lost my piston circlips!!
- Thread starter dave89b
- Start date
He will know, when the top end comes off? I sure hope its not the cir clips! 15 minutes a completely new bike is broke in. It very well could have seized from some other reason. Julien, I stole the information from a previous thread with 89er, and often wondered from past failures. The way I figure it is, you would have a better chance of hitting the lotto, than getting the rings lined up again. I never thought about what I can not see. Not a big deal, just solid performance. The thing about jury rigs, sometimes they work, and sometimes not. Vintage Bob
I totally get what your saying, and in some ways it makes sense. In other ways it does not. The rings are designed to wear into the shape of the cylinder walls, and to do so fairly quickly. If they DID get moved, they would simply wear in again. On an old and barely within service range set of rings, I could see this being a problem. The additional accelerated wear could lead to premature failure before the next expected service. With a new set that's only been run for a couple hours? I would expect them to re-seat with no noticeable side effects.
Probably this is one of those things that a couple fellers could argue about all year long, and nobody ever turns out being right. I'm only speaking from MY experience, which usually means more to me than any article, review, or even "solid data" procured from the interwebs. I can be almost certain that you feel the same way about YOUR peronal experience, and I have total respect for that. I would not presume to be capable of swaying your opinion in any way.
Probably this is one of those things that a couple fellers could argue about all year long, and nobody ever turns out being right. I'm only speaking from MY experience, which usually means more to me than any article, review, or even "solid data" procured from the interwebs. I can be almost certain that you feel the same way about YOUR peronal experience, and I have total respect for that. I would not presume to be capable of swaying your opinion in any way.
I'm with Julien. I've reused rings with little run time in a couple 2 strokes in the past and had no issues. It might be more of an issues with 4 stroke oil rings? I'm sure it's not the best for ring life or performance but I seriously doubt it will cause a catastrophic failure.
- Jul 20, 2009
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Here is what you can get away with if you have nothing to loose.
Some years ago a friend of mine (Andy) used to race a supercart and he seized it BAD in practice. When I arrived at the track he was ready to go home before racing had started. Another friend of mine (Ian) and myself set about rebuilding his motor out of melted parts. We used a very worn oversized piston (Andy had it in his toolbox) in a very worn and seized undersize bore, we scraped the melted aluminum off the bore with a screwdriver and honed it by hand with a honeing stick. We picked the rings out from under the melted piston (the rings were barely visible), they were stuffed. We sharpened and shaped the edges of the rings with the same honing stick matching it to the bore the best we could. We anealed the old copper headgasket using a lighter and a bowl of water and patched together a base gasket out of something (I can't remember what). We torqued it up using the hand and eyeometer. we ran it with a bit more oil in the premix and told Andy it would probably seize or blow up, but he had nothing to loose so go for it. That cart ran at well over 100mph in all his races. If memory serves he rebuilt it properly before he raced it again. I think we were lucky but hey, that's what you can sometimes get away with, and sometimes not.
Some years ago a friend of mine (Andy) used to race a supercart and he seized it BAD in practice. When I arrived at the track he was ready to go home before racing had started. Another friend of mine (Ian) and myself set about rebuilding his motor out of melted parts. We used a very worn oversized piston (Andy had it in his toolbox) in a very worn and seized undersize bore, we scraped the melted aluminum off the bore with a screwdriver and honed it by hand with a honeing stick. We picked the rings out from under the melted piston (the rings were barely visible), they were stuffed. We sharpened and shaped the edges of the rings with the same honing stick matching it to the bore the best we could. We anealed the old copper headgasket using a lighter and a bowl of water and patched together a base gasket out of something (I can't remember what). We torqued it up using the hand and eyeometer. we ran it with a bit more oil in the premix and told Andy it would probably seize or blow up, but he had nothing to loose so go for it. That cart ran at well over 100mph in all his races. If memory serves he rebuilt it properly before he raced it again. I think we were lucky but hey, that's what you can sometimes get away with, and sometimes not.
I don't find it hard to believe.
All my stuff is usually "jury rigged". I must be really good at it, because on those extended weekend trips, I'm usually the one guy that doesn't have to put a wrench to his bike. Makes me grin when my buddy spends 2 hours bleeding brakes on his 09 KTM after it springs some unexpected and inexplicable leak, while my 89 KDX doesn't need a thing but to start and go for the entire trip.
