Work Around
Some people have found a problem with water getting into the gas tank. You'll know when you open your gas cap see water is pooled up around the filler neck and then dribbles into the tank. This simple fix seems to take care of the problem. After 1 1/2 years mine kinked. I found that these instructions are very thourough but also fount alternate ways to reroute the hose -use this more as a template than as the only way to fix the problem.
This was originally
posted on SV650.org Nov-8-1999
08/11/99 WATER IN FUEL - Thank you Ian (ian@netgates.co.uk) for another helpful post to the site....
Yep, it happened to me as well. Thankfully I saw it when I was filling the tank, I haven't noticed any change in the performance of the bike.
As suggested, I tried to pull the drain hose from the bottom of the tank, to shorten it a little, but I couldn't get my hand in to get a good enough grip.
If you follow the pipe from the bottom of the tank, after about six inches it goes into the back of a T piece. The front of the T piece goes down to the drain on the right of the engine, directly in front of the frame. The tube from the side of the T piece goes to the left hand side of the bike, continues up around the left hand side of the tank, around the front and into a breather/overflow of the black plastic coolant tank by the right hand side of the airbox. Pull this tube from the coolant tank and unthread it all the way back to the T piece.
Just in front of the tank hinge is a small, black cylinder, about two inches long and 3/4 inches in diameter mounted across the frame. It's got two spade connectors on the left hand end, but I don't know what it is. Undo the right hand mounting bolt and the cable tidy should now come free. You should now have enough space to manouver the T piece so that side entry and the long tube to the coolant tank cross the frame in front of the strange electrical cylinder instead of behind it. This effectively shortens the tube from the bottom of the petrol tank and stops it kinking.
Replace the bolt that holds the cable tidy and the odd electrical thing, thread the long hose back round the side and front of the petrol tank and reconnect it to the top of the coolant tank.
Also....
In answer to a question that I posed a couple of weeks ago, the nearest colour to 1999 SV650 metalic blue is Ford Matisse Metalic. It's a little on the green side, but it was th closest that I could find. It works well on the plastics, because they are black to start with, but on anything pale you might be best to use a dark blue or black under coat.
One thing that always anoyed me is that the throttle squeeks. It didn't affect the operation or control of the bike, but it just anoyed me. Anyway, I fixed it. If you look up into the bike from the front right hand side, from under the radiator, you can see where the two throttle cables wrap around the pulley on the front carb (the throttle action is transfered to the rear carb by a push rod on the left. It looks like the balance adjust screw is here as well). There is the throttle return spring wrapped around the carb, I gave it a squirt of WD40 and now it doesn't squeek.
John's SV650 Home Page
How to Shim Page
Rejet Page