1985 Kaw rebuild questions

[danmdevries]

I just came across quite a challenge. Guy at work said his son had a bike in his garage that he needed to get rid of to pay off a cellphone bill (been out of work for a while) So I said allright, I'll check it out. My two bikes in the garage I've picked up the same way, someone was strapped for cash, bike didn't run, needed alot of tlc and they just wanted to get rid of em. I went over to his house and he let me in the garage and showed me a frame, three plastic rubbermaid containers, a seat, some wheels and a tank. I almost walked away. This is by far the biggest undertaking I've attempted thus far. (every car i've owned has been the same way as well)

The bike is a 1985 Kawasaki ZX 550 and it shows 11k on the odo. So I asked him what he wanted, he told me he wanted $500, I laughed and walked away, he immediately dropped to $250, I said no way and said, I'll give you $100 bucks for all of it, an I'll get it outta here tonite. He said he's got a $147 cellphone bill, so I opened my wallet, gave him $150, took the boxes and bike and brought it all home.

Now what he told me was he took it out in the fall of '03, was leaving the driveway, gave it gas and it locked up, wouldn't turn over when he tried to restart it, pulled the engine out (i have no idea why, the way the bike is setup you can do everything but crankshaft and tranny repairs with tht ebike in the frame) and took the head and cylinders off. Pistons are remarkably clean, I expected half inch carbon crap all over, it looks normal in comparison with the bikes and cars I've done before. One chamber's valves are burned pretty good, but other than that, the cylinder walls have only slight scratching on the number 4 cyl and mild rust from being stored for so long, a rebore is probably in order but I'll get to that later.

I'm considering running down to autozone, picking up a bottle brush hone and running that in the cylinders to clean em up, will this remove too much material? The only agent I'll be adding is some WD40 to help rinse away the moisture rust, there's no pitting. Before I attempt to do anything else to the bike I want to see if I can reassemble the engine and get her to chug, if that's the case, I'll go further.

Here's my questions: What would you all recommend, go ahead and bring it to the shop, get it bored .020 over? If I do that, where can I get pistons? My searches online so far havent turned up anything. The headwork I can handle, [email protected] has the parts I need, as does the local dealer, so its just time from there.

or

I also found two used engines from the same model, one year prior with approx 25k on the odos, both from wrecked bikes for $500. Would this be a wiser move than trying to repair this one being that it was disassembled and just sitting for a year an a half?

I'm not so sure disassembly procedures were followed when he pulled it apart either, and I have jars and boxes of parts that I'm supposed to dechipher when reassembling, and repairing and adjusting anything that could've been damaged during disassembly.

Now before anyone posts with a comment that the bike is old, needs too much work, isn't valuble, can do better please don't. I own a 1981 SR250T and an 82 CM400E I have a blast riding either. They may not be fast, they may not be fancy, they shure as hell aint comfortable but they're on two wheels and I love em. I'm ready for a sportbike, or close to it, this one meets what I want and the price was right, especially considering two new tires with only 80 miles on em.

Just throw it back together and see what it does?
Get it rebored? (where do I get the pistons?)
Buy the used motor?
Are there complete rebuild kits?

My local dealer said they don't rebuild engines but rather replace em and they cannot do mine, so that's out.

thank you much for any help anyone can give me. I've never touched a kaw, a 4cyl or a sportbike, so I don't know what the future has in store for me.

If i can figgure out how to work the camera i'll throw some pictures up here.

[MagicRat]

This sounds like a fun project.
Of course, if you don't actually enjoy working on such a vehicle, its not worth it. But personally, I would enjoy taking a box of parts bought for next to nothing and making something useful from it.

So lets say you have a clean title (its useless without one)
Can you get a Haynes or Chiltons manual for it?

Next, with the help of the manual do a parts inventory and make sure you have everything.

If pieces are missing, look for a parts bike...the whole thing, not just the engine.

If you have all the parts, I think you can fix the existing engine for not much money.

I would first want to find out why the engine seized. From your post, you may think its a seized/scuffed piston or rings, but from your description, that may not be the case.

I have had engines seize a crankshaft, while the rest of the engine is fine. Does the crank move freely? The slightest bit of roughness in the bearings when turning the crank and connector rods is enough to cause problems.

