ssanddemon

I am always hearing 'heat cycles' on new break-in and I can't really wrap my head around it. But the fact that Jeff suggests it lends some weight. The thing that makes sense to me is a couple of good warmup-and-cool downs then a retorque of the head and cyclinder bolts due to gaskets settling into place and shrinking a bit. The last shee motor I put together lost about 10 ft lbs on the head nuts after cooling down the first time. Other than that, I'm blank because it's not heat treating- that's done at very high temps using extremely gradual and precise heating and cooling processes. Anyone wanna clue me in on heat cycles: pro/con/irrelvant?

Cool. You know not to hold in the clutch down long hills, right?

Well, that's good. It is a mistake to hold it on the power for any real length of time- the new parts expand from heat, and giving a cool down period between power application will keep the pistons from scuffing. What is important is cylinder pressure, not rpm. This means that the engine needs to be loaded; this can be done just as easily at the bottom of the power band as the top. Obviously, if any mods were done while the engine was apart, the main thing is to make sure it isn't running too lean. A poor setup isn't going to do a new motor any favors at all. My own personal belief in regard to the manufacturer's poor break-in directions is this: the critical aspect to a "power" break-in is to change the oil VERY frequently to remove the metal from the engine. Very few new vehicle buyers can be trusted to do this, and engine damage will occur. I went thru this with my dad last year when he bought a new honda outboard motor. He insisted on following the lame break-in directions, which included putt-putting and the first oil change at 50 hours. Personally, i would have run the motor hard and changed the oil after 1/2 hour and again after 5 more, then again at 20 hours. I would have then considered it fully broke in. But he did it their way and his oil almost instantly turns dark after oil changes due to poor ring seal. Go figure.

No worries. Helicoils properly installed are stronger than the original threads.

That's fine. Your motor won't die (significantly) sooner or be less prone to breakage if you baby it and heat cycle it- it just won't run as hard as the guy who does a proper break in. Just about any reputable race engine builder breaks in motors on the dyno. You think they are letting it idle? Hell no, it's getting run right into the power band and staying there after cam break-in.

Motoman is a god. His rules on break in are right on the money- high cylinder pressures on the fresh crosshatch will finely set the rings for maximum life. Make sure to change out the gear oil pretty quickly after the first ride, and do it while hot. You may see some fine metal and silicone sealer come out after any major build.

13 tooth front fer sure in the sand. I found that the bike goes way plenty fast topped out in 6th and that having a smaller gearing spread made me able to get into the band on the next gear up- a massive improvement for very few bux.

Ya, 7 HP is BS. The typical 45HP bike will pick up 3 or 4 HP. Which is great, I love my v-force reeds!

Kneel on the grab bar to squish the bike as far as possible, then reach down to feel free play. I like mine pretty snug, like 3/4" or so. The main thing is, you want the chain to be as tight as possible without stressing the countershaft bearing when at full squish (landing off jumps, etc). Got 2 years of heavy duning on the factory chain & sprockets with this proceedure. My buddy used to go thru a set of sprockets every few rides until he started running his chain this way.

Trying to remember back a few years ago when I bought my black 03 new.. seems like I did have to rejet with just the snorkel off- ran better but flat thru the mid range. But it picks up a couple/few HP easy- a noticeable seat of the pants difference. The next thing I did was to cut out the entire center of the airbox lid- keeping the perimiter to hold in the crappy stock filter. That needed another rejet and got me several more ponies.

I have had the clutch cover off three or four times with the same gasket. The trick is to glue on one side and apply a fine coat of grease to the other. That way it always stays on the cover and never sticks to the cases causing a tear when the cover is removed. Also, apply some silicone grease to the coolant tube o-ring.- Keeps it fresh and slides right on.

NO. You must install an eliminator kit.- It has the idle stop screws. If the carbs you bought already have the screws intalled, then you are all set. If not, you will have to buy a kit or connect the wires and use the TORS carb tops. It won't idle otherwise.

Just had to jump in here since I 'tired up' wrong and have been living with it for a couple of years. I have 9 paddle Extremes (10x10s) on my 55- or so hp bike, still with stock length swingarm. I have the power to turn the tires, but the hookup is way too much in the steep stuff; can't keep the front end down. It's great for playriding with the kids- just point and shoot wheelies, but I have to run the tires backward in the tree shots. The setup is calling for either an extended arm or fewer/shorter paddles.

Wow, a few are freaky suggestions! I would certainly use some real filter oil on the air filter, certainly not ATF or worse yet, totally dry. The crankcase doesn't much care what's in there as long as it's full or a little overfull and you change it often, though most guys don't run synthetic due to clutch slip. Plugs are good at .020 to .030, the smaller gap for high compression motors. 30:1 is rich on mix unless you are running crap oil. I run 60:1 with Klotz Benol.

