Years of neglect

[badlegbill]

My package arrived today so more pictures

Milled from billet and looking very sexy, so is the sump plate.. If you think its dirty it was a lot filthier when I started.

 

[badlegbill]

Life is funny sometimes, the motor that I removed from the black bike wasnt bolted in and when I opened it up showed ferrous swarf under the exhaust valve and, curiously rusted swarf of the same pattern on the outside of the motor. There was more uncorroded swarf in the exhaust side of the right piston.

and outside

However I had a bottom end ready for checking on the bench so I gave that some cleaning before disassembly, it turned out to be the matching numbers engine for the bike..
As I said previously the pistons showed signs of excessive wear, they are on their second oversize,so the motor has probably done some miles.
However if the bottom end is serviceable it is going to get the big bore to 750.

Fortunately the bores aren't too bad and the barrels should be reusable once more, the carbon ring is similar on both cylinders as you can see.

 

[Charles13]

Where did you source the sump? There was a girl on here that I was trying to get one from but she just faded away.

 

[badlegbill]

From a guy who trades as Smedspeed in the UK, he does an exchange modified plate or a machined from billet item.
I know he ships stateside because he told me that is why he developed the billet item because it cost a fortune to ship into the UK so it was cheaper in the states just to buy the made item.
He and his Dad had a business making the XS650 faster than the TX650, his website is worth a good look http://www.smedspeed.co.uk

 

[badlegbill]

OK so good boy day yesterday, on the advice of the supplier I have cleaned the surfaces of the big barrels. Whether you are installing new or rebored you should clean them, I do it like this.

I suggest whatever material your sink is line it with something that wont scratch, sinks are easiest because I changed the water 3 times, cleaning between fills. Use lots of dish soap/detergent. Eventually you should get to the point where your check cloth shows no signs of grey when wiping out the bores.
I don't know if its better or not but I use clean non-absorbent plastic to spread protective films. The supplier recommended a brand of a well known water dispersant. I think he doesn't trust us to dry things properly, he might be right but if I don't use them for a couple of days I will probably wipe them with chain lube which I have found to preserve finish even in damp conditions.

 

[badlegbill]

Black Head on another swings and roundabouts day. For those not familiar with old fashioned tools here is a story.

This one is called a valve spring compressor and I haven't used it for a while, it works by setting the threaded bolt against the valve head while capturing the valve stem end leaving room for the collets to be removed. You then simply press the operating handle down compressing the valve spring- simples.
Not so much this morning.
Firstly the stem end will not sit on the valve because of the shape of the head, this can be cured as I rediscovered ( I knew it a long time ago) by simply dismounting the pieces intended to capture the valve and replacing them upside down.
Cause for celebration.
Not so much this morning.
It turns out that pressing the lever down can only be done by someone who doesn't have arthritis in both wrists.
However if you move the lever over centre until it locks and then use the setting screw to compress the valve just sufficiently to remove the collets you can then unwind the tension.
Disassembly proceeding smoothly from that point it became apparent that the swarf had been in both inlet tunnels as well as exhausts but the good news is, at least prior to cleaning, there is no detectable slop or sideways movement in the valves and the seat faces are only a little chewed.
So I am reading some threads on porting and best seat cuts now.

I'm sure there is something still to do, Oh yes cleaning.

 

[badlegbill]

So I did some cleaning and lapped the valves until I had visible seats. You might be surprised that the exhaust valves looked like they had not closed all the way for some time but not me.What did actually surprise me were the substitute exhaust gaskets I found pictured below.

Yes the po did bend solid round iron bar to almost fit the exhaust port rather than sacrifice a foot of copper electrical cable and failed to remove all of the previous gasket on the other side.
I no longer wonder how the bottom end came to so completely lock a rod, with such a knack for substituting maintenance items he may have decided to use creme soda instead of engine oil.
The good news is the seats look recoverable with a boring amount of lapping and i can't find my ER16 collets so i am using what we in the uk call a dopstick, which is a piece of dowel with low quality suckers on each end.

 

[badlegbill]

Some of you who have read my posts may have noticed I don't like paying other people to do stuff on my vehicles and I try to do as much as I can myself.
A wise man once told me there is no such thing as a jobstopper, you may be victim to a lack of tools a lack of talent or a lack of resources or all three' but there is often a way round an issue. I must say I am enjoying relearning or just remembering stuff I used to know now I am doing some building again.
Cleaning engine parts especially aluminium alloys can be a dirty backbreaking pain or a cost you'd rather avoid but it doesn't have to be, check out the images below.

