I have been having some serious issues with the seals on the valve cover. It’s the simplest of jobs. You do all the time consuming work stripping all the bits off the bike to get access to the cams and such, do all that tricky stuff, then bung a strip of rubber between the two surfaces and tighten it up. That’s it. I’ve never had a problem with it on any other bikes, including lots of VFRs. I had to re-do the front one this time. Which is an arse to get to. I was paranoid about seating it right the second time. It took me lifting the cover about 3 or 4 times (to adjust where it was slightly out) then quadruple checking the seal was seated all the way around, to get an oil tight seal. Hopefully that’s the last time I’ll have to take them off for a few years. I’ve changed the cams, the valve clearances are within spec, the seals are tight.
I dropped the oil (and had to remove the radiator so had to refill that) so I’m hoping I’ve got the stray metal fragments.
My next job is fairly simple, just clean the new carbs when the arrive and swap them.
My new, new carbs.
I got a cheap set off ebay.
OMG!
I’ve never seen the like.
The first thing I noticed was the mixture screw heads are all stripped, so I was going to have to drill them out. I ordered a new set. Then I opened them up and saw the condition inside, as in the pictures.
I still didn’t despair. I set to cleaning them out. Then I tried to remove the jets and floats. They were welded in by corrosion. I got two of the pins out and removed the floats and got one set of jets out. Then it went pear-shaped. The head of next jet sheared off it was stuck so tight. I tried drilling it out then using my extractor. I was wedged in so tight the extractor snapped off in the jet!
I spent an hour of so trying to drill that out but in the end I admitted defeat.
I should have got the decent set for £50 more. Which I’ve now ordered, should be arriving tomorrow. I’ll give them a thorough examination before I touch a screw. I’ve still not got the other floats or jets out. I’ll try and strip them for parts. And then separate the carbs to see if I can put them back together again. If so, I’ll repair the set I’m taking off and sell it if the new set work.
I’ve got a quote for £320 for a complete carb strip, clean and rebuild with new seals.
The other, non-bikey news, is I that I appear to be fully sane again. The doubled dose of loony pills has finally done the job. I was resigned to living with always feeling some anxiety, and the dread of it flaring up into overwhelming panic at any moment, but now I can look for it and it’s not there. I was concentrating on ignoring it and never looking for it. Lots of distraction. But I’m going about my day forgetting about it now. It’s wonderful.
I’ve started running again. I did two 6 mile runs, both of which were a real struggle by 4 miles, then today did the extra ‘out’ mile to make it an 8 miler. That used to be my bread and butter, miles in the legs, run. To be fair, it’s wasn’t terrible this time, and I managed to gently push the pace at the end to bring it in at a sub 8.30 average pace. It’s a start. The main takeaway is that I wanted to do a run. And the first 6 miler I’d done my bike jobs but was still restless. I’m returning to myself. I’m already getting obsess-ey over buying bike bits.
It’s very, very, good to be back. You don’t realise how much of yourself you lose until it starts coming back.
Cool.