Connecting Rod Bolts

Leaving the rod bolted/torqued down on the rod will keep things from shifting on a daily rider/driver motor ,whether its a motorcycle rod or a rod on a v8 car motor.
Youre only changing 1 rod bolt at a time while the other bolt is holding the rod/cap/bearings tight against the rod journal,its not going to move.
If the big end of rod was round when you started it will still be round after doing it this way.
If youre building some hot rodded high strung fire breathing beast its a differant story.

what do you do to "resize your rod big end "and what bearing in sert do you put in?as far as i know the only thing you can do is put different bearing inserts in and check the clearance.

DFIGPZ, I was relaying what Kawasaki says about the big ends on rebuilding their ZG 1400 motor. I don't have a ZX 14 service manual to look at to see what it says about this. I would agree if building a fire breathing high HP motor, probably a good idea. But on a run of the mill fuel injected ZG motor which makes around 156 HP not required according to the Manufacturer.

I would also agree that going that extra step sometimes is worth the extra expense and effort. However on a stock motor, car or motorcycle it is not necessarily a requirement for many years of good service.

You guy's do as you may I am just trying to help someone from ruining crank and rod assy can it be done I do not know what i do know is when measuing big end of rod with old bolts TQ to specs you measure the big end run out then install new rod bolts and TQ to specs and measure again it Will Change ... if you want to do it fine its your engine not mine , if you done it and it worked out fine is it correct No. do as you please. :whistle:

ok so what do you do to "resize the big end "make the size bigger by honing .where do you buy the over size bearings ?
""i do not think so .try again and get back to me.

I don't know about other bikes but the FSM for the z500 makes no mention of replacing the rod bolts and simply says to check the clearance with plastiguage and replace bearing caps based on the makings on the rod. Same from the crank journals.

kawi810 wrote: ok so what do you do to "resize the big end "make the size bigger by honing .where do you buy the over size bearings ?
""i do not think so .try again and get back to me.

The caps and rod ends are surfaced on flat mating surface making the big end slightly smaller,then the rod and cap are reassembled and then the big end is honed to size on a machine.
The big end of rod is same as origional after resizing,the i.d of bearings can be standard or undersize depending on condition/work required on crank.

This resizing rod bolts I've never heard of, also individually honing and fitting components in the factory I'm not sure of.

The crankcases, rods and main /big end bearing journals are all in two or three sizes and assembled by selective assembly to get the tolerances. By size marking components it allows for some drift in machining accuracy, and allows for thicker bearing inserts to compensate for wear. The markings are difficult to see on an old engine, plastiguage is the real test imo.




I carefully check the condition of the nuts and bolts, and weight the whole rod assembly, usually the same within about a gram. I tourque them dry with no oil or threadlock.

If you remove the cap to plexigage the bearings and (or) install new bolts I've read they should be resized like Plubmen says .....says it slightly distorts the hole ........ on Chevys anyway so I imagine this means on bikes too........ betting its very minor and most don't though unless its a all out motor.

Kind a makes me glad I didn't split the case when I did the top end. :laugh:

You are correct it distorts the big end of rod if the big end of the rod is out of round then no bearing is going to fix it ...