Monday, February 21, 2011

Trying To Save A Yamaha XS650  



Perhaps we should call this the Wheel Barrow build because that's how it was transported from Billy's place. Well not the whole way, just from his cache' of engines at his place. We put it in his wheel barrow to cart it to my truck. When I got it home my son helped me get it in my wheel barrow to cart it in the shop. My son had to head off to work just after, so it was up to me to get it on the bench - should have kept my home made hoist . I knelt down, put my arms around the bugger and lifted it on the table and let me tell you what, this baby ain't light.  
 You can see in these pictures just how abused this engine is. This is the way it came to Billy by the way, he wouldn't dare treat one of his babies this way. In fact, as I remember it, Billy was sorta upset about it's condition and treatment. We're going to take care of that so it will have new life in the Brat frame he got from Hugh over at http://hughshandbuilt.blogspot.com/  Hugh has talent a plenty and is an accomplished builder fabricator.



A wheel barrow shot of the XS650 carburetors. These will be cleaned in the Sonic machine and overhauled.
                                           
 Here she sits on the operation table awaiting diagnosis. We may need to call in GI Joe for help in the demolition stage. Did I mention she's a heavy Gal?
 In this shot you can see the shifter is bent downward 90 degrees. Because of this little setback the transmission is locked in gear so rotation of the engine assembly is not.

Here folks is a shot of the valve cover. At the very front of the picture are the top end oiler tubes/lines. The section on the right has a slight bend and snapped off during removal. It use to be nice chrome but had some rust and flaking. I hope Billy doesn't wing it at me when he sees it, he has a a pretty good aim. I spent the next better part of nine hours getting the parts off needed for removal of the valve cover. Soaking nuts, bolts and screws in PB Blaster, then tapping same with a flat punch to help loosen up rust and grime. It took time to get things moving, you can't force issues on old fasteners like this as they probably have never been turned since original assembly, except the points. The points looked new other than observation this engine had been left in the weather for several years most probably as a complete bike. Such a shame letting one of these bikes get to this condition. Next post we tackle the removing the valve cover.       




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