Motorcycle Repair: fuel leaking from bottom of crankcase, yamaha xj650, fuel leaks

Question
Hello, I own a 82 Yamaha xj650.  I recently had the throttle cable break while the bike was warming up.  I shut it down and went for a new one.  It was not installed for several days.  I noticed gas leaking out of the bottom of crankcase the next day. After I installed new cable it appeared to stop, I changed the oil and it ran fine.  But now 1 week later it is starting to leak again.  When I pulled the drain plug about 1 gal of gas was mixed in with the oil.  How can I fix this.

Thanks Dennis

Answer
Hi Dennis.
 What you have was a simple float bowl problem.  Chances are that you only noticed it because you had to work on the bike.  Fuel leaks have nothing to do with the throttle cable or choke on the bike.

 Check the floats to make sure that they are working correctly, set correctly and make sure that the seals are good.  What's happening is that fuel is seeping past the float seals while the bowls are full.  That fuel gets into the airbox and engine and seeps into the crankcase.

 Once the float seals are correct and the floats are set correctly and working right (not sticking), your fuel seepage will go away.  You may want to refer to the repair manual for working on this problem.

Good luck.
FALCON