In this episode I fix one of the three compression leaks that were preventing this engine from running (and had the benefit of making it cheap enough for me to buy it!): the valves. This is also the most daunting of the three since neither of the two valve spring compressors I have tried were able to work on this head. Honda makes a valve spring compressor that works on this and most if not all of their other motorcycles, but the price is well out of my budget. In fact, it costs about as much as I have in the entire bike so far. I was planning to try building my own valve spring compressor, but then I found one that looks like a copy of the Honda part at a price I can afford, especially since I have other Hondas that I will likely need to use it on at some point. It is made in China (like most things nowadays), but it worked just fine.
Here it is, if you need one. I'm pretty sure it works on other makes of bikes, too.
2 comments:
I vaguely remember, in the old days, supporting the valve underneath and putting a socket on top of the spring and giving it a whack, which would cause the keepers to pop off. In other words the socket was the valve tool. Not sure how to get it back though, that has faded from memory.
Yeah, I've done that for getting the valves out. I don't know a good way to get them back in without a compressor, though.
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