TOPIC:

Wish I had room for one of those, both in my wallet and in my workshop. Enjoy!!

Nice indeed wish I not only had one but the skill to make good use of it too!!!

Kawboy wrote: Kawboy's going to be deadly now. Just bought a baby lathe, big enough to fit the camshafts in. I'll modify a tool post grinder to fit the lathe and grind my own camshafts. THEN we'll also get around to doing the camshaft drive chain gear modification to allow adjustment of the camshafts. Now I'm getting back into my old life style. Looking forward to some serious intellegent modifications. Yipee !!

Very nice John! I've often wondered about grinding on a lathe. Go for it! I'm ready to learn.
Bill

Wow Kawboy that is very interesting information about the camshafts. I find it interesting that some many shops offer a weld re-grind service. Some people swear it's never a good idea, others disagree. I have had this done in the automotive world, and in that case the results were very good. I was planning on regrinding a set of cams for my 1300, but in its current state it runs quite well, and I have decided I don't want to upset the state of tune.


Nice lathe, I have used my 9" south bend for crank and cam inspections. I would suggest fabricating a degree wheel that fits to the back side of your spindle, then you can very accurately measure and plot your cam profiles.

I have seen mods to make adjustable cam timing were the original gear is machined down to a flange of about 1/2 the original thickness and an outer diameter large enough for a an appropriate bolt circle. The donor sprockets, were cut off an old camshaft with a band saw then machined to fit the flange on the new cams. The result looks similar to the way kz750 cams are put together, but with slotted bolt holes.

Adjusting cam timing can really wake up an engine, it can also cause some serious headaches. With adjustable cam sprockets you can find the "sweet spot" with some trial and error. This will be fun to watch. Keep it up!

Tyler wrote: Wow Kawboy that is very interesting information about the camshafts. I find it interesting that some many shops offer a weld re-grind service. Some people swear it's never a good idea, others disagree. I have had this done in the automotive world, and in that case the results were very good. I was planning on regrinding a set of cams for my 1300, but in its current state it runs quite well, and I have decided I don't want to upset the state of tune.


Nice lathe, I have used my 9" south bend for crank and cam inspections. I would suggest fabricating a degree wheel that fits to the back side of your spindle, then you can very accurately measure and plot your cam profiles.

I have seen mods to make adjustable cam timing were the original gear is machined down to a flange of about 1/2 the original thickness and an outer diameter large enough for a an appropriate bolt circle. The donor sprockets, were cut off an old camshaft with a band saw then machined to fit the flange on the new cams. The result looks similar to the way kz750 cams are put together, but with slotted bolt holes.

Adjusting cam timing can really wake up an engine, it can also cause some serious headaches. With adjustable cam sprockets you can find the "sweet spot" with some trial and error. This will be fun to watch. Keep it up!

I talked to Megacycle cams about the "process" and they told me that the cams are weldable, just a lot of issues with warpage from the welding and having to restraighten them. Delta cams on the other hand had some catastrophic results and refuse to do a weld/grind. I have a set of bitched cams that I had ground to 280 duration and .350 lift, but they had to cut .150" off of the base circle and I told them I could afford .050" off of the base circle. Shitheads. I'm so done with machine shops. I could have got a chimpanzee to do the work. Just follow my flipping instructions. what I might do is overlay a stellite 6 hard surfacing on the bitched cams and bring the base circle back up to spec and add enough material on to the peak of the lobe to achieve .375" lift. That should work nicely with my ported heads. In the end they cam lobes will look like this.





Back on page 12 of this post, I showed a CRF 450 timing gear that I picked up from EBay. Same width, pitch and 36 tooth. the APE Store ape-store.com/shopsite/page34.html just happens to sell adjustable sprockets for the CRF 450 which could be used on the KZ1300 provided some machining is done, hence the purchase of the lathe. I will machine a backing plate to bolt onto the cut down existing gear on the camshafts and tap the plate for bolting the adjustable gears to. I haven't decided yet whether I will have a set of indexed mounting holes to provide - + 2 degree increments in a 10 degree range, or just 2 mounting holes and use the slotted sprockets. If I use the stock CRF 450 gears, then I have to go with the multiple bolt holes patterns. I've heard of issues with the cam mounting bolts when using the slotted sprockets, backing off and the timing going out and possible bent valves. The multiple indexed bolt design is more positive but not as adjustable.

Now that you have a lathe, it might be easier to weld / relocate the collet grooves on the valve stems so you can tip them back to spec.

Just a thought - seems to me this would be an easier task than welding / grinding the cams.