Another cause for the seizure may be a stretched or broken cam chain. If the camshaft skipped even just one tooth, it may drive a valve into a piston stopping the engine. When this has happened to me, all thats required is a new valve or valves, depending on whats bent) and a new camchain, sprockets and sometimes, a tensioner. Usually the piston is not damaged.

If there is no descernable ridge at the top of the cylinder, I would say just re-use the existing pistons, hone the cylinders (bottle brush hone only) lightly, just enough to clean up the walls and no more.
Chances are with only 11k, you could re use the old rings, but new ones are a good idea,

[danmdevries]

Allright, spent the day with the bike, called the guy and asked him a few more questions i have everything to reassemble the bike minus a nut and bolt here and there. The motor wouldn't turn until he removed the head, and then it turned freely. He thinks the camchain skipped. One of the lifters is pushed out, the rest are all in place, intake cam sits perfectly, exhaust cam is where its locked up on, so tomorrow if I find time I'm going to pull that valve/lifter assembly out and see whats going on there. I have pictures, asked a buddy to take care of posting em up on here, i'll get em up asap.

It's not a matter of not wanting to work on it, I'll spend all my freetime working on this, it's something I love because it makes you know your bike that much more. In the same way that everyone likes to customize or modify their bikes, I like to be the one that put my bike together, but I don't have the money, equipment or time to build a full one off.

The suspension, everything not related to the engine is in great shape, the wiring harness was replaced in 02, so the electrical system is perfect. I found that the bike does have the optional oil cooler, something I didn't know.

So the rings I removed and are *shocked* within tolerance... maybe they were replaced already? There's no end play on the crank, dunno how accurate that check is, but whatever. I don't want to tear it down any further because of the design of the engine it's a pain in the ass and i'd rather just rebuild the top end of a used motor than go through that. There's no marks on the valves or pistons to indicate a collision. Tomorrow I'm going to see if I can check the stretching in the camchain without removing it, I have a feeling that could be the case unless something broke in the valve/lifter assembly and the chain is good. I'll keep it updated, I'll probably need all the help I can, there's almost nothing on ebay, dealer can only get limited parts, and I've never done an engine like this one. Thanks

[danmdevries]

Apologies to anyone on dialup, I don't have any editing software. You can kinda see my other two bikes in the picture, the red one with the bald tires is wrecked from an accident back in august alcohol + parking lot across the street + no helmet + ditch to jump = something to never do again. I definitely learned a lesson there, left me with $7900 in hospital bills and brain damage from the hemmorage, short term memory is damaged, attention span is limited. Really hurts considering before aug 19 I had an IQ of 153, a 4.0gpa in premed studies at Indiana University and now I'm working in a factory. Had to post that to try to drive home three points: beginner riders shouldn't attempt anything stupid well, anyone for that reason, don't ride without a helmet and definitely (we know this, but I learned it) don't mix alcohol and motorcycles.

But yeah, as you can see, it's in need of many many many hours of tlc to clean it up alone, not to mention the mechanicals. One thing that has me worried, the coils on whatever cover are hanging below the seat on the bike, they don't look to be in such great shape, havent' really taken a close look at em, don't know if it's got point condenser or electronic, anyone identify that?

[speediva]

I've got no answers, but I wanted to add that this is a PHENOMENAL thread!!! Please keep us updated!

[MagicRat]

I agree, its a fascinating thread.

The ignition system will be electronic. Points and condensor went out in the early to mid-70's.

The pics are great. It actually does not look as bad as I thought. Much of the bike is still together, more or less. It may take a few week ends to fix, but its no worse than what many bike mechanics are faced with each week.

I am sorry to hear about the accident. Thank you for sharing that with us. I sincerely hope that this project will be good mental exercise to speed your recovery.

[CBURKE]

Damn man you have your work cut out uh?

[danmdevries]

I'd say the majority of the work is going to be on the cosmetics, saw a pic of the bike when he bought it and it wasn't too easy on the eyes. I'll keep it updated as I go through the project, I work 7 days a week so my time is limited. Tomorrow night I'm going to pick up the bottlebrush hone and take another picture of the lifter side of the head to show what I mean by one is pushed out. All valves are seated firmly, but the lifter is pushed out the opposite direction that the cam would push it as if the valvestem had cracked and the spring pushed it out? I don't know, I got called out to work today before I had a chance to look at anything.

