Right, back to this. I left off back in October with the engine mostly together but needing some new cam caps and the clutch cover needing to go back on. Back in May I bought a head off ebay which was complete with cams and caps for a trifling £65, so I am now rich with spares. I replaced these two caps:
Because whoever the moron was who built this engine last time had tried to force a bolt with the wrong thread down the hole that holds the rocker cover on top. All four are a bit mashed but the correct bolts at least go down into the other two holes. Behold!
That's better. I then decided to clean out the oil strainer and clutch cover of metal and blue hermatite. I knew the goo problem was bad but it turned out to be really,
really bad. Here is some of it below the rocker cover:
I think I scooped about that much again out of the clutch cover. There was also a bit of bearing cage hiding under the strainer, which is somewhat disconcerting when I have no real idea of the history of this engine other than it has had a hard life. The bearings are/were small though, possibly cam bearings or maybe gearbox. I also found a few pieces of bent wire, I think these are from the one way sprag clutch that forms part of the cam chain tensioner mechanism - the whole thing must've imploded. While checking everything over I also replaced the made up, solid allen bolt that is supposed to be the oil feed for the idle gear for the cam drives with the correct bolt with a hole right down it - this explained the poor condition of the inside of that gear! I later found the old bolt had been used as a frame fastener, the previous owner must have been a class A berk.
With the cam caps now properly in place I could turn the engine over for the first time - a 23mm socket on the crank/primary drive nut did the job. Thankfully it turns smoothly, with nothing obviously grinding or things hitting other things. I then put a spark plug in the hole and went for it.. It sucks and blows! Total success. Though I did find the plug cap to be decidedly knackered..
Buoyed by new found enthusiasm I turned my attention to the clutch cover. First I pulled off the gasket which had more hermatite on both sides, and scraped off the remnants of the original gasket and the rest of the goo. I then washed the spiders and a disturbing amount of grey metal sludge from the cover with a bucket of water. Then I left it in the shed to dry out.. Until October. You know how these things go.
With the Germany trip in September out of the way it was time to pick this back up. Doesn't it look great already?
A bit more gasket/sludge cleaning and scraping and the engine is ready to be buttoned up. I used the old allen bolts from the previous rebuild because these shiny things that have been put in by the previous owner are horrible, already trying to round out.
I took the cam cover off again to fill the engine with oil from the top - always do this after a rebuild, you need oil up there. I then removed the cap on the alternator cover and churned the engine over anti clockwise until oil spewed from the dowel near where the carbs will go - at least it pumps! Cam cover back on and the engine work is finished, until I start it and maybe find all the crank bearings are shagged. Right, time to put it all together then..
