As I thought about this problem. I considered a few things.

#1. There are only 4000 miles on this bike, so the starter can't be that messed up.

#2. When I first started the bike it didn't make this sound

#3. The only thing that changed since it first started was that fuel made it's way to the crankcase.

#4. The starter clutch is sitting up high, so contaminated oil won't be lubricating very well up there.

So I changed the oil out with some Castrol 10w30 and sure enough. After the bike ran for about a minute, that terrible whirring sound went away!

As much as I don't like to shop at wal-mart I must say that their 24hr. shopping and wide variety of cheap oil made me very happy that night!

This means I'll have to change out that petcock and not just rebuild the vacuum one.

So, i got the carbs all back together and mounted properly. I got my carb sync tool set up and ready to balance. Then I hear a nasty sound.

wwwwWWWWWHHHHHHIIIIIRRRRRRRRR!!!!!

It sounded like the starter was about to take off and shoot through the roof. The bike would run for a few seconds, then slowly the starter would start turning until it would catch up to the speed of the engine!

Now, I don't know much about starters but I did a little Googleresearch. These bikes are a little tricky in that the starter engages an idler gear which somehow or another engages with a clutch via some roller and pins. I've got no clue right now exactly how it works, but I could only find out that a replacement means that I have to pull the whole engine and split the case!!

No, I'm not interested in opening this engine up. . This was going to be my cheap commuter.

Now, there is one other possibility. I used 20w-50 synthetic oil rather than 10w-40 for the first oil change (because that's what I could find). Also, I know some gasoline flooded the cylinders because when I went to check the oil level it was way over and smelled like a gas can. Considering all of that, I'm hoping that maybe the contaminated 20w-50 might be causing the problem and may be fixed with an oil change and a few squirts of dino oil through the hole for the starter.

If you have any experience with this. . . PLEASE SEND A MESSAGE!!