All my stuff is usually "jury rigged". I must be really good at it, because on those extended weekend trips, I'm usually the one guy that doesn't have to put a wrench to his bike. Makes me grin when my buddy spends 2 hours bleeding brakes on his 09 KTM after it springs some unexpected and inexplicable leak, while my 89 KDX doesn't need a thing but to start and go for the entire trip.
If the motor is correct/fresh, measure the psi. Keep checking it every week after riding. You will see when the psi drops off, so does the hp. The ring survives 1 break in, not 2. The tolerances being what they are, can not be negotiated. I have tried, and many others. These same discussions do keep coming like waves, every week, month, year, same disagreement. Its all in the archives. Lot of people have gotten tired of repeating the same stuff, big names at that! The truth is in there. I thoroughly enjoy learning why things are as they are, and figuring is usually the exact opposite of the facts. It sure makes jetting a whole world easier. It is safer for the rider, and anyone around them. What might work in a pinch, no way would I EVER recommend someone to do. BUT, I have stuck my hand in the fire before, and probably will again someday. The fire is hot! Vintage Bob
Dude, lighten up a bit. I hope you were stretching the truth when you said you felt "gutted".Joburble said:
I just can't seem to understand how a ring seal good enough to get an engine running can be acheived after scraping molten metal from the cylinder walls with a screwdriver and running a hone stone along the ring surface? Seems like less than a 1 in a million chance to me.......and a glimmer of hope for all backyard hacks.
- Jul 20, 2009
- 417
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Firstly we did expect it to seize or blow up. Secondly we did our best to make sure it didn't. To get the ring seal we placed the rings on a flat surface and rotated them against the honeing stone that was held vertically against the side of the flat surface. Then we pushed the rings (not at the same time) into the bore using the non melted piston, with the ring end gap where it should be. We then held the cylinder up to the light and looked at the gap between the cylinder wall and the edge of the ring, did more honeing, and repeated the process. When we were satisfied we very slightly deburred the edges of the rings. The cylinder was honed by hand in a cross hatch pattern using the same small rectangular stick as best we could prior to doing the ring work. When we assembled it and spun the crank it didn't pick up so we put the head on and were good to go.
Have you got your motor apart yet Dave?
Have you got your motor apart yet Dave?
Thanks for the info Bob. I enjoy discussing these sorts of things. I will keep that in mind next time I pull a jug, and I will be more scientific about compression testing periodically after the fact. I would like to explore this further!
Dave, can't say I'm looking forward to seeing what you find, but I am curious. Get us some pics up when you get it apart. Perhaps it was not a circlip after all, but some other unforseen failure. There are also risks involved when honing a plated cylinder, as I discussed with you before. The edges of the ports don't take kindly to it, and it is possible that it snagged a ring.
Did you check if that cylinder was still on ebay? The buy it now on it was really cheap.
J.
Dave, can't say I'm looking forward to seeing what you find, but I am curious. Get us some pics up when you get it apart. Perhaps it was not a circlip after all, but some other unforseen failure. There are also risks involved when honing a plated cylinder, as I discussed with you before. The edges of the ports don't take kindly to it, and it is possible that it snagged a ring.
Did you check if that cylinder was still on ebay? The buy it now on it was really cheap.
J.
Joe, have you ever raced, a lot? Some of my less than glorious jury rigs at the races, I will never admit to. Some worked, some could have endangered my son, myself and others, but, thats racing. Its all about the checkered flag. Even if you have to push the pos across the finish! Joburble, thank you for the story.Tear the story apart Joe? I was not there. It could have been worse. How much abuse can an engine take before even pull starting with a quad is fruitless? We all have a lot in common, believe it or not? You think you came up with something new, search through the archives. Now, what happened to the OP? When you take the top end off, remove the spark plug and base nuts, no spinning the bore, this will push them guide pins in the ring lands in! Raising the cylinder straight up, allows the cir clips to be removed while the ring is still in the bore. Remember the first time you took a top end off, this way is the same. You do it a couple times its not difficult. Personally, I hate it, I would just as well replace the ring. Vintage Bob
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