These images brought to you by the wonder of baking soda, you should have listened to your mother.
If you don't have an air compressor somebody will, so buy a cheap spot media blaster, do not use an air brush or a paint gun, remove the recycling media bag and the spot nozzles which leaves you with this:-

Baking soda as a blast medium has its downside mainly the fact that it clumps when left alone, worse if it gets damp, this can be dealt with by the vigorous action of a kitchen fork which will separate it back into usable particles. However the upside is tremendous because it is not a controlled or regulated substance and can be bought in relatively large amounts cheaply or liberated from industrial kitchens. Scratch that I know you are not that sort of people. Note that the gasket is left on even against the most gentle of blast mediums.

As you can see it is effective against baked on carbon deposits but does not harden the surface or remove casting marks. You can do it outdoors, upwind, or you will look really old, and it is readily soluble in water so does not need harsh cleaning agents afterwards.
If you doubt me give it a try on something.
Cleaning old paintwork and rust requires a different medium and a cabinet so when I get round to the rolling chassis more on blasting on a budget once I've remembered it, hopefully...

 

[badlegbill]

Having got the head and valves fairly clean it was time to check the fit again, without a micrometer all you can go by is feel because standard calipers, even the digital powered kind, do not give an accurate enough reading.
Valve have a less than ideal direction of travel with a certain amount of rocking induced so the wear is not the same along the stem.
First things first check the margin or how much of the valve head is left below the contact ring, if there is less than the manual states then it is insane to reuse it. Certain things you can be a little loose about but not that, history has taught me that bits of valve head do not do bores any good at all and they do it very quickly.
Testing fit is not rocket science but it does have to be thorough. Fit each valve in its respective guide the right way round and then with the valve at greatest travel, so that the stem is level with the top of the guide apply effort to and fro while turning the valve betweem pushes, slowly allow the valve to move back towards fully closed. ANY clicking means the valve should not be reused unless it is ok in a new lubricated guide.
With any wear on the valve there will be positions which allow slight movement which can be felt but not seen the rest depends on your pocket.
The human body is a marvelous thing and you can detect tiny movements which would be hard to measure but if you detect more rocking at certain valve heights than others you are detecting wear and need to accurately measure the stem at several points before reusing; a reasonable micrometer or dial gauge is cheaper than a set of valves.
If you are rebuilding an engine that ran fine without a noisy top end I don't usually replace valves or guides but if it was noisy take the head and valves for checking, it could just be a worn timing chain that you were hearing but it could have been worn guides, poor lubrication will often wear guides before valves see any appreciable wear.
A valve with some detectable rock which measures within limits means valve guide replacement.
If on the other hand you are paying good money to build the best engine you can and which you expect to be trouble free for years it is foolish to reuse valves and guides without measuring with professional equipment.
Being a fool myself I have, of course done this when broke, sometimes being broke coincides with rebuilding XS engines as there is no limit to the spend and I was young.
Anyway mine seem OK but I have never heard it running so I am still going to buy a micrometer set because I can't find the one I had and they are really useful things.
I did find some basic porting advice on the site which can be summarised as clean the inlets and exhausts and then grind off any roughness and casting marks, for early heads there is apparently a small ridge in the exhaust valve pocket which should also be carefully ground away without taking too much metal.
There is more information than I think I need regarding the finer details of porting for performance engines, check out posts by Jack for more on this point.
Finishing ports appears contentious with the polishers against the no boundary layer guys but I will content myself with looking for a reasonably smooth surface on the exhaust ports, remember they will be coated with smooth hard carbon quite quickly so I go for no lumps or bumps that I can feel and do a light polish on the inlets.
For those looking for power minimising the projection of the valve guides into the ports seems popular but I have no experience with this and worry about the wear rate so I am not going that radical as my ambition is simply to run at highway/ motorway speeds without too much vibration. This means torque and not power so I will be putting 3" stubs into the exhaust ports for comparison testing.
This post is rather longer than I intended but I didn't want to give anybody a wrong and damaging idea about reusing valves and guides.
I am going to try rubber impregnated dremel type bits which are recommend by several forum users for the purpose.
Oh no pictures, so ashamed !

The clamp is to both protect the cable and to prevent divebombing dermels, jelly jars are useful for storing individual valves springs collets etc. but don't forget to mark the jars and the lids.