Brian is right, this one has been covered again and again. In a nutshell, If you have the eliminator caps and throttle stops in place, unplug all the TORS crap and either throw it out or leave on with the wires hanging. It is then totally out of the loop and affecting nothing. If the guys with cylinder miss are having TORS problems, it's not from lack of this suggestion. I guarantee it gets mentioned every time as one of the first possible sources. You can do a search on 'TORS Meat'. Meat wrote up a really good step-by-step on everything banshee electrical a couple of years ago, should come up.

Sure, check the reeds. There are a bunch more things it could be as well. Quite a few guys with left side misfires lately, lots of really good tips will come up with a search.

Yeah WTF, dude? So you wore out a 1 year old banshee riding on the street in Brooklyn, New York. Start your mods by tightening down the loose wingnut behind the bars.

Since your bike is revving up on it's own, it's running REALLY lean. Don't try to ride it until you get this worked out. The very first thing I would look at is the fuel strainer screen in the tank. It's easy to get at if you drain the tank. You can then flip it over and remove the fuel petcock valve from the tank. You will see the screen on the end of the valve, probably full of crud. I cut mine off an put an inline filter between the tank and carbs, works better than the strainer and much easier to get to. Sometimes a float will stick in one of the carbs, and a few sharp raps on the side of the carb with a srewdriver handle or similar medium-weight tool will break them loose. If neither attempt fixes the problem, you will need to take the carbs apart for cleaning.

It's really pretty easy: If your Passion cable is for a thumb throttle, it'll never fit a twist. By the same factor, a twist cable won't fit a thumber. The cable end where it attaches to the throttle tube is about 3" longer for a twist. I have had the Motion Pro twist and wasn't impressed with the finish. It started to corrode and get ugly prety quickly (and yes, I do wash my bike after every ride). If you do get the Motion Pro, just buy the complete kit from Rocky Mountain for $46 and make sure to give the aluminum a quick paint job to prevent corosion. The CR reference is to the Honda CR bikes, it interchanges with the mid-80s CR 125-500 twist grips.

WD-40 or similar. Just to keep it from forming rust between rides. Actually, I hear lots about the lighter penetrants getting past the o-rings into the sealed area and thinning the grease. Maybe a wax-type preservative is the way to go. But no lube on the chain per se; it's got the lube sealed in behind the o-rings.

Use oil on the tap. I mean a lot of oil! Screw in the tap about 1/4 turn as you dribble oil on it, screw it back, then in some more. Continue this back and forth while slowly gaining a little depth at a time. Occassionally, screw the tap all the way out, knock it against something to get the accumulation of shavings off it, then back in for more cutting. This keeps the tap from grinding the shavings into the new threads as you go. This is the proper way to cut threads in any kind of metal. I think guys run into problems just trying to crank the tap in dry all at once.

Not totally true. It is true that the airbox lid holds the crappy factory filter setup together, but only at the front edge of the lid. For free, you can cut the entire center out of the lid, leaving only the edges all the way around to properly locate and retain the filter. Works just like no lid at all. If you keep the factory filter, be sure to grease the foam sealing edge of the filter LIBERALLY to keep crud from getting around it and into your motor.

BRUTAL! This is an awesome thread for guys chasing cylinder firing problems, tho. Tons of good info on possible culprits. Sorry about the problems- maybe start looking for a good witch doctor?

I notice that someone mentioned a leak down test, someone else said "whats that?" the answer given- and then it was promptly ignored. This happens a lot when someone finds out what kind of a pain certain types of tests can be. But just about any bike shop can do a leak down for cheap; just get results only, and let them know that ahead of time. The incentive to perform various acts of sodomy will be reduced, and you can avoid buying all the leakdown equipment. They will probably find a bad crank seal in the test.- That's what my left side no-fire-problem ended up being (after I built the top end, replaced carbs, reeds, coils etc)- a $12 seal and 20 minutes to install.

What I have noticed after riding both the Honda and Yama 450s is this- steep sand chutes that I pull (several) gears running through on my baby have to be run in 2nd gear on the limiter on these bikes just to make it out at all. Yes, you can say that comparing a moddded shee to stock 450s is unfair, but the truth is that with equal engineering, a 450 will never spank a shee. For the most part, 4 strokes are built to be run in near stock form, otherwise longevity badly suffers. Any real gains come at the expense of titanuim exhaust valves, short skirted pistons, and thin cylinder walls for immediate heat transfer.- Oh wait, the 450s ALREADY have all these things and actually do need costly rebuilds every 50 to 100 hrs! Conversely, the shee is a functioning asthmatic until it gets pipes and at least a bit of port work. Don't get me wrong, the for-fiddies are a blast, but to really compare apples to apples, the new four strokes straight from the showroom have at least as much engineering toward performance as a moderately built shee. Therein should the comparisons be drawn- not that the 450s are fast, but that our poor little shee has been neglected for so many years while lesser designs have been propped up so far.