Well, to recap the story, we gassed up on I-90, drank some water, rested, etc., then went out to leave and I was hitting on 1 cylinder. I used my built in compression tester (my thumb) and determined the rear cylinder had no compression. I figured a dropped (stuck) or bent valve. An experiment on the feeder showed that I could hit about 55-60 MPH on the front cylinder only, so we took off for Pierre, the closest dealer about 60 miles away. We frequently stay in Pierre, so we got a room at the motel we usually stay at. After a short trip to a dollar store and Sears (in-pounds torque wrench), I started tearing the motor down that evening and had the head off by beer-thirty. The valve was proud of the seat about 2mm or so. The next morning, I took Dr.Linda's bike over to the dealership, about 4 blocks away, with the head and the shattered crossover pipe. They sold me the parts I needed, or thought I needed: gaskets, valve, guide. The crossover pipe was not available. I asked if they had a MIG welder and the owner said "yeah, but you can't use it." I just kinda looked dumbfounded as he walked away. The counter guy said "don't worry." A few minutes later, a guy walks in and says "follow me." He leads me out back and there's a Hobart Handler and an extension cord behind the shop. I MIG'ed it all up, doing my ugliest welding job ever (and that's saying something) on it, but it was windy and the welder was on the end of a long extension cord. It held up anyway. They didn't do machine shop work there, but the machine shop they used was 2 doors the other way from our motel, so that worked out. I brought the head and valve/guide to them and picked it up later that afternoon. The valve was actually fine, but the guide had dropped out of the head. He said he could tap it back in place, but since I had a new guide anyway, he put that in and lapped the valve. I returned the new valve I didn't need. I put the bike back together that evening and we rode off the next morning.

The moral of the story is to always inspect your crossover pipe. The one I had was literally shattered. My bike had been backfiring on deceleration for the last 15-20 years. I always thought it was sucking air at the muffler/pipe connection. It may have been, but the crossover was also shattered under the cover, where you couldn't see it. I figure that after that long, hard-run stretch on 90, then sitting at the gas station, the motor was real hot and air got in the exhaust pipe holes, cooled the valve and valve guide which loosened up the interference fit (there's no shoulder on the guide), then when I hit the starter at exactly the wrong time, the whole thing dropped out of the head. Anyway, we only lost about a day and a half and a bill or two. My friend, who owned a Harley dealership for a while, said that's Old School.

 

That would likely happen to me on the 1st day of a long Holiday weekend! You done good Doc!

 

What a story... dropped a valve and up/running the next day! I don't think you would have been able to repeat that story with any other brand.

and just since I peek'ed at you web page, I'm a BANA major from Texas A&M as well, class of '94. Gig 'Em!

 

Do we know each other, Ben? I graduated in '93, although I'm Class of '92. Surely we've had a class or 2 together. I was the older guy with the 'tood and the Harley shirt. I rode my bike most days (same bike in the above pics) so I could park somewhere. Dr.Linda rode her Sporty to school a lot also. Black (at the time) 883 with drag pipes. She used to set off all the car alarms in the parking garage when she rode past.

 

Wow small world! I'm sure we probably crossed paths at some point, but your name doesn't ring a bell. I started off at Baylor and rode a metric bike there. By the time I transfered to TAMU I had sold it off to help pay for school.

 

I was at TAMU from '89-'93, then UTMB -> '97. Remember that Hess is my first name, short for Hessel. Unfortunately, all my elective courses were things like Organic Chemistry 1 and 2, Physics, etc. I wasn't in the BANA club thing, but I did try to give them my database of every course, teacher and number of A,B,C,D,F,Q,X-drops for an entire semester. I called it "The Good, The Bad and the Ugly." Dip shiites didn't appreciate the power of information, and that's the BANA club. Bet they went far in business analysis. Probably selling used Chevys today.

I had a roommate once from Tomball. He got a degree in Dairy Science. Last I heard, he was rapidly moving up the cop food chain in College Station.

 

We could do with a Class photo to see if you are both in it!

 

I don't think we had any, Tup. There were over 35K students at TAMU at that time.

 

and I never took a yearbook photo while I attended.

As for BANA...I could never understand why I had to take so much COBOL programming when I told my counselor and PROF that as long as I had a pulse it would never appear on my resume (and I've held true to that promise). Yet they wouldn't offer classes on Client/Server networking technology which is something all I.T. based jobs were looking for at the time (MCSE, CNE/CNA, etc). I eventually got what I wanted, that piece of paper, which gave me the credential I needed to get started in the field that interested me.

 

In one class?! That's rather a lot to squeeze into one classroom, let alone a photo!