Yeah, troublemaker! Now you went and made me spend even MORE money that I don't have!

I'd found some pages outlining the process of checking relief, and see that it basically doubles the work. Also seems that often enough at least one of the pistons needs additional relief, and while I see some have done it with a Dremmel I'm not all that comfortable with the process.

SO - that being said, I made another call to Scott this morning and discussed my concerns, and the timing was good as they still have my heads getting finished up. We talked options, and he made me a very good offer to bump up to 107" with a handshake cylinder exchange. This is going to end up to be a bigger bump than originally expected, and should end up with a very fun bike to ride... I can already feel the ear to ear grin.

Thanks for bringing the issue up and making me aware, as it would have just been my luck to get it all back together, hear a bad noise, and end up with bent valves and trashed pistons and a chance to do it all over again.

Now back to work so that I can pay for all the money you spent!

Roger

 

Hey, I just brought up the issue; you spent the money.

Do you know what cc volume will be used to equalize the combustion chambers? Talk to Scott about head gasket thickness and CCP. Did you have compression releases installed? If not, you should. With today's fuel, keeping CCP under 190 is a wise decision.

Going to 107" instead of 103" was a good move; an extra 4 cubic inches for no additional cost except for the pistons.

 

Yeah, we had a good talk about the compression and I told him I'd like to end up between 9.8 and 10:1 - I believe he was going to target 9.8:1, but with the pistons now the options are wide open. And since I was doing that I definitely had to do the compression releases, so even 10:1 would be great. I'm letting him decide where it ends up - he knows what I'm after and how it should align with my cams, and since we're now doing the heads, jugs, gaskets and pistons all at the same time he's going to set me up with a nice configuration. I originally wanted to stay at 9.7:1 or less so that I didn't have to deal with the releases.

Should be great, until I decide to dig deep and go really big.

Thanks again for all the input - really appreciate it! (and if anyone sees my wife on here mums the word!)

Roger

 

IT'S ALIVE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Got my parts from Hillside yesterday, and was able to spend a few hours getting started. I was also able to get some time today to finish it up, and was able to fire it up for three heat cycles (15 seconds, 45 seconds, 3 minutes). Fired right up and sounds pretty badass so far.

Unfortunately we're looking at rain tomorrow, so looks like I may have to wait until Thursday or Friday to get it out for a break-in run, but I'm stoked that I was actually able to do it. I learned a bunch in the process, which was one of the primary objectives.

Thanks mucho to Scott from Hillside for everything - can't wait to get it broken in and see what Bob comes up with on the dyno.

Thanks to all, and especially djl, for all the guidance and input!

Roger

 

Good job! Sounds like you learned a bunch and had a blast doing it yourself!! Having these forums is great to get tips and bounce ideas around. Back in the day it was mostly school of hard knocks!

 

So true.

Well, in spite of the rain it cleared enough for the streets to dry, so I got a chance to get the first break-in run in. I ran about 17 miles keeping it mostly between 2000 - 4000 up and down, with good roll ons and some hard acceleration in 4th and 5th. No unusual sounds, no flat spots, and it pulls hard for what I was doing. I'm really happy so far.

Looks like I'll have to wait until Friday to get some more miles on it, but I think that was a good first run.

Roger

 

Rodger,
Pleasure to help with this!!
Keep us posted on what Mr. Lobenburg has to say!!
Scott

 

Congrats man ... what a great feeling ... and you'll get many years of pleasure with a good solid reliable build, too ...

Great job ...

R/
'Chop

 

Just to put a final epilogue on this, I was able to ride out to RC Cycles last weekend and have 'dyno' Bob Lobenberg work his magic on the tune - ended up with 105 horses and 114 foot pounds of torque. Great numbers for this relatively mild build

The really important aspect isn't peak dyno, however, but how it performs on the road and I can tell you that it runs great throughout the ranges that I ride, from 2k - 6k rpms, and I'm extremely satisfied with the results.

I did end up putting on a VP92T lock-up on the clutch, along with the SE spring I was already running, and there is absolutely no clutch slippage (even on the dyno under load) and it will cut the 200mm rear loose speed-shifting into second.

A ton of thanks to all who contributed to this thread, and especially to Scott for his guidance and service and djl for suggesting that I make that call.

Here's the dyno sheet for anyone interested:



Roger

 

Remember now---when you hit 2nd gear hard there is a narrow drive belt back there.
I always worried about that.