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Arrrrgggggg mystery rattle in top end...........


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Posted

 

 can you re use the head gasket if you are careful when taking the head off?

I know your way past this point but yes you can reuse head gasket providing it hasn't been bent or otherwise damaged.

It's common practice with 2-stroke engines. I quite often do it when I'm screwing around with heads and / or I know the gasket is fairly new.

I also do it when when I'm working on a rat bike that I suspect has other issues or when it's not worth waiting on gaskets in the post.

Use plenty of copper head gasket spray.

 

However if I'm doing a restoration on an engine that wont be touched for years after I go ahead with a new one.

 

Posted

I know your way past this point but yes you can reuse head gasket providing it hasn't been bent or otherwise damaged.

It's common practice with 2-stroke engines. I quite often do it when I'm screwing around with heads and / or I know the gasket is fairly new.

I also do it when when I'm working on a rat bike that I suspect has other issues or when it's not worth waiting on gaskets in the post.

Use plenty of copper head gasket spray.

 

However if I'm doing a restoration on an engine that wont be touched for years after I go ahead with a new one.

 

 

 

 

As it happened I used a new gasket anyway. Its a three layer gasket with indentations and raised portions so thought best play safe and go with new.

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted

To be honest not sure yet? I've been giving it a few miles to  bed everything back in, the noise is definitely reduced but still there. Over the Christmas period I'm taking the rocker cover back off and checking the tension of the cam chain to see if I can wind the tensioner up a bit more now. I also want to check the valve clearances as the guys who skimmed the head and lapped the valves were supposed to re set the clearances, but I'm not sure if they need re setting now everything is bedded?

By the way, does anyone know what the proper 'tensioned' cam chain deflection should be on a WR? When setting the tensioner the general guide given was 1/4" deflection, but that seemed quite slack, so I've gone to 1/8". Can I go tighter? 

I've had a look through the manual but, unless I've missed a page, I can only find the wear limit measurement for the cam chain and to check the tensioner for smooth operation. Enlightenment would be greatly appreciated.

Posted

sorry for that, i don´t hvae a workshop manual, so can´t give you info on that.

but do you have comparison to a sound engine ?

maybe it´s just what you expect to hear ?

Posted

Yeah been wondering that ( what I'm expecting to hear ) but I know it wasn't making this sort of noise before it broke the cam guide? I've done a bit of internet searching and found a few pointers on tension, so next week or so I'm whipping the rocker off and checking the deflection.

  • 3 weeks later...
Posted

OK. Well after riding it around for 50 odd miles or so and the rattle quieter bit still present I finally found an afternoon this week to get the rocker cover off and see where she's at. Good news was the cam chain was still in need of more tension, so I set too it and tightened it up to where I thought ( backed up by a very experienced classic car restorer friend of mine ) the cam chain was tight enough, maybe 1/16" of deflection up and down but just a slight side to side movement, indicating it wasn't too tight for the chain to flex. Rocker cover back on, all the other bits returned to their rightful place, Radiator topped up and fired her up! So far so good, no excessive cam noise, just the usual rattles I would expect. I had to finish a few other small jobs off at my work but half an hour later I rode the bike home and still NO RATTLES !

Now I'm hoping the weather reports are correct for tomorrow morning because the wife is working until 2pm, leaving me free to have a couple of hours riding and enjoying the sounds of a rattle free cam train :tu!

Although I have noticed a small exhaust leak out of the side of the 2 into 1 pipe, oh bugger, here we go again.....................................;)  

  • Like 1
Posted

This could be a lonnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnggggggggggggggg thread, took it for a shake down test yesterday, ended up at the local fuel station calling a mate to come and collect me in the work van>:(. Something has gone really bang now, again sounds like its in the valve train but proper loud clatter, clatter, clatter. Its not looking good, I am now trolling a certain site for second hand engines........... Fer Farks Sake!!

Posted (edited)

Ok I've bit the bullet and bought a reasonably priced second hand engine off the Bay. Fingers crossed its as good as the seller reckons, same year ,'94' and 30k on it when taken out of crashed bike, that's 15k less miles than mine. I've done some delving ( on my current engine ) and an initial look under the rocker cover shows nothing obvious, so I reckon its probably shat its piston ring on cylinder two. When I took it apart first time it looked a little scored, but as I found a mullered Cam Guide I assumed that was the major problem. Might be regretting that assumption now:$. I'll drop the engine out of the frame in the next few evenings, when private jobs allow and do a bit of dismantling to kill the time till the new engine arrives. At least I'll have plenty of spares and maybe I'll swap the serviced head over? We'll see though.......

Edited by badgerkdd
  • Like 1
Posted

yeah, its one big learning curve :tu 

Me and couriers don't seem to have much luck either, one was supposed to pick up the engine yesterday but never turned up and reckoned he did! trying to sort out a re collect today now.....

Posted

New ( secondhand ) engine going in this weekend, will post up pics and more details later, but she runs off the starter motor with no horrible noises and good compression on all cylinders. Fingers crossed, I hope to be back on the road by the end of the weekend!

Posted

So that's what I did! My friend Brian ( classic Moggy restorer ) and I got it loosely bolted in the frame on Friday ( I was the only one in my work on Friday, so I took a loooooong coffee break ) ready for Saturday when I could spend proper time on the job. Yesterday was spent in the workshop bolting, connecting, sometimes cursing, but mostly succeeding! She fired up on all cylinders yesterday evening  :D:D .

Today I finished putting bits of body work on so I could take her for a shake down run, clutch was still untested, gearbox seemed ok, I had gone through the box by hand but on the road it may have been different? The clutch still needed setting up anyway.

Well I took for a short'ish run down to local beach café with my 125 riding mate ( meant I had to take it easy, he can't egg me on to rag it ;) ) and it runs nicely. No undue noises, smooth on the roll on/ roll off, even the clutch took very little playing with to get set up, actually feels lighter than my original clutch. I'm still taking it easy as I don't know how long it was standing unused with its previous owner and want to give it a bit of a running in period. To be honest, I'm not 100% trusting it yet. Maybe I'm being pessimistic but it still seems too good to be true that a £100 engine of Eblag isn't hiding a dirty secret. Time and miles will tell!

On a further point, I need to make some engine hanging plates, as the top plates don't fit from a 94 engine to a 93 engine. The bosses are missing on the head of the 93 model that cast ally top engine brackets bolt to. I was going to take some pics but my camera ran out of battery. If anyone knows how the brackets on the 93 differ from the 94 model, or if they even had brackets, I'd be interested to know. I'll take some pics as the plates come on but will start a new thread for them.

 

 

Posted

94 got the the brackets when they put the chassis on a diet - they needed to pick the stiffness up after thinning down the wall sections of the extrusions and casting of the earlier frame. I suspect they do make a difference.

  • Like 1

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