Diving in head first!

It's coming along nicely I see.

Ohlins are a good addition as well.

Keep us informed...how much did Dan charge you for the shocks...I had a few talks etc. with him when I had my SP1.

SR

Looking good! Do you know anyone in the south bay that does restoration on cases? I'm in San Jose, and was looking for similar work, but Petaluma is a bit of a hike!

Ohlins were in the 750 USD range. That includes a bit for labor (oops labour) to sort them for the SR500. They started out with MX valving. Dan felt that they needed some spacers to mechanically fit up to the bike so I received sleeve bushings to fit the shock eyes to the frame mounts and some thick shim washers. BUT, actually, the stock Ohlins eyelets works fine as far as diameter goes and the washers to space out the shocks on the mount are the wrong size --don't know what sizing chart he was working off of. Anyway, that's what the lathe at work is for! Have dealt with Dan for a few years now, always helpful and does a great job. They sorted out my CBR 929 suspension nicely -- Ohlins shock, fork rebuild, damper etc...

As far as case restoration goes, the engine dynamics folks seem to be the premier place locally. I sent up everything UPS. For the cases, cylinder, cylinder head, head cover, piston, valves etc it was $25.00. Way cheaper than a drive up these days Call before you do this as they have a certain (logical) way they like to receive things. Basically, include a packing list, box everything up and pack inside a larger box. After they receive the package they call back with an estimate etc.... He specializes in porting work so I am getting them to clean up the ports and match the inlet to the Keihin FCR39 flatslide.
Turnaround time is about 3 weeks



The rearsets are certainly just that. I really like the position but these sort of things are personal preference of course. One of my very first bikes was a brand spanking new 1980 Ducati 900ss. Since then everything else I have owned seems luxuriant!
The one unexpected thing about the rearsets was the length of the peg -- very short but they seem to be comfortable and hold my foot in place.

Forgot to mention, the Ohlins were built to a 330 mm eye to eye length.

Started cleaning and polishing the case covers. First thing I noticed was a crack in the clutch cover case. This picture shows the crack viewed from the inside -- the black paint obscured the crack from the outside If anybody needs a clutch cover that could be repaired give me a shout.



Was able to get a new one from BikeaBandit.



I went after the generator cover and countershaft sprocket cover with paint strip (disgusting), wet/dry 220, 320, 400, 600 then Tripoli on a 2000 RPM wheel. I sanded in a water bath with a little bit of dish soap. The detergency of the soap did help keep particles away from loading up the sandpaper. I haven't gone any further with the polishing for now but will likely go to a finer polishing compound to see what happens. Was interested to see that some compound manufacturers suggest heating the piece to be polished before going to the wheel. Seems to help keep the wheel from loading up.




Does anyone have a more modern polishing "Recipe"? This is basically the same recipe I used on my 1978 GS1000 cases in the early 90's. Worked OK but there must be more effective methods out there? Maybe we could post a sticky on the site with the "preferred" SR500 polishing recipe ;D.


Has anyone tried anything on the case covers likes Nickel Plate or Clear Anodizing? Would like to get something "shiny" without the polishing up keep. I have good intentions when in comes to polishing but just know I would fall behind. I remember the sorry state of my GS1000 cases a year or so after I polished them up.

Also like to find a plating process for the XS 650 Hub I am lacing up for the front. Always such a nuisance to polish up between the spokes. Have heard some people have had success with clear powder coat. Any thoughts???

Here are a couple of shots of the slug thats going in (on the left) compared to the old stocker Yamaha piston (right). Its the 90mm Wiseco 11:1. Mark Apland recons that an 80thou copper head gasket should bring the compression down to about 10:1. Was a bit concerned with the cam chain length since I would be increasing the total chain path length by moving the camshaft centre away from the cam chain drive sprocket on the crank. Mark says this will work out just fine and seems to be a popular mod. Again, any advice/direction/warnings appreciated!






Thanks for the help/advice and encouragement.

Bill--

Mate, for the cracked cover, have a bead of TIG weld run over the crack and carefully clean off the resulting damage.

You should be able to do it so you can hardly tell, or not tell at all.

SR

Thanks for the case repair tips. Maybe I will keep the old case cover and fix it up when I get time. There are a few other deep gouges in it so it could take some effort!

I have the 251-40 cam in hand -- any thoughts on this grind with the 540 piston. Looking for something easy to live with -- starts and idles well and lots of easy torque on tight roads -- loads of that around here.

Thanks

Bill--

Freshly pressed crankshaft with new Falicon Con Rod undergoing incoming inspection by the lead mechanic on this project.







Crank was assembled by A&A racing in San Carlos -- if you are ever in the Bay Area this is a must see place. I think it was featured in Classic Bike a couple months back --its the flat-track racing shop that had the pet mountain lion.

We had a look at the Flat-tracker TZ-750 that they built up out of Robert's spares and an engine from UK. Roberts never raced it but they have pictures of the King Riding it. Amazing place.....the odd SR hanging around too. Lots of XR-750s, XS650s etc. They make hubs, triples etc for SR/XT/TT .