Topic: ...what have I done?

[dave500]

if you miss a gear under full accelleration and hit a false neutral dont worry about it,,those revs are well within the design parameters and more than soaked up by the over engineering,these short strokers have a pretty sedate piston speed even at high revs.

[DJ_AX]

yep .. my 550 has popped out of 2nd @ 8k+ getting on the freeway ... revved to 10k+!
and like the op... I mistakenly downshifted once too... ...
She's still runnin' great!

[Sparked]

I was once told of a conversation between an old bike mechanic I know and the Honda factory rep where they were discussing redline. The Honda guy said that redline on a Honda is not maximum engine speed; but is maximum continuous engine speed. Meaning you can wind it out and hold the bike at the redline all day and it's running where it was designed to be.

[lucky]

Crap.

So I just picked up a nice '75 400F. Good maintenance all its life, no rattles, ran pretty well, compression and leakdown came up ok when tested (don't have the numbers handy, though). A little over 14k on the motor, but timing chain is in good shape, along with bottom end—no funny noises. Idled fairly smooth.

So what do I do? I go out to ride it yesterday—first full-length ride on the bike since I bought it—and overrev the thing.

I'm not a total noob; I rode a couple 400Fs and 750Fs in college. But it's been more than a few years, and I'm just getting back into riding. As such, some of the motions and reflexes are a bit rusty. And I had a brain fart while coming off short little acceleration burst. Going for third (from second) at about 8k, I somehow toed down instead of up, and dropped it into first. I was momentarily stunned that I even did such a horrible thing, and it took me a hair longer than it should have to grab a handful of clutch.

I feel like a total, complete, and utter moron. Why? Probably because it's just about the dumbest thing I've ever done with a machine. All I want to do now is check the damn thing over to make sure I haven't done anything disastrous, like break a valve spring. The question is, what else should I be looking for? I have a pretty strong mechanical background, but I'm not that familiar with these engines. Aside from visually checking for broken springs and maybe getting more compression/leakdown numbers, is there anything else to check? No odd noises have showed up, but I'm starting to get paranoid, and I can't tell whether or not this gearbox rattle was there before...or if it was this buzzy at high rpm. (Like I said, I don't have many hours on this particular bike.)



Thoughts? I'll take any advice you've got...



Thanks!

I will tell you something that will get you over this.

If you took the throttle of most any Honda and turned it till it was wide open while running and held it there for a seconds the valves would start to float. meaning they cannot keep up. That limits the revs.
It won't blow up.

Ho do I know this?

My Honda shop service manager showed me one day.
IT scared me... but I got over the idea that a mis shift would bow up the engine.

IT happens in racing all the time.

[singedebile]

'lucky' that must be what happened with my bike, it almost sounded like a rev limiter...  just came back from a great ride with some friends, and I can say she still has plenty of kick to her. Thanks for reassuring