getting ready to pull the head

I have the origninal shop manual, wich should help me with alot of the dissasembly and reassembly. How do you guys mark your cams so that they go back in the way they were taken out. I dont want to mess up the timing.

thanks,

Nick

Nick, Have you actually looked at that manual? Remove your spark plugs, remove the points cover, turn the engine using a 17mm socket on the 17mm nut on the crank end (NOT THE 13MM NUT!!!) to TDC for 1 and 4 cylinders. You may need to turn the engine over twice. Look at your exhaust cam. There should be an arrow pointing FORWARD to the valve cover gasket mating line in the front. When the arrow points to the front, the timing mark on your engine case under the points cover will align EXACTLY with the line next to the T on the 1 and 4 part or your mechanical advance.

Remove your cam chain tensioner; there are two 6mm bolts retaining it at the rear of the cylinder block. Remove the idler assembly atop the cam chain well. This is the tower that the chain rides on. DO NOT drop the four bolts or rubber pads into the well! The pads will APPEAR to be bonded to the assembly but they are not; they are loose and sandwich a metal plate. I suspect you should replace the rubber pads when reassembling as the old pads will be hard and will cause the assembly to be noisy.

OK, the chain should be fairly loose. LOOK AT THE INTAKE CAM. You have a mark on this cam which says 28T... if you start counting at the first chain link pivot pins (not sure what these things are called but they are the pins that the side plates pivot on) above the arrow to the front, you will note that there are 28 pins to where the 28T is positioned. That is why 28 is stamped on the cam sprocket.

When you reassemble, put 1 & 4 cylinders at TDC. Put the exhaust cam in first so that the arrow points forward at the gasket mating line and then slip the intake cam under the chain with the 28T mark aligned to the chain (counting 28 pins as a reference) in the same way you removed it.

You can see pics I think at our website under "wg's Tech Stuff Index" in an article on VALVE CLEARANCES.

Agreed. No need to mark your cams. They are already stamped with the reference marks. Just follow the instructions in your service manual (or what George wrote) when reassembling.

I havent taken it apart yet. Im having the head sent out for a rebuild (valve job, re-ported). I have every tool I need except a 17mm socket. And im not even going to try using a standard socket. Can the rubbder pads be purchased anywhere?
thanks for info.
Nick

NickW900LTD wrote:

Can the rubbder pads be purchased anywhere?

Yes: www.z1enterprises.com/detail.aspx?ID=350

should i get new head bolts while doing the head rebuild?

Nick

You only have two bolts retaining the head. They are 6mm bolts on the ends outside the two outer spark plugs. The rest of the fasteners are nuts. The nuts that came from the factory work fine although they tend to rust some. APE makes head nuts that work well if you want to replace them. I have purchased cylinder head nuts that were slightly smaller than the brass washers under them and the washers will leak oil as the outer four nuts/washers fitted to engine studs have oil journals under them. These aftermarket stud nuts were not wide enough and the leaking occurred.