Reinstalling valve buckets back into head

[clcorbin]

Gents,

I'm doing some work on my head of my 79F. Things are almost 100% done and I am at the point of reinstalling the buckets over the valve retainer, but it is fighting...

Is there any trick to these things? I was able to get the center 4 (I and E for cylinders 2 and 3) in without too much trouble, just a good cleaning of everything, oil on the bucket and then rocket it back and forth and side to side until it lined up and started down the well.

Unfortunately, the outer four buckets are NOT playing so nice. And before anyone asks, yes, I kept all the hardware for each spot together and it all when back into it's original location. Here is what I have tried:

1) Cleaned each part with brake cleaner, then lightly oiled with motor oil and rocketed into position worked for half of them)

2) Heated well in head with a heat gun to expand the aluminum, then rocketed the bucket over it (Did not work on the two I tried it with)

3) Froze bucket in deep freeze (-20F), etc. No joy

4) Combined 2 and 3 above. Ditto on results.

Is there anything else I am overlooking? They all came out nice and smooth with a strong magnet, so I would HOPE they would all go home too!

[clcorbin]

Well, I got them all in. Maybe the break of coming in here help as the two buckets for cylinder #1 went in pretty easy when I went back out to the shop.

#4 was a much bigger pain. I eventually pulled the valves out so I could get to the well. On each of them, I felt a few little burrs right at the top of the well (were the 45 degree bevel is). I decided to fix that, so I used a cone grinding stone in my Dremel and carefully smoothed out the burrs. Given the height of the well, I wasn't worried about damaging the well as I was only working on the top 10 thousands or so of the well.

Needless to say, after removing those burrs, the buckets "slipped" in with pretty much the exact same work as the other buckets. Both of these wells fill just a bit snug (at room temperature) on the bucket at the very top, but it loosened up significantly as I worked the bucket up and down with a magnet and after squirting some oil around the well, so I think all is well. Especially considering that aluminum expands much more than steel with temperature, so the clearances will only increase as the bike heats up.

[trbig]

Yeah, sometimes they can be a pain in the butt. If they get stuck, it's because they get cocked in there just a bit. I'll take the wooden handle on my rubber mallet and tap around in a circle.. or you can sometimes see which way it's cocked in there and give a few taps to the opposite side, then all the sudden it will slide right into place.

If you've done any valve grinding or such, you'll basically have to go back to the beginning to get the valve shims right. Just do one side at a time, installing just one cam at a time. Remember to have the head up off of the work surface so the valves have room to extend all the way down while you spin the cam. They drop lower than the machined edge of the head.

[clcorbin]

I was able to get by with just cleaning the valves and then lapping them. Only two valves were out of spec and they were just out. I would say I have the new shims and am ready to put the head back, but I just figured out I went the wrong bloody direction on calculating new shims, so I have a 240 and 245 when I really need a 230 and 255! (And for those who don't like math, yes, that means I originally had a 235 and a 250)

Now I just have to decide if I want to pull the cylinder off tonight to replace the base gasket, or if I want to hit that in the morning. I'm kind of tempted to get cleaned up and go see Atlas Shrugged Pt2 tonight.

[CaptonZap]

Glad it worked out, but I hope you cleaned up after the Dremeling. Yeah, it's aluminum, but aluminum grinding swarf turns into little pieces of aluminum oxide swarf, and you know how abrasive that is.
Please tell me that you cleaned out the grinding dust throughly after the operation, and didn't let any get down in the sump.
Any time you do something like that, a second hand holding a vacuum at the work site does a lot to help keep the dust out of the works.
Makes the little woman feel needed. CZ

[clcorbin]

I cleaned it up pretty good after the grinding, including using carb cleaner to clean out the well before wiping it completely clean and dry with shop wipes. I'll give the head an additional once over before reinstalling it just to make sure as you do have a very good point on aluminum oxide.

The head was on the bench when I was working on it, so I'm not too worried about the case as the rest of the bike was about 6 feet away and I was between the head and the bike. And no one has ever claimed I make a good window...

[trbig]

Those cylinders can be a major PITA to get off and many sets have been destroyed in the process. Plus, after you get the cylinders off, there's lots of scraping to do to get the old gasket off. LOTS of scraping.

With those buckets.. or anything you're assembling actually, it's a good idea to use some sort of assembly lube. There will be zero oil on those parts on startup otherwise.

[clcorbin]

Getting the cylinder off wasn't too bad. I soaked each bolt a couple of times with Kroil penetrating oil to soften up the assorted "stuff" packed in there then blew it out with compressed air before hand to remove as much of that stuff as possible. It was a bit of a pain, but it came off fairly easily.

I was most worried about splitting it, but that was very easy with a couple putty knifes and a small hammer. After than, I worked it up with a long flat blade screw driver and pulled it up. It did fight with me near the top like most other folks have experienced, but another shot of kroil from the top of each bolt flushed out enough junk that the head came right off.

Getting all the old gasket material off was DEFINITELY NOT FUN! I ended up using one of my wood working chisels (razor sharp) to get most of it off. But I had to be REAL careful as it would cut the aluminum almost as easily as it would the gasket.

I made sure to lubricate everything up well with oil (rings, pistons, cylinders, buckets, cam bearings, cam lobes, etc.) when I was putting it all back together. I'm happy to say that it went back together smoother than I expected (especially after the first time trying to get the rings compressed with the hose clamp!). Also, I turned the engine over several times by hand and verified that the oil system was primed up to the cam, so it should be good to go.

Oh, and 99% of the oil leak WAS from the timing chain adjuster (big surprise, I know!), but I did find a small leak from the inside of #2. But given the way the cylinder fit in there with the gasket and the orings, not much oil could come out that way.

At this point, I am happy to say the top end is buttoned up with the cams adjusted and everything seems to rotate (by hand) nice and smooth like it always did, so I will call that a good thing. I just have to get the carbs reinstalled (always fun! ... ... NOT!), set the timing and sync the carbs. Hopefully, that will be fairly quick tomorrow morning.

[clcorbin]

She is all back together and running well. Another carb sync and fine tuning of the idle mixture got her purring away at idle.

I had a slight scare when I first (tried to) start her up as she wouldn't start, but would spit back a bit. I had removed the ignition advance mechanisim for a good cleaning (that bearing was NASTY and ROUGH!), and sure enough, I put the trigger wheel on 180 degrees out. Oh well. Quick and easy fix. She fired right up after that.

The only thing that didn't go according to plan is setting the ignition advance. I couldn't find my timing light! It's in there somewhere, so maybe I can find it with the bike out of the (small) shop and I have room to breath. I marked were the advance was bolted down before I removed it, so I know it is in the ball park.