Kawboy's restoration/conversion of a 1980 KZ13

 Christmas came a couple of days late. Good things come in small packages.

 

What's interesting is that the upper half of the old chain is longer than the lower half of the old chain suggesting that the stretch in the chain is not evenly distributed. Not uncommon but strange that I layed the chain out for a pic and this is what was revealed.

On a side note, I got the chain from HB Cycle in Lindsay Ontario and up in the loft they had a Eddie Lawson Replica or maybe it was Eddie's bike, I'm not sure but I know the owner of HB Cycle is a collector of rare rides. ELR's for the consumer had quarter fairings and this one is decked out like the original track bike.

 

Kawboy wrote:

 

On a side note, I got the chain from HB Cycle in Lindsay Ontario and up in the loft they had a Eddie Lawson Replica or maybe it was Eddie's bike, I'm not sure but I know the owner of HB Cycle is a collector of rare rides. ELR's for the consumer had quarter fairings and this one is decked out like the original track bike.

 

Beautiful motorcycle, it is a ZEPHIR decorated with ELR colors.

Old chain on top.
New chain below.
Piece removed from the KLN110 cam chain (16 links) on the bottom

It's done !!! Shortened the KLN110 camshaft drive chain from 88 links to 72 links for the water pump drive chain.
So, how did I do it ??
Carefully pushed out a pin until it almost came out of the far side plate. I didn't want it to come out of that plate because it would be a bitch to get back in.
Pushed out a second pin to remove the 16 unwanted links.
Lined up the 2 ends of the chain and then carefully pushed the pin back in until the peened end was back against the side plate.
Then peened the end over that was forced through the chain to split the chain.
Now the chain link was too tight. Back to the chain splitting tool and lightly pushed on the new peen to loosen up the pin. Still was too tight . Lightly pushed back the pin from the other side to center the pin between the 2 side plates. Still tight. Finally got a screwdriver from a miniature screwdriver set and placed between the 2 side plates and gently nudged them outward. Bingo !! The new joint is as free as the other joints in the chain.

I have no worries about this chain not performing as if it was a new 72 link chain. Since the chain is no longer available, this worked out for me. I like the idea of this replacement being identical to the old chain with the straight side plates rather than going to a standard 25H roller chain with the figure 8 side plates. I just feel more comfortable. I also like the fact that I didn't have to use a master link with a clip and since I couldn't buy a master link that had a pin that could be peened, this seemed to be my only option.

Also, with the chains lined up, you can see the growth in the old chain compared to the new chain and bear in mind that the old chain was still just within service limits .
New chain 20 links =127mm
Service limit 20 links 128.9mm
This old chain with 65,428 Km on it - 20 links measured 128.3mm

I've done that with Cam Chains and never had any problems. One tip I'd recommend is marking the joined link (somehow) to make it easier to identify - they're very difficult to spot once joined (but it would be useful to easily identify the link in order to inspect it occasionally).

Bucko wrote:

I've done that with Cam Chains and never had any problems. One tip I'd recommend is marking the joined link (somehow) to make it easier to identify - they're very difficult to spot once joined (but it would be useful to easily identify the link in order to inspect it occasionally).

It's easy to identify since the peened end of the pin is different than the manufactures peens on the rest of the chain, but it raises a good point- since it's a "modified chain" It should be periodically checked.
Thanks

Spent another 3 hours today cleaning up the lower crankcase half to get ready to button this thing up. Came across 2 things that I need to understand before moving forward.

1.) All the plain bearings on the upper half crankcase fit nice just like you would expect BUT all of the plain bearings on the lower half crankcase sit proud of the half joint on 1 side by enough to catch your fingernail on, so maybe .003" - .004" ? I checked everything trying to figure this out. Crap behind the bearing shell?  Nope. The only thing that I can see is that the locking tab that fits in the notch in the case to keep the bearing from spinning has aluminum crud and crankcase sealer built up in the notch and MAYBE it's not allowing the bearing to sit fully. I'll be looking at it again tomorrow. Sometimes I find it best to walk away and approach problems later and sometimes the problem reveals itself, so .......

2.) While cleaning up the half joint I noticed that the oil port that feeds the secondary shaft plain bearing doesn't line up with the oil supply hole in the plain bearing.  I popped out the plain bearing and I see a oil channel machined in the case that lines up with a similar channel in the upper case, so if in fact that's a oil supply channel, that's the last place you would want half joint crankcase sealer to fill up and block. So again tomorrow, I need to pull out the secondary shaft from the upper crankcase half and the bearing shell to understand just how the oil supply feeds the plain bearing and wherever / whatever else it supplies.

 

In this pic you can see that there's no oil supply port or channel to feed this oil port in the bearing shell
Also, see the notch carved out of the case web just in front of the bearing?? I only noticed it when posting the pic. It lines up with the camshaft drive chain. Gee I wonder why we modify the camshaft tensioner ?? Duh !!!

 

This pic shows the location of the camshaft drive chain and how a loose chain can carve the crankcase web.

 

This pic shows the oil hole in the bearing shell doesn't line up by about 12mm. Also shown is the channel in the lower crankcase that the oil port feeds around the perimeter of the bearing shell, but how / what does it feed??