TOPIC:

Here is the web site that sells manuals by the original author, Pete Snidal. Royal Enfield guy;

www.enfield.20m.com/

I really got lucky on the gaps on the new rings that came with my pistons, 3 of the top 4 were right at ..0085 and one was at .0055 so I only had to open the one up .003. The second rings ran .0115 to .014 if I remember right and got to leave those also.

Before the start I checked comp and got 150 on all and 165 on all after 600 miles. I put 50 miles on it (with a few 4,000 to 6,500 pulls in 3 and 4th after it was fully warmed (followed by a nice easy cool off for a quarter mile or so). Then re torqued the next day and then did a pull or two like that every ride till I hit 600. Maybe 10 - 50 mile rides.

At 600 miles I finally topped it out a couple times through 5th. Running exc except for now that damn starter clutch. Has 900 plus now.
I also changed the oil at 100, 300 and 600 and with all the break in oil, stp, oil and breaking in metal mixed in it needed it.

In the 70's I put in STP because my motor started to smoke. I ran it until the broken cam chain and the overbore etc to fix it. All the 903 piston pins were blue. The rods were OK so I put it back together. Never use STP on a good engine!
Steve

STP is an oil thickening additive. it's got no business inside a decent engine. If your engine is burning oil like crazy than maybe.

My first car was a Triumph TR4. It overheated one day and a piston stuck. Got it loose but had to file open the ring grooves since the piston was distorted. Got the engine running but it was burning a LOT of oil. Threw in some STP and the burning reduced. Sold the car. Never used STP again (and never will).

I used STP in every car we had back in the day (and there were many) as well as my KZ 750 since new throughout it's life off and on. It's basically 90W oil with some additives that do various things. Of interest today is that STP still has Zinc additives that were removed from car oil, so you can use it to bump the ZDDP back up. It is probably superfluous given that there are much better syn oils available today but back in the 60's and 70's, a lot of people used it.

STP is an oil thickening additive.

It's base is around 90W and it's quantity is about 12 ounces. So if you add it to four quarts of 10-40 oil (about 128 ounces) there is a 10;1 dilution so it bumps the viscosity up to about 18 - 48W wich is pretty close to 20-50. In my bike I used to use a 1/2can of STP which bumped the viscosity up to about 14 - 44W which isn't much higher than regular 10-40.

When I was a kid I worked in a gas station pumping gas. We always checked the customers' engine oil while pumping gas. The owner insisted we try to sell a can of STP to anyone who's car was a half quart or more low on oil. We sold quite a bit, BUT what a royal pain it was pouring it into the engine. Why? Because I worked there during the Winter and the owner insisted on keeping the STP rack outside so customers could see it. Once that stuff got cold it was like trying to pour caulk! I'm sure it was fine one it blended with the car's engine oil. Ed

That was a time when 100.000 miles was all you could get out of a motor. Tolerances were loose compared to today's standards. The Z1 came out with roller bearing lower end and tight tolerances all around. Those were the days of Ray Lube (paraffin base) oil and STP, seal swell and all the other crap we as dumb consumers bought up. I look back on it now and liken myself to an ape or a dog following his nose. I cost myself a premature rebuild after a disaster that was the result of using this junk.
You want cheap, you get cheap.
Steve

650ed wrote: When I was a kid I worked in a gas station pumping gas. We always checked the customers' engine oil while pumping gas. The owner insisted we try to sell a can of STP to anyone who's car was a half quart or more low on oil. We sold quite a bit, BUT what a royal pain it was pouring it into the engine. Why? Because I worked there during the Winter and the owner insisted on keeping the STP rack outside so customers could see it. Once that stuff got cold it was like trying to pour caulk! I'm sure it was fine one it blended with the car's engine oil. Ed

Actually.... you bring up an important point: on my bike, the oil pour goes right over the clutch. You do NOT want to pour straight STP in, I would always dilute it into the oil I was putting in at the oil change.

Guess why I learned how important that was......

The time I dumped straight STP onto my clutch, it wouldn't work for a while after I started the engine (until it got hot and thinned into the oil). I think in a car it won't matter but don't dump it into a cold bike's clutch.

swest wrote: That was a time when 100.000 miles was all you could get out of a motor. Tolerances were loose compared to today's standards. The Z1 came out with roller bearing lower end and tight tolerances all around. Those were the days of Ray Lube (paraffin base) oil and STP, seal swell and all the other crap we as dumb consumers bought up. I look back on it now and liken myself to an ape or a dog following his nose. I cost myself a premature rebuild after a disaster that was the result of using this junk.
You want cheap, you get cheap.
Steve

I remember back in the 60's not that unusual to see MOPAR cars with a 225 slant six that had clocked 150,000 on all original parts (even the water pump and oil pump) just had oil changes and tune ups. MOPAR was all we bought back then, their engines were legendary for being bulletproof.

No question the oil wasn't good then, or more accurately the additives weren't. The base oil used in mineral oils hasn't changed much. The new process of hydrocracking (used on fake synthetic oil) makes it better by removing more impurities but the oil is the same. Bikes had a real problem back then because the viscosity increaser additive would shear out in 500 miles or less leaving your 10-40 oil just being 10W oil....

650ed wrote: When I was a kid I worked in a gas station pumping gas. We always checked the customers' engine oil while pumping gas. The owner insisted we try to sell a can of STP to anyone who's car was a half quart or more low on oil.

Just about everybody worked in a gas station at some point back then. The crooked ones would do the old "short stick" where they only push the dipstick in part way and then come running back showing how it was a quart low. They would add a quart and then the engine would blow it out......

swest wrote: I look back on it now and liken myself to an ape or a dog following his nose. I cost myself a premature rebuild after a disaster that was the result of using this junk.

Steve

I actually worry more about that now as oil makers are changing the oils in response to the FED like taking out all the ZDDP. The really scary thing is the new "SN" service grades with viscosity like 0-20W. The thinner oil is being phased in for exactly one reason: increased CAFE (fuel economy) as mandated by the FED.

If somebody who doesn't know better were to put that crap in a ten year old car, they would be screwed. I cringe to think what it would do in an old bike.

The point is that all through the 60's, 70's and up until around the early 90's each new service grade of oil was unconditionally better than the previous. You just bought the newest grade. That's no longer true. New oil isn't even safe to use in some older engines. I wonder how many engines have been screwed up by people who went to Pep Boys and just bough the name brand oil and put it in their car not realizing that new oil can't be used in old cars.

OK, here's a text book question to all involved. What is the primary purpose of oil in an engine.
First one that answers correctly gets a cookie. DR
Steve