Tuesday, May 13, 2008

Carbs &Valves (New tires too)- 1st time for everything

I did it. I finally did some mechanichin'. My experience with the mechanical side of things has been limited to non-existent. Coming from a family of mechanical minds, this has always been somewhat of a rub to my ego. Now I can say, "I've rebuilt a carb!!!"

Bought a Clymer's manual for the bike and that's been my guide so far (Kudos to Blake Smith as well.........my neighbor who also limelights as my Beemer Mentor). Decided to pull off both carbs a couple weeks ago and sat down one Friday evening and went at it. Completely disassembled and cleaned. Replaced all O-rings and gaskets and reassembled. I'm sure the process took me much longer than a seasoned vet but I learned a great deal about the inner workings of the carbs. I also proved to myself that I will be able to do this. Putting the carbs back on was not much of a problem. Had one cap screwed on incorrectly so the throttle cable was too taught but that was an easy fix.
Next up was valve inspection and adjustment. The next few pictures show part of the process. 1st I had to remove the valve covers which was all of 3 bolts. The valves on both sides looked to be in good condition (so far so good). Didn't appear to be anything other than normal wear occurring. Moved on from inspection to actually adjusting the valves. This was the 1st part of the process I did a bit of head scratching. Finding TDC (top dead center) and feeling "good" about it were not jiving. I finally took a poke and it and......I got it. Valves adjusted on the right side. Moved to the left. Easy enough, just repeat right? Oooooooops. First mistake. Did not give rotate the engine a revolution and tried adjusting the left valve clearances. Ended up stripping one of the valve adjuster nuts. Nothing serious. Just killed about 5 days waiting for the correct parts to arrive. When I noticed that "stripping" feeling, my heart skipped a beat. I was certain I had done something very expensive. Quite the relieft to realize it was only a minor mistake. Once I had the new nut, I went through the process again, this time getting TDC for each side. This time. No problems. Another task in the rebuild process checked off the list.

Right valve - Looks good Left Valve - Ditto

Valve covers back on. Also took the rear luggage rack off. Starting to resemble a bike.
I didn't take pictures post new tires but...they're new. Michelon Mcadam 50/50's. Nice tires. Side note. I have now popped 2 new tubes putting on the rear wheel. I'm so frustrated I'm just going to have a shop put the tube in and seat the tire. Argh!!!
So far this week I've purchased a used /5 tour tank (small dent.....nothing major) and a set of low rise Euro bars. Once I can replace the current ape hangers w/ the Euro bars, it will look MUCH better.
Goal for this week is to get the front forks rebuilt. We'll see if time permits. Wedding to attend this weekend.

1 comment:

Elix said...

Cool bike...

with the right cosmetic will look very very pretty. McQueen style!!
talking of cosmetic I need to change indicators on my Thunderbird.
Eliseo