Or at the very least cost me some big bux in repair bills
Here’s the scenario: I’ve had the bike for slightly over a year, it’s a 99 LT and currently has 53K, it had around 38K when I got it Nov of 06. I've had the oil changed out several times but nothing else done cep tires.
Last weekend I had some friends over to do a major tune up on it including a valve adjustment. The guy that helped me has done this 4 times prior (using the Gunsmoke method) and each time there were no problems with his machine or the others he has worked on. I got all the new parts, including oil pan gasket, filters, etc. I did the work while he guided me. I've owned airhead for years (since 76) and done work on them without a hitch so i know how to use turque wrenches, proper sequence for torquing head bolts and such but this is my first modern bike. Everything went well and we wound up swapping out 9 buckets that were too tight. Some we simply swapped around and 6 were replaced with new units. In three we had to go with slightly over on the lose side due to the .05 size limits on the bucket sizes. We got it all back together, torquing everything to spec and started her up and ran her for about 15-20 seconds and everything seemed fine. After they left I put the remaining tupperwear back on the next morning and on new years day I decided to go for a ride. On leaving out I noticed it smoking but since it had been on the side stand over night I wasn’t worried. About a ¼ mile down the road it was still smoking and when I stopped at a light a few blocks later I noticed a lot of smoke coming form the front of the engine and could smell hot oil. I quickly headed back home and when I parked her in the garage I noticed a puddle of oil form under the front of the engine. Damn Damn Damn!!!
After much cussing and being just generally bummed I started looking around and I discovered I had failed to replace the screw in the timing cover we had removed to hold the tensioner while removing and replacing the cam shafts! the oil on the back of the front fender confirmed that's where the oil was coming from so I replaced the screw and checked the oil level. I topped it off, which took around 2 thirds of a quart bringing the oil level in the sight glass to around half way between the bottom of the red circle and the center dot. Note that this was with the bike on the side stand. When I started her up the smoking stopped, even with revving it to around 3K a number of times.
Then last night I was cleaning up the oil around the bottom of the engine then I started her up again, and within 30 seconds it started smoking again plus spitting what seems to be rather a lot of water with flecks of black onto the garage floor and after a minute or so oil smoke started coming off the front of the engine again and I noticed more drops of oil on the floor which had not happened the day before. Even after running it for a good few minutes it still continued to smoke, rather a lot it seemed, and it just seemed to get worse.
So:
1: why would it have not smoked the day before and then started smoking out the tailpipe again lat night as well as drip more oil? It does seem logical, if its smoking because something went wrong with the work, it should be consistent.
and
2: do I risk the 30 mile ride to the dealer or have it transported there and have them tear it down? Which means I wind up paying the majority of the $1200 for a full service plus whatever other damage was done by my bone-headed desire to save myself the cost of having them do it in the first place.
And I still can’t figure out this oil level check business. When I looked last night I couldn’t see any oil in the sight glass, yet after running it last night I then checked the glass after about 5 minutes and the oil was back up to 1 / 3?????
Note all this was on the side stand because I still can’t get the damn pig up on the center stand by myself.
In thinking back I realize I made another possibly fatal mistake because we were running late and the guy helping me needed to leave so we didn’t recheck the clearances.
Needless to say I’m pretty bummed and worried that I’ve toasted it and I still got 6K left on the loan.
Anybody what to buy a toasted pig?
RM
Here’s the scenario: I’ve had the bike for slightly over a year, it’s a 99 LT and currently has 53K, it had around 38K when I got it Nov of 06. I've had the oil changed out several times but nothing else done cep tires.
Last weekend I had some friends over to do a major tune up on it including a valve adjustment. The guy that helped me has done this 4 times prior (using the Gunsmoke method) and each time there were no problems with his machine or the others he has worked on. I got all the new parts, including oil pan gasket, filters, etc. I did the work while he guided me. I've owned airhead for years (since 76) and done work on them without a hitch so i know how to use turque wrenches, proper sequence for torquing head bolts and such but this is my first modern bike. Everything went well and we wound up swapping out 9 buckets that were too tight. Some we simply swapped around and 6 were replaced with new units. In three we had to go with slightly over on the lose side due to the .05 size limits on the bucket sizes. We got it all back together, torquing everything to spec and started her up and ran her for about 15-20 seconds and everything seemed fine. After they left I put the remaining tupperwear back on the next morning and on new years day I decided to go for a ride. On leaving out I noticed it smoking but since it had been on the side stand over night I wasn’t worried. About a ¼ mile down the road it was still smoking and when I stopped at a light a few blocks later I noticed a lot of smoke coming form the front of the engine and could smell hot oil. I quickly headed back home and when I parked her in the garage I noticed a puddle of oil form under the front of the engine. Damn Damn Damn!!!
After much cussing and being just generally bummed I started looking around and I discovered I had failed to replace the screw in the timing cover we had removed to hold the tensioner while removing and replacing the cam shafts! the oil on the back of the front fender confirmed that's where the oil was coming from so I replaced the screw and checked the oil level. I topped it off, which took around 2 thirds of a quart bringing the oil level in the sight glass to around half way between the bottom of the red circle and the center dot. Note that this was with the bike on the side stand. When I started her up the smoking stopped, even with revving it to around 3K a number of times.
Then last night I was cleaning up the oil around the bottom of the engine then I started her up again, and within 30 seconds it started smoking again plus spitting what seems to be rather a lot of water with flecks of black onto the garage floor and after a minute or so oil smoke started coming off the front of the engine again and I noticed more drops of oil on the floor which had not happened the day before. Even after running it for a good few minutes it still continued to smoke, rather a lot it seemed, and it just seemed to get worse.
So:
1: why would it have not smoked the day before and then started smoking out the tailpipe again lat night as well as drip more oil? It does seem logical, if its smoking because something went wrong with the work, it should be consistent.
and
2: do I risk the 30 mile ride to the dealer or have it transported there and have them tear it down? Which means I wind up paying the majority of the $1200 for a full service plus whatever other damage was done by my bone-headed desire to save myself the cost of having them do it in the first place.
And I still can’t figure out this oil level check business. When I looked last night I couldn’t see any oil in the sight glass, yet after running it last night I then checked the glass after about 5 minutes and the oil was back up to 1 / 3?????
Note all this was on the side stand because I still can’t get the damn pig up on the center stand by myself.
In thinking back I realize I made another possibly fatal mistake because we were running late and the guy helping me needed to leave so we didn’t recheck the clearances.
Needless to say I’m pretty bummed and worried that I’ve toasted it and I still got 6K left on the loan.
Anybody what to buy a toasted pig?
RM