Topic: Do I need to have a shop rivet my cam chain?

[jakec]

I am needing to rivet my cam chain on my CL350. I have a new DID chain and a genuine honda rivet link. I have seen people say "omg I would never trust myself to rivet a cam chain" and others say they've done plenty without any problems. I have only riveted a drive chain a few times but I know how to do it just fine. I have a tool like in the pic, and I believe the 2.2mm pin is what's used to mushroom the pins?

[CycleRanger]

i did my own on my CL350. I should have bought a kit like that but I didn't. I improvised but if I had to do it again I'd use a proper tool.
I'm hoping my slightly-less-than-perfect job will hold up.
That kit will work although you may need to grind the tip down a bit, according to others.
There's some threads over at the Twins forum about riveting cam chains. (And some threads here.)
https://www.vintagehondatwins.com/forums/index.php

[jakec]

Yeah the pin end is flat, and I assume I want a rounded tip like on the drive chain riveting attachment, right? I figured I would need to round off the edge of the 2.2mm pin?

[CycleRanger]

Yeah the and I assume I want a rounded tip like on the drive chain riveting attachment, right? I figured I would need to round off the edge of the 2.2mm pin?

Yes.

[pekingduck]

The cam chain master link has a 3mm pin, with the very end not hardened. All you want to do is just push metal from the area arond/above the dimple to the sides. I'd try the smallest size first, not use too much force, and then go to the larger sizes if you need.

When I was working in Honda shops in the early '70s, we used the factory cam chain tool that was very much like a pair of vise-grips, with one containing an adjustable thread-in pin and the other side an anvil.  When it disappeared, we used a small hammer and punch, with a second person holding a larger hammer face to the other side as an anvil. 

This worked fine, the point being all you are doing is mushrooming the head enough so the plate doesn't slide off, since there is no side-load on the plate.  We even did this with drive chains. Just be sure to stuff the entire cavity around the chain with rags first.

[jakec]

Thanks for the advice, my whole top end is apart so I can hold the chain over to the side away from the openings. Do you suggest I round off the end of the 2.2mm pin, or leave it flat like it is now?

[CycleRanger]

Ideally a rounded pin will center on the hole and slightly "mushroom" the end of the pins.
It doesn't take much to secure the plate.

[jakec]

I ended up cutting the pin's length down by about 75% because it was buckling like crazy. I also rounded the end off. At first it was being really fiddly, but once I got that shaft shortened it was a piece of cake. I'm including a pic here showing the slack in my link, compared to the normal link above it. You can see the posts are nicely peened out.

[Rosinante]

I'm with the one who suggested to at least use the proper tool.  If properly swedged/peened it should be fine but think about this:  At 3000 rpm, the crankshaft is rotating 50 times per second.  At 6000 rpm....100 times per second.  And so on.......

Per second.

[Rosinante]

Also, shops do not necessarily do a better job than you would.

[BenelliSEI]

Also, shops do not necessarily do a better job than you would.

+1 to that! Another check is to very accurately measure the outside dimension of the links somewhere else on the chain (outside of faceplates, between the pins). Check the one you are pressing together. When you get the same dimension, STOP.

This works well when riveting your drive chain too.

[Oddjob]

I do loads of camchains. I tend to cut down the DID 219FTH chains to suit the 350/400/500/550 engines as the chain is far stronger than the normal DID219T/H chain fitted. I use a factory tool and the results are so good you cannot spot the soft link except by the fact it's usually got DID written on it and the rest of the links haven't. I turn the fitting plate inside out so as to hide the DID marking.

Oddly the new style chains these days tend to have the rivet peened rather than crushed out from the centre.

This is a chain I did, one of the links is a new soft link, hard to spot the difference from the factory rivetted links.



Just make sure the new rivet link moves freely.

[BenelliSEI]

“Just make sure the new rivet link moves freely”

Doing the measurement the way I suggested ensures you don’t “crush it”.