Another pretty good day. Really hot and I had a little swooning episode, but recovered and put in my time. So earlier in the week I was rooting around in my parts boxes and came across these TS brackets. I'd been struggling with the TS decision. I just needed to nail down a mounting point, I can pick the lamps later. So I think these will do it. They should take a bright polish. I mocked them up with the ubiquitous SportBike Marker Lights.
I got my eye on some finned bullet turn signals from Kuryakin, but I'll use these to get finished. Any other lamp will now be a quick swap.
Time out, came across my Yosh 2 ring slipper pistons ca 1978. Hope to use these in an upcoming cafe project assuming I ever get this one finished.
They are "S2" making them a true 750cc. The markings on the skirt are "RSC". Cool. Hope i can get rings.
So I moved on to the head on the bench. I floated this question but never got a response. What does anyone do about the cam mounts? I mean, I have 3 pair and they all have scratches in the bearing surface. I think about you guys with "cam in head" motors, you must have the same scratches, but you can't go replacing the head on a whim. So, in digging around I came up with a 4th pair and they look pretty good, so the question is solved. But still how about checking wear? The manual says clamp it together without a cam, use an internal gauge and measure the bearing in the cam mount, then mik the cam and subtract. Who does this? So I got this great idea to use plastigauge. But the outside limit was 8thou and my plast tops at 3 thou. So off to the store. But the kids at the store didn't know what I was talking about. "Plasti whu? Come back when the manager is here. So I went to 2 different auto stores, same deal. Came back to the first and the manager knew and I got the "blue" plastigage.
All 4 checked out at 4 thou, so I'm happy. Picture is Green gauge, I didn't take any pictures of the Blue)
(not much to see, but we like pictures?)
Final check out for today was the reinforced cam cover. I've owned this thing for many years and finally getting close to using it. But I've taken it on face it was made accurately and thought i ought to check. The bolts that drive down from the top are to land on the 4 corners of each cam mount, pushing it into the head for stability. High RPMs and big bump cams w/springs make these things flex to the point where they can lose oil pressure, leak underneath, etc. There are 4 casting marks on each mount that conveniently serve as the landing spot for the tip of the bolt. (I am running a mild cam, and stock RPMs, so this is for show, as much of this exercize is. But I could put a big bump in if I wanted, I have the springs, Ti tops, and this cam cover)
I assembled the cam mounts and the cam cover, torqued it all down appropriately, then ran the hold down bolts into the cam mounts till I could feel them cut into the aluminum. At first i though I'd put some lipstick on them to leave a mark, then i figured it wouldn''t take much to leave a scratch and sure enough that was true.
You should be able to see the scratches to either side of the valves. The intake side landed slightly off their marks, but not enough to matter. The exhaust side landed perfectly on their marks.
From the inside, the bolts extend down from the bottom of their bosses about an 1/8 to 3/16", not much at all.
During the week, I hope to get to the magnafluxer and then to the cryo lab with engine and front end parts.
