piston ring questions

[mighty13d]

Now that that is taken care of, lets drop the gloves, get our hands "muffed-up", and come out riding....

It's WAY too cold to be going out riding yet! There is patches of ice everywhere and a lot of sand too. lmao Plus my bike is in my enclosed front porch and the roof leaks out there. So, since we have had fairly mild weather off and on my bike is covered in ice along with my snow blower and everything else out there!

Be opportunistic & measure the ring gap (take a ring off a piston, put it in the corresponding bore by itself at various points, does the gap stay within spec the entire time? but from what you say you probably well adept at this). Personally if i was pulling the engine down for other reasons and figured i'd check the rings and bore "while i was there".

If the bore wasn't too sloppy & due for a re-bore, etc, i would consider replacing the rings if at any point the end gap went over halfway between minimum & maximum spec. If so, while you've got it apart, replace it.

Personally, my bike had 44 thousand km when i tore down the top end to replace a burnt out valve. Ring wise, everything seemed in spec but as i had it apart that was a good enough excuse for me to replace them anyway. And in a side by side comparison the old rings were noticeably thinner than the new ones i replaced them with.

Your last paragraph was pretty much where I'm at right now. It's not that I tore it apart to get at the rings, I just have it apart and couldn't decide if I should or not because they do not NEED to be changed. They are still within specs. The engine had just under 25k miles before being pulled. Also, I'm not the best at engine builds/re-builds, just trying to illustrate that I am able to do it.

[chef1366]

Put new rings in it and be done with it.
Change out the valve stem seals.
Check the valve springs.
Change the base gasket and head gasket.
Measure cylinders to make sure they are in spec.
Measure ring gap when installing rings
Hone cylinders
Do a visual check of the valves and seats for pitting and wear
Check cam chain for exessive back and forth play
Did I forget anything?

[mike-s]

Grind the valves a little anyway for good measure?

I replaced one valve as that was obviously the weakest link, and the seats were damaged lightly, but as expected. Took a little while to get the seats ground down, even with the course paste. I still gave every seat a decent run with the suction cap on a stick thingo just to make 100% sure it was seated correctly.

Another suggestion is to check the camchain length is within spec too as back & forth play only indicates the tensioner isn't quite up to the task. The cause of that play could be the tensioner having packed it in OR the camchain has stretched way way way too much (to a point that i would consider lethal to the engine AND the rider).

[argonsagas]

Argonsagas, Are they Hippo Hands on your bars? Do you find that they do a good job at keeping your hands warm? Thanks Ted

No, those are definitely not Hippo Hands. They are from a photo I found, make unknown.

I bought a new pair of original Hippo Hands (NOS) a few years ago, but used them only once.

They are really quite good quality and work well, but they did not suit the pull-back on the bars I have on the GK, making hand positions awkward for me, so I chose to use mitts instead..

I just sent them off to a new home a few weeks ago.

[headsbikesmopars]

Mighty13D,

I feel your question was a fair one. You wanted an answer to a good question that many of us have asked ourselves manytimes over the years. You just wanted an honest answer/ opinion as do we all. I see nothing at all 'out of bounds' with what you were asking. With that said...Go with what CHEF1366 said. All good and solid info there. I agree it is down so refresh it. Much easier now than after it is back together. As always...JMHO. And I believe that is what you were asking for and not useless information. Good luck

Terry

[makr]

I seem to remember that Matchless found some Fiat rings that were identical and a lot cheaper. There's a post on here somewhere but I'm blowed if I can find it.

Looking at other stuff, and found this thread. Research is like the match game.

http://www.thegsresources.com/_forum/showthread.php?t=134725&highlight=rings

[Nessism]

Looking at other stuff, and found this thread. Research is like the match game.


http://www.thegsresources.com/_forum...ighlight=rings

I found that thread too, but it won't do the US/Canada folks any good since that engine is not sold over here.