Thanks guys, the fastest I've said that I've been on a bike was 270 KPH (169 MPH) on my Honda VTR1000R (RVT1000R in the US) SP-1, and a peanut here from Germany questioned my integrity, suggesting that only in Germany did they have "Autobahns" that could carry that sort of speed, not realising that Germany will fit inside Australia 22 times, and the Hume Freeway (local to me) is only 60 miles short of Germany's longest Autobahn, and just as wide. Of course I'd never ride at those sorts of speeds on public roads, because that'd be illegal, and "legal" is my middle name......... (besides "safety", of course) You have to laugh when people think they know what they're talking about, when they're talking out their arses......
Anyhoo, yesterday was a much nicer day than Saturday. If I'd known just how good, I'd have put 5 litres of gas in the F2's leaky tank and gone for a ride with the Dyna coils to see how much better the ride was, but instead, I attacked the 1428 engine, as I need to move that bike out of the sheltered workshop, so I can start on the Z1. I cleaned the gasket surfaces on both the head and the Arias cylinder block, and sprayed a nice heavy coat of copper gasket spray on the copper head gasket to (hopefully) ensure a nice tight seal. I let it dry to the point where it was just slightly "Tacky" then dropped the head back in place.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. First I had to helicoil 5 of the 16 camshaft saddle bolt holess, as the sad thing about DOHC engines running big cams and heavy springs is that the puny 6mm screws strip out very easily when you go by the book to lock the cams in place as per the OEM manual, when setting the cam timing.
1428 head job 27 Sep 2020 1 by
Terry Prendergast, on Flickr
That was fine, and I dropped the head in place, and after torquing down the head to 30 foot pounds in 10 foot pounds (or "pounds feet", whichever way you pronounce it) increments, was very proud of myself for getting the cam timing spot on, on the first go. Keeping in mind that I haven't checked the valve clearances yet, I set the APE top cam chain guide in place, but didn't loctite it as yet, as because it has the more desirable "Shim under bucket" valve adjustment arrangement, once you work out what size shims you need, you need to remove the cams to lift the buckets, to replace the shims. I bought a 13mm shim kit so I have plenty of shim options, so hopefully I won't have any problems giving myself around 5 thou clearance on both the inlets and exhausts.
1428 head job 28 Sep 2020.jpg 1 by
Terry Prendergast, on Flickr
I didn't have to "clearance" the head for the Norris .425 lift cams, but it was close. Hopefully, not too close.
1428 head job 28 Sep 2020.jpg 2 by
Terry Prendergast, on Flickr
As you know, I had to wait 6 weeks for the APE cam chain guide. The OEM GPZ1100 head's cam chain guide is just a rubber block, held in place by a couple of cast in alloy studs.
1428 head job 27 Sep 2020 5 by
Terry Prendergast, on Flickr
To make it work with the custom APE guide, I had to "mill" out the cam cover to make room for the APE guide. With a dremel tool fitted with several burrs, my Makita 20,000 RPM die grinder and a hand held "finger sander", it took around 90 minutes to just get enough clearance. Once again, APE could have engineered it better, rather than expecting that all their customers would have the tools required to make it fit. I like APE stuff, but in this case, they've chosen form over function. Oh well, 90 minutes of my time as opposed to 1 minute on one of their CNC mills is no biggie, in the grand scheme of things. I did finally get the cam cover off, even though it's probably paper thin now...........
1428 head job 27 Sep 2020 6 by
Terry Prendergast, on Flickr
The Kawasaki production line is looking pretty nice though, I gotta admit. More soon.
1428 head job 27 Sep 2020 8 by
Terry Prendergast, on Flickr