Gas Leaking from intake box

[081DBX64]

Ok.

1980 GS550E

Bike was running find I noticed today that gas was leaking from the intake box through the drain at the bottlom of it. I took off the air cleaner and found gasoline in there. What could this be?

Regards

[Rich82GS750TZ]

Opinions:
A few possibilities, or a combination of any or all.

Petcock left on prime. Easy fix - Don?t do that.

Petcock not stopping flow when bike not running and is set to ON or RES. Fix - Replace petcock with OEM or similar or try your luck at rebuilding. This has a very low success rate.

Float needles in carbs not doing their jobs to hold back gas when not called for. Fix - Replace carb float needles/seats.

Highly recommend checking your oil level for over full. Oil should not smell like gas. If gas in your airbox, could very well have gone the other way into the engine. Fix - Drain oil, change filter, fix fueling issue, replace oil.

[salty_monk]

That year petcock has the prime that has to be activated with a screwdriver from memory. It's a weird one & there is an O ring in there from memory. If you didn't know what it did... maybe it has just vibrated loose (or the O ring disintegrated & that allowed it to come loose). Fingers crossed. The other fixes are harder.

[081DBX64]

There is no prime position on this. It uses vacum from the carbs to open the valve. Just on and reserve. I rebuilt the ptecock but it still leaks from the opening when the tank is off the bike .

[cowboyup3371]

The 1980s have a reserve but like Salty_Monk said, it's a bit different than normal. How about posting up a picture of your petcock so we can make sure you don't have the dreaded version?

[Gorminrider]

After you fix or replace petcock you will still have to

Float needles in carbs not doing their jobs to hold back gas when not called for. Fix [cleaning and replacing o-rings might do]- Replace carb float needles/seats.

per post #2. The float needles should stop fuel flow on an upright bike even when the petcock fails.