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-   -   Servicing Valve Clearances... (http://forums.sv650.org/showthread.php?t=85507)

joeheaven 13-03-07 02:44 PM

Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
I've been recommended Supreme Motorbikes (or similar) near The Imperial War Museum for getting my bike serviced and was wondering:
a) Does anyone else know them? Are they good?
b) How much I should expect to pay for a 15,000 mile service (valve clearances etc).

timwilky 13-03-07 03:05 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
The 15,000 mile service includes a valve clearence check. 95% of the time, no adjustment would be necassary. I would suggest that to add 1hour labour to your normal service costs should cover the check.

Only if a problem is found are you going to be into significant extra cost. (2 hours additional labour). IMHO Charging for a service to include unknown work content (re-shimming) would be a bit naughty. They should include the cost of the check and phone for an authorisation to proceed if a problem found, unless you agree up front for them to do the re-shim if a problem is found on the check.

joeheaven 13-03-07 03:09 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
Great news, thanks, my top end is a bit noisy at certain revs...Any idea of cost from an independent friendly type shop?

kcowgergmm 13-03-07 05:16 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
is this hard to do it yourself?

joeheaven 13-03-07 05:18 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
I don't have a garage, and I wouldn't attempt it on a bike. It's easy on an old car like a vw beetle but these beasties are awkward to get at and probably have twice the number of valves. Getting it wrong could be rather costly!

Biker Biggles 13-03-07 05:43 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
Easy to check them yourself.You just need basic tools and a feeler guage,but if you find they are needing adjustment it is quite a tricky job.You can save money by doing your own checking and only putting it in the garage if it needs doing.

SVeeedy Gonzales 14-03-07 01:18 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
What would happen to the engine if you carried on riding it with the valves not set right? Would anything get damaged or would performance just be compromised?

Would the rider notice anything, and if so, what?

Flamin_Squirrel 14-03-07 01:24 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by SVeeedy Gonzales (Post 1137962)
What would happen to the engine if you carried on riding it with the valves not set right? Would anything get damaged or would performance just be compromised?

Depends how far they're out i believe, but the answer to both is 'yes'.

jambo 14-03-07 02:03 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by SVeeedy Gonzales (Post 1137962)
What would happen to the engine if you carried on riding it with the valves not set right? Would anything get damaged or would performance just be compromised?

Would the rider notice anything, and if so, what?

That depends on whether clearances are tight or loose.

Too loose and the valves won't open for as long, or by quite as much, they tend to sound a bit noisy at this point (although not by much, and only if they're loose by quite a bit) Engine performance will start to drop off as a result. It's not great for the engine either.

Too tight and the valves won't close as fast, or in bad cases at all, As the valve is not spending enough time tightly seated in the valve seat it can't transfer heat to the head and gets very hot. This can lead to burning valve seats and valves (that's expensive, don't do that). Also it can lead to low compression is one or more valves is not closing tightly (We are talking quite a long way out of wack at this point).

In short it's a job that you really can't tell by listening if it needs doing, it's quick to check but a bit fiddley to adjust. On my ZX6R I had to change 11 out of 16 shims at the first check and the engine felt and sounded the same. But I knew it wasn't going to eat itself.

If you're cack-handed enough adjusting the valve clearances you can dammage the head, valves, and pistons if the piston meets a valve because you put the cams back in in the wrong timing position. So make your own call on if it's something you want to do, but do get it checked on schedule.

:mrgreen:

joeheaven 14-03-07 02:07 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
I'd guess that short term, just performance would suffer. Longer term neglect could probably cause damage but I don't know for sure.

Sid Squid 14-03-07 02:32 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
Read this:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Me! (Post 852749)
The valve clearance check is scheduled every 15,000 miles, so at 20,000 miles it's slightly overdue, yes it is entirely normal to find some clearances out of tolerance - that why it's a scheduled check. That said the SV is known for not needing a lot of adjustment, that doesn't mean it's never needed though.

Generally speaking exhausts close up and inlets open a bit, so your finding the exhausts a little tight is not something that can be ignored. As you're going to be removing the cams I'd reset everything to as near the middle of the allowable range as is possible, that way it's odds on the longest period until it needs doing again.

Every time the inlet valve opens it receives a nice cooling rush of incoming gas, and when it's closed it dissapates heat through the valve seat, even though that's a small area for conducting away heat - every little helps - in short the valve itself has an easy life, and thus wear in the opening mechanism commonly outweighs the wear to the valve - thus the clearance often opens up a bit. Exhaust valves however don't have such an easy time, they get and stay very very hot, their primary way to dissapate heat is the thin ring of the valve seat, and a little up the stem, everytime the long suffering exhaust valve opens it gets fried with gas at/near combustion temperature - typically 300-700C - thus in the case of the exhaust, the valve tends to wear more than the opening mechanism, hence the clearance reducing.

Also we have a nasty Catch 22 - if the clearance becomes significantly reduced, (or worse still if there's no clearance and the valve never fully closes), the valve spends less of the already small amount of time that it should do closed, thus it never disspates the heat it should do and can literally melt, this is called burning a valve, no surprise there, and you really don't want to get into that.

