Honda Spree and Elite 50 Forums

So I got my friends 85 spree with 72.4 miles on it running tonight after it had sait for 18 years in his basement. I pulled the carb and it was spottless, put in the a new plug(original looked great), topped off the oil and gave it a fresh tank of gas.

I hooked a battery up to it and it started after maybe 5 seconds of cranking. It ran pretty decent so i left it running and after about a minute it started to smell. I turned it off, waited like 5 minutes till the smell was gone and then started it again. After about a minute again it started to make the same smell so I killed it.

Wierd smell, at first I thought it might have been burning plastic. Does anyone have any guesses what it could have been.

I had the bike up on the center stand with the rear brake. Would the belt start to smell if left like that or something else stupid like that?

All advice is appreciated. Thanks.

Does it smell like burnt rubber? Burnt oil? Does it do it after 5 minutes of running on the stand or 5 minutes of riding?

might just be the old stuff in the engine burning

Bearing seals?

Actually, I had a chunk of bearing seal break off in one of my chainsaws (STIHL 039, 64.1cc's), and get caught between the crank counterweight and engine case, and it caused the engine to be stuck. A teardown, remove the chunk, put it back together, and I was cutting again.

could be gaskets still burning off

I should be picking up the battery for it tommorow. Then I will take it for a few laps around the neighborhood and hope I dont melt anything.

I did get my vespa riding for the first time since I bought it 6 months ago. What a hoot to ride. Now I just need to fix all the new stuff I broke on it. Oh well, so is the life of a vintage scooter. Fix or repair always.

D/l the manual for the procedure to check the oiler for function. Otherwise probably just dirt and bugs burning up.

I'd dump the gas , dump the oil in the oiler, replace the trannie oil and replace the air filter foam before I put a hard 20 minutes on the bike.
Old oil separates and serves no lube function- goodbye rings and bottom end, the foam in the filter is dead in 5 years so you'd be sucking decomposed foam. Even if you gased up an empty tank when it came out of the basement you can get the rust out easier that way than through the fuel screen.

The air filter looked brand new, I cleaned it and re-oiled it and put it back in. The gas tank on the bike was empty and spotless on the inside so I didnt touch it. The oil tank was mostly empty so I topped it up with fresh 2 stroke oil. I premixed the gas I put in the tank so lube shouldnt be an issue, the only possible problem could be the spark plug getting fouled from excesive oil, but thats not too much of a big deal.

Put about 5 miles on the scoot between yesterday and it seems to be running fairly well. Starting off down a hill I was able to get it up to about 33 or so, flat out, it topped out about 30 mph. I was actually kinda sad, the thing seemed a fair bit slower than I expected. It didnt have much of anything till like 15 mph or so once it started to get into the powerband.

david_594 wrote:The air filter looked brand new, I cleaned it and re-oiled it and put it back in. The gas tank on the bike was empty and spotless on the inside so I didnt touch it. The oil tank was mostly empty so I topped it up with fresh 2 stroke oil. I premixed the gas I put in the tank so lube shouldnt be an issue, the only possible problem could be the spark plug getting fouled from excesive oil, but thats not too much of a big deal.

Put about 5 miles on the scoot between yesterday and it seems to be running fairly well. Starting off down a hill I was able to get it up to about 33 or so, flat out, it topped out about 30 mph. I was actually kinda sad, the thing seemed a fair bit slower than I expected. It didnt have much of anything till like 15 mph or so once it started to get into the powerband.

If you are running premix AND oil in the reservoir, that is bad. Means less fuel for the mixture = lean. You dont want that. Either dump the oil and take out the oil pump and go premix, or take out the premixed gas and go gas + injected.

This is mostly likely whats causing it to smell. are you seeing any smoke?

I went with the latter, drained the tank and went to normal gas. The premix was pretty weak anyways, around 100:1.

Its the same thing I did with my vespa. Small amount of premix fuel in the tank till I was sure the oil injector was working.

david_594 wrote:I went with the latter, drained the tank and went to normal gas. The premix was pretty weak anyways, around 100:1.

Its the same thing I did with my vespa. Small amount of premix fuel in the tank till I was sure the oil injector was working.

oh ok, thats good. does it still smell different?

Maybe the belt is too stiff with age and slips at low speed - for the slow first 15mph.

the spree really doesnt have much power in the rpm range between 0-15mph.

After riding it around for a while the smell seemed to be gone(or I got used to it). Either way the bike seems to be in decent shape.

Its so small and cute that I think I am going to have to keep an eye out for one of these for myself. It was effortless to just hop on it and go as compared to my 240 lb vespa.