait 30 seconds or so before attempting to fire it up, or there is no response from the starter button.
I've just been outside and tried it and if fired up first kick without any delay.
Any help anyone could offer would be very much appreciated .
KR
Faversham