A round of applause for your exhaust valves please - the hardest working bit of your bike, full stop.


SVeeedy Gonzales 15-03-07 12:40 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
Ah well, not too much to worry about then, not even at 9000 miles yet. I'll probably crash and write the thing off by 15,000 miles.

joeheaven 15-03-07 12:52 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
I just spoke to an SV mechanic in a central London bike shop who said that they have done loads of checks but had never an SV650 that needs adjusting! If they needed adjusting the noise, apparently, would make it obvious. He said they are very solid motors...

jambo 15-03-07 01:14 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by joeheaven (Post 1138763)
I just spoke to an SV mechanic in a central London bike shop who said that they have done loads of checks but had never an SV650 that needs adjusting! If they needed adjusting the noise, apparently, would make it obvious. He said they are very solid motors...

The fact that the valve clearances on the SV motors need adjusting infrequently is well documented. You will never hear a tight valve though, and as documented above it's a very bad idea to put it down to faith that they're ok. Get it checked or check it yourself, chances are it'll be fine but lets not tempt fate eh?:rolleyes:

Jambo

ujoni08 15-03-07 06:13 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
I'd like to 'move up' from checking all the easy stuff, and start checking the valve clearances. Is there a clear guide somewhere for doing this?
Jon.

Flamin_Squirrel 15-03-07 06:54 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by ujoni08 (Post 1139057)
I'd like to 'move up' from checking all the easy stuff, and start checking the valve clearances. Is there a clear guide somewhere for doing this?
Jon.

It shows you how to do it in the service manuals, available to download from this site.

TSM 15-03-07 07:04 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by joeheaven (Post 1138763)
I just spoke to an SV mechanic in a central London bike shop who said that they have done loads of checks but had never an SV650 that needs adjusting! If they needed adjusting the noise, apparently, would make it obvious. He said they are very solid motors...

For the peice of mind, get it done, should take you less than 1h to check them.

Mine at 20k ish, were all out, but my bike has not had an easy life. I need to do them again though as when i last did them afterwards the exhausts were a little tight, still in the correct range but not by much.

ujoni08 15-03-07 07:42 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
Flamin Squirrel, can you tell me how to find the manuals before I smash this laptop?:mad:
Jon

Flamin_Squirrel 15-03-07 08:24 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
http://www.sv650.org/sv_manuals.htm

kcowgergmm 15-03-07 08:53 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by SVeeedy Gonzales (Post 1138745)
Ah well, not too much to worry about then, not even at 9000 miles yet. I'll probably crash and write the thing off by 15,000 miles.

that is a great way to look at things

ujoni08 15-03-07 09:58 PM

Re: manuals
 
OK thanks. Time to get a feeler gauge and start reading manuals...
Jon.

oldie 15-03-07 11:31 PM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
I just checked mine at 24,000 kms and they were fine. The next time I check them, I will remove the radiator, rather than just loosening it. It will make valve cover removal/replacement much easier and it will be a good time to replace the coolant at the same time.

Sid Squid 16-03-07 09:13 AM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by joeheaven (Post 1138763)
I just spoke to an SV mechanic in a central London bike shop who said that they have done loads of checks but had never an SV650 that needs adjusting! If they needed adjusting the noise, apparently, would make it obvious. He said they are very solid motors...

Whilst this is true, the SV motor is solid and they don't require much valve adjustment, it would be extremely unwise to ignore the scheduled check.

Written in answer to a previous, related enquiry:
Quote:

Originally Posted by Sid Squid (Post 883838)
I can understand exactly what you mean, the SV is well known for not requiring much adjustment, but as an unscientific example of how random it can be I've adjusted nothing at all on many 15,000 mile bikes but just recently did one, (that I've known from new, so can be certain of the mileage), at the same 15,000 that needed three shims changing. Another SV, just on 95-100,000 miles now, has had only three valves adjusted in all that time - five have never moved at all, but the 45,000 check on another late last year revealed four needing attention.

Go check.

Quote:

Originally Posted by oldie (Post 1139245)
I just checked mine at 24,000 kms and they were fine. The next time I check them, I will remove the radiator, rather than just loosening it. It will make valve cover removal/replacement much easier and it will be a good time to replace the coolant at the same time.

Good way of doing things. I'd only remove the rad if the coolant was to be changed though, just removing the mounting bolts allows you to move the rad plenty far enough to give good access, particularly if it's subsequently found that no adjustment is needed.

timwilky 16-03-07 09:31 AM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
For an indication of what a service should cost, i came across this the other day. I am not saying it is what all should charge as obvously overheads/labour rate vaty but use it as an indication. No recommendation made about this dealer. I have never used them nor know anyone who has.

Baph 16-03-07 09:35 AM

Re: Servicing Valve Clearances...
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by timwilky (Post 1139399)
For an indication of what a service should cost, i came across this the other day. I am not saying it is what all should charge as obvously overheads/labour rate vaty but use it as an indication. No recommendation made about this dealer. I have never used them nor know anyone who has.

Bugger me at the cost of the 600mile service on a K6!!!!


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