Valve adjustment -- Disaster! Help please...

UT R1150R · Post by **UT R1150R** » Wed Jun 28, 2006 12:09 pm

Ok, I have adjusted my valves twice now. Each time I did them according to the "valve adjustment for dummies". This last time resulted in a kick to the groin.

Here goes...

My first adjustment resulted in a 'ticking' sound from the right head. I did them again last week and they sounded perfect. Turns out the exhaust valve tolerance wasn't correct.

During this most recent adjustment I tightened the locknuts a "snerk" (or what I thought was a "snerk") as stated in the OVAD.

Well, my first trip was to Vegas, via route 12 in southern Utah on saturday afternoon. I stopped to take a picture and heard valve noise coming from the left head. At the next town I took off the left valve cover only to discover that the locknut for the lower intake valve was missing!

. It wasn't in the valve cover either.

The bike was still running well and I didn't hear anything that indicated that the nut had found it's way into a worse spot (such as between the cam gear and the chain or in the transmission, etc)

After looking at the head for a while with the valve cover off, the only thing I can figure is that it went down the cam chain tunnel into the crankcase.

I had the bike trailered home and once there took out the oil filter, and drain plug. Still no nut

.

I've never heard of this happening before but I doubt I'm the first.

Public Service Announcement!!

Make sure your nuts are tight!!

I obviously didn't "snerk" it right and I hope to learn how to do this properly. Any ideas on this?

Can anyone give advice on the easiest way to find this nut without taking out the engine and splitting the case? If I can't find it myself and end up taking it to a mechanic, how many semesters of college will my kids have to pay on their own? I'm guessing I will get poked for at least $2000. So much for saving money by doing my own maintenance

--- kicks self in other nuts ---

Post by **DJ Downunder** » Wed Jun 28, 2006 2:06 pm

thanks for the advise...hope you find it..did you try a little magnet on a wire or string?

DJ

SLEDGE · Post by **SLEDGE** » Wed Jun 28, 2006 3:18 pm

Don't worry about the nut!

The oil pump won't pick it up. The pump has a screen on it. The nut will just lay in the sump. Look for the post by fozzie tidled Quality maintenance vidio for r1150, in the one for valve agustment it gives a torque value for the jamb nut. The dealer can fix you up with a new nut. Good luck.

Post by **Beemeridian** » Wed Jun 28, 2006 5:41 pm

Post by **Boxer** » Wed Jun 28, 2006 6:55 pm

UT, Belive it or not this was a question I had three years ago when I first started doing my own valve adj. After each adjustment I worried like crazy that those locknuts would somehow vibrate loose and fall into the engine. I have never heard of this happening before on this board so you may hold that honor, at least in this neighborhood.

I'm glad SLEDGE had some words of comfort for you and nothing worse occurred with the bike.

Just a tad bit of advice re the locknut. As I stated above I fretted about this issue until I was almost sick. After each adjustment, I would open up the covers again and check just to make sure I hadn't left one loose. I started using a torque wrench to tighten them and soon discovered I was inadvertently tightening the valves' adjustment ever so slightly with my torque wrench as I tried to torque the locknut. I would tighten and check. Find them too tight. Loosen and adjust. Retighten and check. Find them too tight again. It was very frustrating until I decided to can the torque wrench idea and go with the "feel" of how tight it should be as I held the adjuster with the hex key. I'm sure I got the locknut too tight many times, but a little too tight to me was better than having them too loose and fall off as yours did.

You should find someone who can work with you on an adjustment and let him show you the proper "snerk" and then you can loosen them and see how it feels to you, then retighten and let him check them. Do this until you are confident you have it pretty darn close.

Post by **challey** » Wed Jun 28, 2006 7:13 pm

Can't talk about what harm may or may not have been done in loosing the nut but the tips in the OVAD are actually pretty good if you have some appreciation of the torque values they are meant to approximate.
With nearly 13,000 on the clock, I've adjusted the valves on my R about every 3k miles using the "snerk" method pretty successfully. It probably helps that I am used to doing valve adjustments on other vehicles and have developed some feel for what torque value to tighten the R's locknuts to (if memory serves, 8 NM or something around 6 lb/ft?). This is a pretty low value - I think it is just bad luck on your part that you dodn't tighten things down enough. You may want to consider investing in a torque wrench which will take the guesswork out of things.
From the posts so far, it looks like you may not really have done much harm to your R. Hope that's the case and let us know how it turns out.

jbuzbee · Post by **jbuzbee** » Wed Jun 28, 2006 7:14 pm

good reason not to worry about it. How many have checked and actually found the valves out of spec after 16,000 miles???

UT R1150R · Post by **UT R1150R** » Wed Jun 28, 2006 10:32 pm

Thanks for all the advice and well wishes!

I'll do the following:

-- Try the magnet on a wire thing
-- Get a magnetic drain plug
-- Get a crows foot for my torque wrench
-- Get a new nut
-- Get extra nuts
-- Make sure the wife, daughter, and dog are not around to bother me
-- Torque the nuts
-- Hope the missing nut doesn't learn how to jump
-- Ride the thing

By the way, I found the formula for correcting the torque setting when using an extension. I haven't verified that it's true but it seems to make sense.

http://www.specialpatrolgroup.co.uk/...ue/torque.html

It's:

C = D (A/A+B)

The letters in the formula have the following meaning:

A = length of torque wrench
B = length of adapter
C = torque wrench setting
D = desired torque at end of extension

UT R1150R · Post by **UT R1150R** » Wed Jun 28, 2006 10:36 pm

Oh, and for those following this thread, the nut loss turns out to be a pretty common occurence.

I posted on advrider.com and got some interesting answers...

http://www.advrider.com/forums/showthre ... ost2904532

Thanks again for everyone's help. I'll let you know what happens so that you don't have to go through this yourselves

single650 · Post by **single650** » Thu Jun 29, 2006 1:52 am

I did it once on a Bandit

No damage - the nut disappeared somewhere, I never did find it.

I think that if it doesn't get caught anywhere in the first instant then it just settles in the sump and sleeps.