checking out and helping

This last Sunday I stopped over and my old friend Jim's house to help out on some KLR stuff. The big thing was getting his bike torn down to check his valve clearance. Kawasaki says to not worry about the valves till 15K and Jim is only at 10K. Nothing wrong with checking early and Kawasaki was right, they were all on the money. One of these days I'll get to use the valve shims I bought.
We also did the basic stuff for the engine harness recall. That went well with no rubbed and chaffed wires.
The cool part is we planned a big trip in June to ride around all the great lakes. It's gonna be on the cheap and all tents. My biggest fear is Black bear and this really freaks me out. Last summer when the family and I headed up to Hayward WI we had a little bear encounter. We went to a restaurant and a bear was outside behind the place eating because the owners were feeding them, not to smart if you ask me. I didn't know he was their until we were in the place, but when it was time to leave he wasn't in view of the window where we were watching him from. I was freaking out that we needed to run with the kids to the van. I asked the waitress how the bears react to them and she said they take off when the bears see them. Of course nothing happened and we didn't see him. Gotta get over these little fears. It's gonna be FUN!

RD400 carb work

Well it's time to start screwing with the old two stroke again. I took a extended brake after this spring when I had hand problems. I started to replace some of the engine mount bolts. The longer engine bolts will be a big issue for finding replacements.



Two of the short engine bolts in and two nuts on the really long mounting bolts. The ACE hardware by my house closed and they were my source for metric flange head bolts. Now I have to another ACE about nine miles through road construction. Kind of a PITA but at least I don't have to mail order them.
Next up is replacing the needle and seats in the carbs. They are original and were seeping when the bike was off and dripping on my floor. You don't want that with a heated garage and forget to turn off the petcock. Besides that, just getting a good tune out of the engine could be hard.
bowls off and seat needing to be removed..
The original needle was just brass on brass. The trick is to replace with a rubber tipped needle style.
Top one is the good style.


If you click on the picture you can see the wear groove on the needle.


The spec out of the RD forums is to set the float height at 23mm +/- 1 mm. You can see mine are set at about 20mm and that would put more fuel in the bowl.

After many small adjustments it's set on the money. I'm expecting a little better control of fine adjustments at idle and a little smoother off idle drive-ability. For now I have to wait another weekend to pick up yet some more bolts behind and under the carbs to see if this will make a difference.

JNS Engineering Side Stand Pad

JNS Engineering Side Stand Pad is my newest little thing on my KLR. I'm so happy with my skid plate from them that I plopped down the money for the pad.
If you go camping and park in the grass, the stand will sink. The last two camping tips I did both times I had to come up with something to put under the kick stand. One time was a coke bottle and the other time I used the axle wrench from the KLR's tool kit. Kind of a hassle that $28 bucks will take care of for me.
Also I don't know or own JNS and they are not paying me to blog this. I recommend their products and NEVER had any problems about the two orders from them. You pay, get a e-mail, and it shows up. Can't say that about some of the other KLR part sources on the web.




The victim!!!!

It's super simple install. JNS want's you to measure on top of the pad where to drill. I did it my way and just positioned the pad and marked the hole where to drill on the bottom. I think it was a 13/64 bit.


This is it close up and I wasn't really fond of the exposed threads. So I took off to the ACE hardware store for a acorn nut and a slightly shorter bolt.




Now with acorn nut and to me a cleaner look and cost me like a buck to do.
The next thing will take off the stand and get it powder coated so it doesn't look fifteen years old.
I bought a shorter stand two years ago and it seems they used some crappy paint and it's done putting up with my boot and the ground.
Sorry for kind of a lame post but the weather is at zero degrees and I'm going nuts in the house.
RD400 stuff coming soon....

A few tid bits on the KLR

The one thing I knew was happening with the KLR was the exhaust seal was leaking very slightly. I reused it after I took off the the head pipe for something I can’t even remember why. It was obviously leaking and annoying when down shifting, the bike would make a lot of extra pops.

That black corner on the bottom right is the leak spot. After a little ride around the block and no more flatulence from the back-end.

The next thing that stuck in my head was the kickstand switch. When I rode trails and would stand up on the pegs and the heal of my boot constantly pressed on the switch cover. If I cracked the switch while riding the bike would die out which would be a bummer.

This is the switch connector that needs to be jumered to eliminate the option.

Pretty simple = one bolt!!

Taking the switch off does leave you with a big ugly blank plate to look at but worry free.

Wires butt connected and weatherproof. I electrical taped it up and it’s all hidden behind the starter solenoid cover plate.

The last thing to do was the heated grip switch. The switch is not waterproof or even water-resistant. I’m surprised it lasted a year in the rain and multiple bike washes. At the time I couldn’t find a waterproof and small switch. There really isn't many options that worked well for my spot on my bike either.

Last week I was looking into heated seats on the web for the wife's van and stumbled onto a rubber cover for a 13/16 rocker switch. For only a few bucks it was at my door in four days.

kind of looks like a big contact lens.

The switch needs to be popped out to get lipped over the edge.

I know this isn’t perfect but it should help keep the elements out of it.

Fit was very close to perfect. With the camera flash it makes the cover look translucent but it’s pretty clear with the naked eye.

Next week will be tinkering with the RD400 again, since I have been slacking off on that project since late may.