Topic: Second compression ring - which side up?

[Maltboy]

I was reading the thread the other day about the guy whose freshly re-ringed CB was smoking badly.  Someone mentioned that the middle rings might be upside down.  I don't recall seeing any marking on the ones I installed in my CB750K2 engine. Did I miss something or do all middle rings have an up side?

[bryanj]

All Honda rings have a marking by the ring gap of some sort and that mark faces upwards

[DaveBarbier]

If there are truly no markings then it doesn’t matter.

[bryanj]

Markings do wear off on used rings and it is only if there are no differences or markings it dont matter

[Maltboy]

All Honda rings have a marking by the ring gap of some sort and that mark faces upwards

The one's I used were aftermarket Japanese rings. I forget the name but they came in a blue box.  The top rings had a gold C on the up side, but I'm almost sure there were no markings on the middle rings.  I'm going to pull the jugs so I can push the cylinder o-rings all the way into the groove (that's another story), so I'll double check the rings while I'm in there. The good news is I can assemble a CB750K cylinders and top end in my sleep now.

[Bodi]

The top ring is the compression ring, they usually have a mark indicating top... but the edges are as close to flat/square as I can determine so I don't know why orientation matters. The second ring is to scrape oil down and reduce oil burning, the edge is slightly tapered and should be oriented to scrape downwards. The oil drain rings, I don't think it matters which is above the springy one as they are so thin that I doubt if there's any tapered edge but I'm not sure. Any markings should go up though.

[Maltboy]

Thanks Bodi.  I assume that you mean the widest side of the taper goes on the bottom, right?

The jugs will definitely come off so I can verify those second rings are correctly installed.  It would've been a major bummer if it smoked after all the work I've done.

I figured out I bought T.K.R.J rings.

[bryanj]

Its a long time since i fitted 750 rings but from memory

Top ring chrome
2nd black with step downwards
3rd oil ring spacer first then rails.

Markings upwards, that includs the "std"  or oversize markings

[Maltboy]

After reading the horror story about another member's new rebuild smoking like a freight train, I was really worried that I had screwed up because I didn't see any markings on the second ring of my 750K rebuild.  I finally got around to disassembling the top end to check the rings, and it's a good thing I did.  With the aid of one of those head-mounted magnifying goggles, I was able to locate a very faint R on the second rings,  It turned out I had every one upside down! I feel like I dodged a bullet.  Thanks for your help!

Onward!