TOPIC:

I have a leak at my valve cover gasket. I probably could replace the gasket myself but with 100,000 km on the engine I think I'd be smart to get whatever can be checked with the head off checked.For reference the bike is an 82 LTD1000 and except for a couple of oil leaks it runs great. Does it make sense to have a mechanic look at it if I don't know what to look for ? I would think that the valves should be checked and though it wouldn't hurt to learn how to do that I imagine that there is a lot more to look for while I'm there..so my question is what else should be checked while Im there ??

First, taking the valve cover off won't provide any opportunity to perform any maintence or do any checking other than checking valve clearances. See the page on my web site detailing valve clearance checking:
www.wgcarbs.com/269767.html

The procedure is pretty much the same for your J motor bike as the bike used in the article. Consult a service manual. This is DEFINITELY something that must be done at periodic intervals as when the bike wears, valve clearances get less (tighten) and initially, performance can be hurt, and later, if left unchecked, you can damage the bike.

The article posted will give you a decent idea of what tools and skill are needed to do this job. If you think it is something you would prefer a shop mechanic to do, make SURE that the mechanic uses the correct shims and the correct sizes. They likely won't have shims in stock and will be tempted to grind your stock shims. This ruins the hardening and they will fracture under load. You can get the proper shims quickly through www.z1enterprises.com at a very reasonable price. They also sell the shims in "kit" form (a variety of sizes) as well as the valve shim tool required to actually swap the shims out. You can also get a less expensive valve shim tool sold by Motion Pro but these don't work nearly as well as the factory tool.

wiredgeorge wrote:

...You can also get a less expensive valve shim tool sold by Motion Pro but these don't work nearly as well as the factory tool.

I just wanted to mention that I bought that cheap tool, and I suppose the main difference is that it requires muscle to jam the "pry tool" in between the shim/bucket and cam. On the one of mine with tight clearance, it was a hard, but do-able. Except for the sweat-effort, it works just fine.

The thing I dislike about the Motion Pro tool is the difficulty getting the tool set on the bucket edge. I have done about 50 valve clearances using one of those things... The factory tool is just set in place and is pretty much self-locating and is MUCH quicker. I didn't mean to knock the Motion Pro tool as it does work. They could have also made the levering piece a bit longer for better leverage. If you only do valve clearances once in awhile, I suppose the Motion Pro tool makes sense due to price.

thanks guys, that's just the info I was looking for. I'm not sure I'll be brave enough to try the job myself but at least I know whats involved.