Engine Leak Detection

Athlete’s foot spray powder is very useful for leak detection.  It is sticky so it stays on the engine until hosed off.

Clean the engine.

Spray athlete’s foot powder all around the suspected leak source.

Start engine

Let engine warm up while bike remains stationary

Riding the bike will blow the leaky fluid all over the place which makes finding the source very difficult.

Eventually while the bike is running in place the leak will manifest itself.

Follow the leaking liquid trail up through the white athlete’s foot powder to the source.

Hose the powder off (It's easy and all of it flows off with a bit of water)

Fix the leak.

Tinactin powder spray is the best for leak detection.  It is the stickiest.  Make sure to the label specifies Tinactin _Powder_.

Lance Gamma Big Bore Motor - Take 2

Starts easier.  Less abrasive engine sound while putt-putting through town.  Pulls so hard up top I haven't found where the power tapers off yet.  I used to run my 500cc motor to redline all day long.  It's so intense with the Big Bore up there that I always upshift.

This is what I bought my Gamma for.  I wanted a big motor so it could ride through town discretely while also being able to scratch my speed itch out in the country.  Suzuki installed a crazy powerband for publicity purposes.  Lance Gamma has finally evolved the engine to what Suzuki should have released in the first place.

Rick has been telling me to try running a gear or two higher than usual.  When I do that the bike is buzzing less than I am used to at any given point in a corner.  Less buzz makes me more comfortable, which leads to carrying more speed.  Going faster makes my suspension work harder.  Going faster makes me have more speed entering the next straight.  Which means I have more speed when the next braking zone comes up more quickly than expected.

So what starts out being more comfortable winds up also being faster.  Who woulda thunk?

This engine will take a while for me to explore the limits of.  That's a good thing ;-)

Philosophy of engine building / RG500 Stator Installation

I have recently proved to myself once again that it is possible to work too fast building an engine.  

A mistake which would have taken another minute to carefully avoid during construction can turn into twenty hours of consternation and repair work later on.

OK, here's a recent war story from my RG500: I skipped looking in the manual at the stator mounting page.  Seemed fairly simple, just three screws after all.  Didn’t see the notice to use locktite.  Didn’t use locktite.

Turns out stators are under lots of periodic stress as the magnets in the rotor whirl around and electricity is generated.  Lack of locktite resulted in stator becoming loose.

Loose stator rattled around for a while.  Until a few windings wore through against the rotor and shorted out.  Causing one of the three yellow stator output wires to break and the stator to fry. 

Fifty twisty miles from home on the Coast Highway while zinging along in 6^th.  Sudden and complete spark disappearance.

Talk about a buzz kill.

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Here's the fried stator:

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Here's the RG500 Shop Manual item about installing the stator.  I don't know what Thread Lock 1342 is.  I used Red Locktite.  It's OK to use Red on small threads, it's only large things that need to be heated for disassembly.

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Here's the loose screws.  Looks like they were rubbing against the inside of the rotor for a while.

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It would have been a lot easier and less time consuming to have read the manual and used Locktite than to have to remove the stator again.  Here's a pic near the end of the job with the replacement stator in place:

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It is important to pay attention to every word in a shop manual.  When they say "Route the stator lead wire properly" they mean it.  Suzuki cast a little post and threaded a mounting hole for a bracket just for this purpose.  After a previous rebuild I found out that if this bracket is left out the wire will rub the rotor, wear through, and cause the bike to stop running.

I made my own bracket.  It's in the top right of this image:

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Suzuki wants lots of Locktite around the stator and rotor:

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Factories are vary sparse with the words in shop manuals.  Each word is important.  Read it or weep ;-)

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Of course, there is another possibility.  Maybe I verified the words of an old AMA Pro friend "Never put a fastener on part way."  It is possible that I put the stator screws in finger tight then never made another round for final tightening.

Which ties in nicely with my opening statement about how important it is to be patient while building engines.

How to Anneal Copper Washers

Annealing copper washers makes them soft again so they can do their job.  Some people even recommend annealing copper washers before the first time they are used, as storage can cause oxidation hardening.

Annealing makes copper washers seal properly.  Copper washers can be reused virtually forever when they are annealed before each tightening. Copper washers get hard over time so simply putting them back in after a rebuild can lead to leaks.  It is a drag to have a fresh engine leak from the head nuts.

The process is simple, heat until it glows red, then let it cool slowly in the air.  Some confused people advocate "quenching" the washer.  Quenching, immersing in liquid, is a way to make hot metal harder.  We want our copper washers to be soft so they can form a good seal.  That's why we let them cool gradually in the air.

Here's a YouTube showing how it's done.

RG500 Transmission Oil Philosophy

The RG500 is the only 2Smoke motorcycle I know of which uses gear oil to lube some of its crank bearings.  The four center main bearings are lubed with oil from the gearbox.  The mains are all ball bearings, as are the transmission shaft bearings.  So oil which works for the tranny bearings will also work for the crank bearings.

The tranny also has lubrication requirements for the gear teeth.  After all, wherever there are moving metal surfaces lubrication is required.  Millions of 4Stroke motorcycles which share engine and transmission oil have demonstrated that engine oil can also work for transmissions.

Suzuki recommends using 4Stroke engine oil in RG500 transmissions.

The problem with using engine oil in trannys is the meshing action of the gear teeth shears the engine oil molecules into little pieces.  Think of oil molecules as being strands of spaghetti which get between the gears so they never directly touch each other.  Cut the "spaghetti" into short bits and the gears have more likelihood of direct contact with each other.  That is why gear oil was invented.  Gear oil has stuff in which allows the long molecules to survive the gear teeth shearing action.

