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Congrats on the progress and looking good! Keep after it, you are making good headway and before you know it will have an awesome bike and can spend many miles and hours enjoying the ride

Brett

It looks like I'm updating this log every month or so now, which between work, family, and school seems to be a pretty good pace..

I finally was ready to tackle my DIY Valve Job.
Started with soaking all valves on degreaser to see if it would aid with carbon removal.


Degreaser removed dirt and oil, but did nothing for carbon. On to mechanical methods...!
So... i mounted the valve on my drill and rotated it while holding it against a wire brush, which yielded crappy results on its own:


Time to undust my carbon removal tool (also known as a screwdriver)


Then alternate between screwdriver, and rotating drill against wirebrush method...

Ahh.... much better!!!

Pretty good surfaces to work with. Some exhaust valves showed a bit of pitting, but all of them were workable.


On to lapping!!!


Then Rattle-can treatment


Add some viton seals!


All assembled!


Cams in place in order to check clearances


5/8 valves were within clearances. I ordered a couple of shims from Z1enterprises.com which should be coming soon...

Getting excited!!!!
It's been a year and a half in the making, but this motor is almost ready to go!!

Woooh hoooo!!!!

Good to see you are still at it Ed, keep up the good work!

Looking great Ed, was wondering what the progress was on this as I really love following along with this unique apartment build! Congrats on all the great progress and it is really coming together, keep it up and thanks for sharing!

Brett

Ed, love what you are doing, great build you have going on. What I like is this build is done with a lot of ingenuity, especially with the tools and respect to how you use what have to make this project, progress. Kudos! keep it coming!

Roy

Guys, thanks for the amazing feedback; it helps me along this crazy project.
In a way, some of these posts are 50% sharing and 50% approval seeking... Ha ha!
I enjoy coming up with inventive ideas to these issues, but just when I'm feeling clever, I see that my own manual instructs to use my fingers to compress the piston rings, or use a wire brush to clean carbon off valves... Then I come back to earth
I am looking forward to finally buttoning up the motor... Can't wait!!

Hey Ed.
This is such a fun build to watch!
Fact is, often during my own pursuits I find myself thinking - "Now what would Ed_in_Miami do?" when I realize I don't have the 'Kawasaki Special Tool #....".
Your ingenuity and tenacity get my respect man!

Ed, you are doing an amazing job on that bike. You are an inspiration. Please keep going.

Reading through your thread I was quite dismayed to see you got yourself an Athena gasket kit. I bought similar for a Suzuki GS1000 build I performed only to learn after the engine was up and running that the material Athena uses for the base gasket is not up to task. It was too soft and compressed and oozed out of position when the head was tightened. Since the snafu experienced with my engine I've seen some other Athena gaskets where the green material looked somewhat different so maybe they upgraded. At any rate, please see the photos below and make your own decision on whether you want to assume the risk on your engine.

Well... if that's not cause for concern, I don't know what would be....
I am Fairly certain the Gasket set is not-Athena though, but I will certainly check on that when I get home...

Nessism wrote: Ed, you are doing an amazing job on that bike. You are an inspiration. Please keep going.

Reading through your thread I was quite dismayed to see you got yourself an Athena gasket kit. I bought similar for a Suzuki GS1000 build I performed only to learn after the engine was up and running that the material Athena uses for the base gasket is not up to task. It was too soft and compressed and oozed out of position when the head was tightened. Since the snafu experienced with my engine I've seen some other Athena gaskets where the green material looked somewhat different so maybe they upgraded. At any rate, please see the photos below and make your own decision on whether you want to assume the risk on your engine.

Ed_in_Miami wrote: Well... if that's not cause for concern, I don't know what would be....
I am Fairly certain the Gasket set is not-Athena though, but I will certainly check on that when I get home...

Athena is the only company I'm aware of using green gasket material. I think they sell under more than one brand name. Check to see if the package says "made in Italy".

Ok,
Checked the gasket.....

Country of Origin is Taiwan... Admittedly not the best choice, but definitely not the country that brought us Fiats, Shoulder-pads, and Athena crappiness ...

ON WITH THE BUILD!