[geezer]

about your choke, i am no expert but fortunatly you dont have to be to work on this bike. what i would do first is get a 14 mm wrench and remove the part off the carb, then see if your choke lever works properly, there should be no noticable resistance when moving it back and forth. if it now works i would suspect the spring thats inside the plunger when you remove it. i had a problem like this to and ended up cutting off the very end of this spring so my lever would move freely. supposedly all this spring does is make sure the plunger comes up as you take off the choke. if it still dont work, the carb might need to be removed and cleaned, giving special attention to the choke circuit. i just went out and played with the choke on my bike and it seems an inch is about enough. who knows maybe the cable broke off or something but i bet when you remove it off the carb youll be able to narrow it down. good luck