As far as Gammas go the problem with gear oil is the stuff which prevents molecular shearing of the gear oil also limits the oil's lubricity with respect to the ball type bearings in the crankshaft.  Oil which is really good for gear teeth is not so good for the ball type bearings used in the RG500 crankshaft.

RG500 crankshaft bearings are expensive to replace.  Also lots of work splitting the cases just to get to them.

I used to think only of the tranny's requirements.  Especially with respect to the dreaded 2nd gear clunk Gammas are famous for.  Putting really heavy gear oil into a Gamma can make the clunk go away.  However, the crank bearings pay the price by being under-lubricated.  Heavy gear oil just cannot flow around ball bearings in a crank spinning 10,000 RPM.

Meanwhile, oil which is really good for the crank can also be really good for the tranny.  For a while.  Using engine oil in an RG500's tranny means the gears will merrily shear the long molecules in fairly short order.  The solution to that is to change the oil frequently.

Changing tranny oil frequently is less work than replacing crank main bearings.  My experience with using heavy gear oil is I have to replace my center crank bearings every time I have to replace pistons.  I know of  other Gammas which have had frequent tranny oil changes which have the crank bearings last through multiple sets of pistons.

So here's what I've come to about Gamma tranny oil: use straight 40wt engine oil and change it every 800 miles.

Lance Gamma RG500 Big Bore Kit First Impression

5th gear jumps off a wave in the pavement!  Same wave that used to make the front end light when I was getting it on caused both ends to skip off the ground for an instant.  It was accelerating so hard it didn't have time to lift the front before the back hit it so the whole bike got a little air.  No matter how hard I ride my Speed Triple it just soaks up this pavement wave and progresses forward.  The Lance Gamma Big Bore Kit has moved my Gamma into another realm of performance.

It also starts easier.  I've started this bike many times since I got it on 1985.  It has been through three sets of heads in the search for more performance.  Four sets of heads total, as the Big Bore Kit comes with o-ring heads having reshaped combustion chambers.  The bike now starts with less effort and more gusto than it ever has.   Here's a video of starting it after installing the Big Bore Kit. It is easy to see the engine is happy and wants to run with this setup.

It is more mellow when riding around imitating a normal bike with the Big Bore Kit than before.  The exhaust note isn't quite as abrasive.  The throttle isn't as picky at low around-town revs as it used to be.  It's almost 4Stroke-like now at legal speeds.

So, it starts easier, putt-putts in a more relaxed manner, while feeding steroids to the beast when given the stick.  When I get on it the Big Bore Kit it takes off with more gusto than anything I've ever ridden.  This is the most satisfying engine upgrade I've ever done.

There will be a whole series of posts detailing various assembly steps.  Closeup images of parts will be included, as in the RG500 Crankcase Splitting post I made a while ago.  For today I'm just going to post the bottom line: Lance Gamma Big Bore Kit Rocks!!!

Advice To A Young Man

Advice as you Head Out

As Samuel Clemens said “Take good care of your teeth”.

Every person you meet has something to teach you.  Seek the lesson they bring.  Sometimes the lesson is to get far away as soon as possible.  Sometimes the lesson is opening a door to a new and enjoyable aspect of life.  Hope each person is opening a door, while being cautious they aren’t trying to take your wallet.

As Pink Floyd sings, you must learn how to tell “a smile from a veil”

Look for women to bring the light side of living to you.  They are in the same ballpark and they are playing a _different_ game than men. 

Women live in a world of emotions.  Talking about emotions is a major activity for women.  Expecting women to talk about cool inventions and things that move civilization forward is like expecting ice to form in the desert sun.

Talk with men about what things do.  Talk with women about how they feel when things happen.

Never do with a woman that which you enjoy doing with a man.

Men solve problems and then leave them behind.  That is, men stop thinking about a problem once it has been resolved.

Women love problems because they stir their emotions and women live for emotions.  Women love problems, which is why they bring them back up years later.

Don’t let other people put their context into you.  They may be upset and you can let them have the emotion while you remain calm and reasonable.

Show respect for each person at all times.

Look people in the eye when you speak to them.

Honor is expensive by definition.  The only way honor can be demonstrated is by making a choice based on honor that has a personal cost.

Chick flicks never have the words Honor, Commitment, or Sacrifice in them.  Those words are absent from their vocabularies, other than as something that men do which they can take advantage of.

The story of the Woolly Mammoth and the Taber-toothed Tiger:  One day, the men of the village went hunting.  No single man with a spear can bring down a Mammoth.  The way to hunt a Mammoth is to have some men chase one into a trap where other men can ambush the Mammoth.  The Chase Men have to trust the Ambush Men to step out and fight at the right moment.  The Ambush Men have to trust the Chase Men to make the Mammoth run into the trap.  The Ambush Men trust the Chase Men to come in from behind and attack the Mammoth once it has been stopped in the trap. Without co-operation all the men will be hungry and some of them will be dead.   The men co-operate, get the food, and take it home to the women and children.  While the men are away the women head out to pick berries.  One of the women sees a saber-toothed tiger approaching.  She quietly gathers HER children and slips back to the safety of her home.  She leaves the other women and children to fend for themselves, as she waits for her man to bring home more food.

While in school take Intro to Everything, then make a career from the classes you ENJOYED and did well at.  If you can’t maintain a B average in your major you need a different major.

Work like you don’t need the money (do what you like and never work a day in your life)

Dance like nobody is watching

Love like you’ve never been hurt