Valves Part 2

So the saga continues...

My trusty 2nd pair of eyes for the job. Meet Eric... He has a loud and proud ADV salute. 

He is the closest person I have to a brother since Gene passed. Actually he is a brother... No really folks. He's black.. On his mothers fathers grandmas unlces side or something like that. Lol. I digress...

Hopefully one of these days I can get him to see the value of wandering aimlessly around on bikes... If nothing else it is good for the soul. 

The day after CMas we were able to get the valve covers off, and the front head done and all buttoned back up. Unlike the mighty Kawasaki KLR the DL1000 has gear driven camshafts so it made for a slightly easier valve adjustment. Since alot of Jap bikes have shim under bucket valves it makes adjusting them a bear no matter how you slice it. 

One word of advice. The cycle shop here in town wanted seven dollars per shim. Before getting raped like this be sure to call the service department at your local cycle shop wherever you may be and see if they will swap shims. I was able to get mine to swap shims for free. A savings of almost $60 as of course yours truly needed 8 shims. I could have reused one of my shims in another valve but the resulting clearance was tighter that i would prefer. 

Here is a pic of the front cylinder at top dead center and the cams in the right orientation. Notice how the tick marks in the exhaust and intake cams alight with the top of the head?

Here is a picture with the front cylinder exhaust cam removed. If you look closely you can see the buckets that cover the shims. These are removed with a magnet and the shim is underneath and usually comes out along with the bucket. 

Here's a list of the measurements pre and post for the front. Hopefully it is good for the next 20000 miles!

I swap my rear shims tomorrow so I should have the job complete tomorrow evening. Hopefully my 2nd chain from Sidewinder arrives after this so I can get the chain and sproket area put back together.