[danmdevries]

Tonite was spent disassembling and checking the camchain tensioner and scraping the gaskets off, honing, measuring and oiling and wrapping the cylinders in plastic to avoid rust, and checking plane of the cylinder/head deck. Everything went smoothly, everything checked through. Question though. The bottom side of the cylinders where it meets the block, the paper gasket is incredibly difficult to scrape off and to avoid any unpolishable scratching of the gasket mating surface, does anyone have any suggestions on solvents to help remove the gasket? I used some good ol wd40 and a putty knife, and then tried some petroleum based hand cleaner that listed gasket adhesive as one of the things it removed, with a wood chisel for between the cylinders, but I could only get maybe 80% of the gasket off safely, now before I risk damaging any of the surface, is there anything to help get the gasket off? Also, does anyone have a recommendation on where I could order the gaskets from? I was able to get the head gasket off in three pieces which I taped together in case I need the services of my local machine shop to remake it (as I did with my '81 Yamaha SR250T, they have a plotter, materials and whatnot but at a cost of 130 for a single cyl head gasket, I want to avoid them) I'm trying to avoid my local dealer at all costs because as far as service goes, I give them a 1 of 10, and their parts dept is less than prompt (took 2 months for them to come up with a gasket set on a buddy's 1998 bike) It's hard finding the parts for such an old bike and you pay the price. The bottom gasket which is giving me the trouble is the one I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to find. If anyone has any suggestions on where I could get a full gasket set for the bike, that'd be great because the carbs are going to need rebuilding, and since its all apart I might as well replace all gaskets and I'm not in the mood to do a full RTV engine, haven't had much luck with that holding up

[danmdevries]

Mechanic next door took the cylinders to work and cleaned the remainder of the gasket material off.
Tonites progress: cleaned the cylinders, cleared all debris, used a felt wheel to polish off the gasket marks that were left, oiled the bare surfaces, wrapped it in plastic and put it in the dryest room of my apt. Cleaned camshafts up, and put the head on the workbench to attack tomorrow.

Here's tonights question: My camshafts are in good shape, but there's minor oxidation on the backside (non contact area) of the lobes. I cleaned it up, but it's not a polished smooth surface anymore, nothing major, a few small scratches like in the paint of a car, but not the way it was. I oiled em an wrapped em up an put em with the cylinder, but is this going to be a problem? I highly doubt it, but cams are always a sensitive piece. Replacement is not an option, I'm wondering if I can just leave it or should I bring em to the machine shop?

Does anyone here do this kind of work on their bikes or is eveyrone in here just a streetbike rider whos only work to their bike is changing minor pieces for customization? When I attack the head, I'd like to have either a mechanic or a well-seasoned shadetree mechanic to ask questions. Heads make me shaky especially on an engine that revs over 10K.

[danmdevries]

So to get any advice... it seems I'm required to open a new thread? or does nobody here actually work on their own bikes?

[aussieidiot]

mate to be honest, i don't think any of us tackle huge rebuilds like this.

if i want specific info on my bike (954) i go to another site with just fireblade guys from all over the world. most race and therefore are technically minded.

[danmdevries]

Oh c'mon, nobody here does this sort of thing?!?! I ran into my first major roadblock. While attempting to split the crankcase I found it impossible to remove the inner clutch hub bolt. Stuffed a rag in the gears, some 14mm sockets between the inner and outer clutch hubs and cranked down to 300lb ft and it wouldn't budge so i was forced to cut the nut off the shaft. If anyone's interested in seeing the progress, or asking questions about the bike or any bike rebuild or repair, visit http://pjapt.mine.nu/kaw/ the full site should be up soon enough, I'm really busy working 60 hr weeks plus 4-6hrs a nite on the bike so who knows, but soon enough.

[patarusky]

just saw this post. Are you still working on that 550? I've owned my bike shop for 20 years. I can rebuild that engine blind-folded. Reply here and I'll give you all the help you need. Patarusky

[Aces0vr8s]

you definatly need to take the cam to the shop go to a reliable one and theyll be honost tell them you want it "turned" or "polished" they should tell you what one if needs if there honost....