Post
by Vince Lupo » Sun Aug 12, 2012 4:23 pm
Been so long since I've had any problems with the bike -- I knew I was due for one!
Went over to my friend Scott's house to meet up with him and Lee and Jeff for a morning ride. As I entered his neighbourhood, I heard a distinctive and fairly audible ticking sound (like a metal to metal ticking sound). The bike had been running totally normal up until this point -- about 15 miles ride from my house to Scott's. When I got to his place and put the bike in neutral, it was still making the sound and a bit of smoke was coming out of the valley cover (subsequently checked the oil level and it was fine). I ended up not riding the bike on our ride (took his fantastic '85 500 Interceptor instead!), and when we got back, Lee, Scott and I checked out the valves to see if one was loose. We adjusted the valves, but that didn't eliminate the problem (I should also point out that the bike would not hold idle). We concluded that the problem must be coming from that camshaft bolt/nut (I had that problem earlier this year, and John tightened the camshaft bolt/nut, and everything was fine after that). I called John (mechanic), and he thought that it could be that problem as well -- he described it as a long thin bolt that opens up a spline of sorts that allows both the 'male' side of the camshaft to connect with the 'female' side of the camshaft, and there's a nut that has what looks to be a 'tooth' in it -- does this make sense? Admittedly, I may not be explaining it quite properly.
In any case, he thinks that this has come loose again. Is there something that's causing this to come loose? Is there something that we're not doing correctly? John was convinced that he had that sucker tightened down pretty well, and hopes that he doesn't have to remove the camshaft again to get at it.
Has anyone else experienced this? Any ideas?
Many thanks!
