Firstly, we were missing our self appointed team manager this weekend, she decided to go to work instead. So we were doomed from the outset, and had only our mutinous leader to blame.
It also meant we had no photographer and so thanks go to Mark P of 200mph.net forums for letting me use this picture, so far the only shot i have.The story starts really on Saturday morning when i fired the bike up to set the ignition timing with the strobe and noticed a large oil leak coming from the cylinder head. It was obvious where it was coming from once i looked, it seems it was missing one of the cam cap oil seals. 2 Days previous i had checked the valve clearances and immediately i realized i must have disturbed one of the seals without noticing and it was more than likely back at home on the workshop floor somewhere. After touring the pits on the scrounge for a replacement cap, it was Pro stock racer Len Padget who had a spare, and so we were back in action.
It wasn't until nearly 3pm before Comp bike was called to the pairing lanes, but it was worth the wait as the bike ran really well. It left a bit softer than previous runs as I'd taken some base pressure out of the clutch, still not enough though as the engine revs still dropped a little. The bike went straight and didn't ride the bars quite as much as the last pass and it crossed the line in a new personal best time of 8.7414 @ 150.51mph. This was also the fastest the bike has gone in anyones hands, i was well pleased.
However .... back in the pits i discovered the engine wouldn't turn over, coming to a definite halt at just before TDC, odd as it had run right to the end of the track without so much as a hiccup.
And so the investigation started, at first it looked like it might have dropped a valve, but this wasn't the case. then it was pointed out that the cam timing was out and it looked like the camchain may have jumped a tooth or more, so i reset the cams only to find that now instead of the valves hitting the piston the engine just became very difficult to rotate until it locked completely. There was nothing for it but to start taking the top end apart to determine what on earth was going on. In the dim light of our awning we eventually got the head and barrels off and discovered the cause of the problem, down in the camchain tunnel, splattered around the camchain sprocket on the crank was my missing cam cap! It came out in one piece using a magnet, and was very chewed up.
I very much doubt it had been like that during the run and i reckon it had only gone round the sprocket a couple of times, nothing seemed bent, all the valves looked ok and so we made the decision to get the engine back together and hopefully run in Sundays eliminations, after all we had qualified an all new best 4th place!
We were grateful to have some help from Bob Brooks and his crew with the loan of a spotlight as we had broken our only mains powered light and were working almost in the dark. Bob also helped me get the barrels back over the pistons, one of the trickiest tasks known to humankind!
I worked until 2.30am and got up again at 7 to finish getting the cams back in.
It all looked good until we tried to start it and the starter failed to turn it over. I noticed that the compression seemed really high and put it down to oil in the barrels, so i loosened the spark plugs a couple of turns and tried again, it fired up and seemed to be running ok. Finally we were called to race and so tightened everything up and went down to the startline. I backed the bike up into the burnout box and Stuart went to start the bike up ....... only it didn't, the starter couldn't turn it again. we tried a few times but with no luck, compression was still higher than usual and as yet i still can't explain why.
Back in the cellar I've started stripping the motor once again. There are lots of things that need sorting out over the winter and it's a good thing this happened now rather than the middle of the season, however my plans to race at the flame and thunder meeting at Santa pod have been canceled!
No comments:
Post a Comment