[Tamaren]

Bike in question is a 1980 900 SSD. I pulled it out of a garage in the mountains of Colorado from the original owner, with 10,000 miles on it, parked in 1984 on the original tires along with everything else down to the bill of sale from the dealer and every single service record, tool in the tool kit, and manual.

It's getting the normal treatment of fuel lines (green), fuel petcocks, full carb rebuilds, a bunch of misc old rubber pieces, oil and filter, tires, brake lines and caliper rebuilds, exc.

My questions:
1) Oil. I know, I know. Everyone's favorite game show. Oil threads. But, searching resulted in no newer information and some conflicting results. So. What oil is everyone running now? I run Castrol 20W-50 Non-Synth in my BMW Airhead and K. I see recommendations for straight 50, which for Phoenix isn't a huge deal but it's still not my favorite, and recommendations for 20w50 non-synth. Can I get away with 20w50 Castrol on 1000mi oil changes?

2) Carbs are obviously PHF 32's, what size float needle valve are people running? 250? I'm ordering the kit from BevelHaven with the choke assembly as well.

Thanks in advance, here's the bike:

 

[belter]

i usually put 15w50 mineral in bevels.

i'd think a 32 should be fine with a 250, but i'd fit whatever is in there now.

you'd do better posting this in vintage. this is more a belt ss page.

 

[duc96cr]

Wow ! Quite a find ! What a beautiful bike.

 

[wdietz186]

Nice find! Using mineral 20w50 is the way to go [15w50 may be hard to come by here] due to the relative lack of filtration. Change at approx 1k mi. Straight 40 or 50 wt. is too heavy unless the ambient temp is in the 90's consistently, even then it needs to warm for a while. I use Brad-Penn [the old Kendall GT1 green stuff], just to get the oil argument rolling! With its age you are probably looking at re wiring the ign. pickups as the insulation falls apart and shorts out. The info you need is on Bev Hev

 

[Tamaren]

i usually put 15w50 mineral in bevels.

i'd think a 32 should be fine with a 250, but i'd fit whatever is in there now.

you'd do better posting this in vintage. this is more a belt ss page.

Fair enough, sounds good. Yeah, I didn't know, I'll probably crosspost it over there.

Wow ! Quite a find ! What a beautiful bike.

Thanks!

Nice find! Using mineral 20w50 is the way to go [15w50 may be hard to come by here] due to the relative lack of filtration. Change at approx 1k mi. Straight 40 or 50 wt. is too heavy unless the ambient temp is in the 90's consistently, even then it needs to warm for a while. I use Brad-Penn [the old Kendall GT1 green stuff], just to get the oil argument rolling! With its age you are probably looking at re wiring the ign. pickups as the insulation falls apart and shorts out. The info you need is on Bev Hev

Thanks! I'm probably going to go with mineral 20-50 then, I know BevelHeaven sells Motul in the 20w50, but I've never used it in anything. I'll look into ign. pickups, but it was stored inside in a climate controlled garage, so the seat and everything are in great shape. I'll pull the cover and look. Thanks!