Kawasaki KR1000 Endurance Replica

Meh, road, dining room. What's the difference? 🤷‍♂️
Ay up Mr Duster




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Today I was going to drop the valve shims and buckets in, drop the cams in and torque the cam caps and check the valve clearances: as all the valves have been ground I was expecting zero gaps which would mean all out - undersize shims in, re check and then all out again for the correct shims to be installed.

Having cleaned the faces of the buckets I wasn't happy with 3 of them which had a few marks on the top - strange as the cams are good.

So I unpacked a spare cylinder head I had in the garage to fined out it was a GPz1100A (earlier head with shim over bucket) so I couldn't pinch 3 from there 🤷‍♂️

I then ordered a set of 8 buckets of Ebay for £22 delivered to pick out the best 3 to use.

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Then the postman came with my rear calliper bolts so I fitted that and gave up on any more progress, begrudgingly swapped to the hall way, filling and sanding a wall :(

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No. My commute alone is good for several thousand a year before I do anything else on the bike.
Rob commutes on a scooter 🛵 all my mileage is for pleasure thankfully as I don't have a commute 😇
 
Dug the combined headlight / oil cooler / front fairing mount thingy out of the garage and stripped it for a polish.

Top tip when polishing alloy, whether a mirror shine or a duller finish that I went for - use Mr Sheen for the final polish: this fills all the microscopic pores and protects it from oxidisation and it will last many months/years before needing a re polish, even if you use your bikes regularly like me :)(y) works for the garage queens too I guess :unsure:


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Now fitted to the bike...


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Dug the combined headlight / oil cooler / front fairing mount thingy out of the garage and stripped it for a polish.

Top tip when polishing alloy, whether a mirror shine or a duller finish that I went for - use Mr Sheen for the final polish: this fills all the microscopic pores and protects it from oxidisation and it will last many moths/years before needing a re polish, even if you use your bikes regularly like me :)(y) works for the garage queens too I guess :unsure:

Moths love eating alloy, the Guinness's
 
Cam shimming took a while, the engine had A2 40mm socket head screws fitted on the cam caps instead of 45mm 10.9 High Tensile Hex Flange Head Bolts. One was stripped 🤷‍♂️ so needed a Helicoil.

All the others appeared OK but I cleaned them out with a tap having masked off to do the Helicoil anyway.

I than ordered the correct spec 10.9 High Tensile Bolts at 50mm long and checked where each one bottomed out so as to get the maximum length possible. Ended up with 48mm on most and slightly less on 2 or 3 that were drilled a little shallower.

There seems to be a shortage of these bolts in the UK - over 40mm were almost impossible to find, even my local Fastner specialist couldn't find them. Finally sourced them and proceeded to order 40mm instead of 50mm so a further delay ensued 🤪

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The valve had all been re lapped in so there was a zero gap initially - borrowed my mate Al's shim kit (he will be dynoing and setting up the bike) and fitted the 8 smallest shims possible then reassembled everything to get a start point measurement.
All dissembled again (shim under bucket) and fitted what I needed to get the upper limit gap.

Rechecked and all spot on (apart from 1 :mad: which had mysteriously grown 0.1mm) so all to come out again to swap one shim.

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The lift on these Cams is mahoosive! They are APE Stage 5 Pro Stock Cams with APE Slotted Cam Wheels...


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The line shows where the original cylinder head was prior to machining to clear the Cam lobes...


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Cam shimming took a while, the engine had A2 40mm socket head screws fitted on the cam caps instead of 45mm 10.9 High Tensile Hex Flange Head Bolts. One was stripped 🤷‍♂️ so needed a Helicoil.

All the others appeared OK but I cleaned them out with a tap having masked off to do the Helicoil anyway.

I than ordered the correct spec 10.9 High Tensile Bolts at 50mm long and checked where each one bottomed out so as to get the maximum length possible. Ended up with 48mm on most and slightly less on 2 or 3 that were drilled a little shallower.

There seems to be a shortage of these bolts in the UK - over 40mm were almost impossible to find, even my local Fastner specialist couldn't find them. Finally sourced them and proceeded to order 40mm instead of 50mm so a further delay ensued 🤪

View attachment 61302


The valve had all been re lapped in so there was a zero gap initially - borrowed my mate Al's shim kit (he will be dynoing and setting up the bike) and fitted the 8 smallest shims possible then reassembled everything to get a start point measurement.
All dissembled again (shim under bucket) and fitted what I needed to get the upper limit gap.

Rechecked and all spot on (apart from 1 :mad: which had mysteriously grown 0.1mm) so all to come out again to swap one shim.

View attachment 61304


View attachment 61305


The lift on these Cams is mahoosive! They are APE Stage 5 Pro Stock Cams with APE Slotted Cam Wheels...


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The line shows where the original cylinder head was prior to machining to clear the Cam lobes...


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Wow, having to machine the head to take the cams that's some lift.

Have you spun the engine to make sure the valves clear the pistons and by how much?

TB
 
Wow, having to machine the head to take the cams that's some lift.

Have you spun the engine to make sure the valves clear the pistons and by how much?

TB
I had this Engine on the road for about 5000 miles around 1990's in this spec- the engine was built originally by NCK racing who were one of the go-to tuners back then (although I have found the odd anomaly in there that raised an eyebrow)...






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