TOPIC:

I know far too little so don’t worry, you can’t ever insult me Kawboy!

Like I said you put me straight a few months ago on my other thread and I’m pretty sure I did it right that time as it was wrong before and the discussion we had made me check twice, plus consult the manual and compare what I did pretty carefully.

My worry is more the picture you posted on how to measure the chain vs the one I found in my manual. They are a link apart! That is 6mm and acc to Pete between 11 and 17 clicks on the tensioner we both have there is 6mm difference...

I can’t think of anything else that could be it really... my money is on a stretched chain, particularly as my primary and secondary chains were shot and I must have measured the cam chain wrongly... and left it in the engine instead of going with my gut and replacing it as well.

But just in case ... how could I check visually if it is routed correctly without taking the head off, or the sump for that matter as getting the exhaust on was a struggle!

Paul

Paul,

At this point, its looking like all the chains in your engine were at their outer service limit or beyond, including the cam chain, but due to the misleading information in the manual regarding the 20 links measurement, when the measurement is more than that in reality, that would explain the extra slack.
A new chain should solve this !

Please keep us all informed and I am always here on the phone if you want an instant opinion.!!

Pete F
UK

I really hope so.

New chain with soft link has been ordered with Oz.

I'll do a separate post on how I stick that one on without splitting the engine, for any future unlucky ones like me - they can hopefully then avoid the pitfalls I will no doubt fall into!

Paul

Ha! Found it. Page 27 of my other thread has a pic of me holding the tensioner the way it went in - correctly!

www.kz1300.com/index.php/forum/bike-proj...t-end-goal?start=156

I did the chain in situ. Follow from post #8794. It's a little tricky but very doable.
Kawboy's restoration/ cam chain replacement

I'd just like to go back to the math for a minute.
The pitch on the chain is 6.350 mm as new. So a new chain of 158 links is 6.350 mm x 158 = 1003.3 mm total length.
A stretched chain at the service limit is allowed to be 128.9 mm over 20 links. Kawasaki is allowing the pitch to go to 128.9 mm / 20 links = 6.445 mm
That means a service limit chain could be 158 links x 6.445 mm = 1018.31 mm total length.
The bottom line- a stretched chain could be as much as 1018.31 mm - 1003.3 mm = 15.01 mm longer than a new chain. So keep this in mind when you're trying to reason out "what the problem is."

So how important is it that we measure the service limit correctly??

Think about it. The secondary shaft pulls the camshafts around. The distance between the secondary shaft and the exhaust cam is close to 1/2 the chain and the stretch on half of the chain could be 7 mm. The pitch on the camshaft sprocket teeth are close to that so in effect the difference between the camshafts set up at new and then with a worn out cam chain could be off (retarded) by as much as 1 tooth on the exhaust and then add the stretch between the exhaust and the intake and the intake will be even further retarded. 1 tooth on the camshaft is 1/36 teeth x 360 degrees = 10 degrees of cam timing which is 20 degrees of crankshaft timing. And that's why one of my projects is to make adjustable sprockets on my camshafts using Falicon CRF450 camshaft sprockets (and a bunch of machining of course !!)

And if that's not enough, there's also the stretch to be accounted for in the primary drive chain and the secondary drive chain which will even further retard the camshaft timing. I'm all about engineering design as part of my understanding before "fixing things" Poor designs need special attention when trying to sort out mechanical issues.

I changed my Chain , many Years ago . My Brother was ' assisting ' , I said '' Here , old the ends of ths chain , do not move '' , well , you can guess what happened , chain disappeared . I 'phoned the People where I purchased the Chain , they asked ' what make and model ? '' , I said Z1300 , and had a loud guffaw done the 'phone , he then explained that what they usually say in this predicament , is sump off , turn the bike upside down . So this is what I did . In other words , when you have fixed the New Chain to the Old Chain , and pulling it through , Be Careful . Again , looking at your engine not turning over , from another direction , could you have filled a cylinder with Petrol , and Hydrolocked ? Happened to me , thought worth a mention .