Eildon via Torbreck River Sunday 6^th April 2008

Ben Warden	Honda CBR954	Renzo Cunico	Ducati 916
Dave Ward	Honda CBR600	Darrryn Webster	Triumph 675
Bronwyn Manifold (1/2 rear)	Kawasaki Z750	Misho Zrakic	Suzuki GSXR750
Randal Leacock	Kawasaki ZX9	Pina Garasi (1/2 rear)	Yamaha R6
Ken Goederee (2^nd ride)	Yamaha R1	Peter Jones (Leader)	Yamaha R1

I was hanging out for this ride as my bike has been off the road for about six weeks in total. I was at a total loss every Sunday; nowhere to go and what to do all day? So I did nothing and saved money to pay for the repairs. (There’s always a silver lining.) It made me realise that our Sunday trips are not only about the riding, but the comradeship and socialising aspects are as much fun and entertaining as the riding itself. I have totally enjoyed my Sundays with you guys and hope to have many more enjoyable outings. There is something special about being part of a group environment with similar interests.

I should also thank you guys for showing me how to ride a bike. I watch and learn every week, trying to copy a few things and see what works for me and what doesn’t. I’ve learnt more from the rides I’ve been on with the MSR than I have in the previous five years riding. I had dirt bikes when I was a 15-16 year old kid, then found other interests.

Five years ago I purchased a 750 Honda Shadow cruiser and took up the sport again. After 12 months of riding it most weekends I decided it wasn’t for me and looked around for a Honda SP1 and found the ZX9 instead. Totally different I know, but green’s my favourite colour. After riding on and off solo and with friends for about 4 years I discovered the MSR. Now the fun has started. I’m amazed at the number of great roads the Club knows and what fantastic scenery there is around Melbourne. I’ve seen more of Victoria in a few of months riding with the Club than in the previous 20 years.

That’s a bit of insight about me and what MSR rides mean to me. Now on to the trip.

First leg: Yarra Glen, Old Healesville Road, Chum Creek Road to Toolangi, and down to Healesville. For me this is a great bit of road: scenic, twisty, not much traffic and I always have fun through here though I had to dodge the odd stick or two and plenty of gum bark.

Then across the Black Spur to Narbethong. This was a little tense for me, all the talk of police hiding in camouflage gear got me stressed so I took it easy, watching my licence demerit points. Then on to Marysville for morning tea. I love stopping at that coffee shop; been doing it for years and always good food and coffee.

Second leg: Marysville, Buxton, Taggerty, towards Eildon then right down the Jamieson Road and 27 km of twisty road till Torbreck River where the road turns to dirt just around the corner. This was an unknown area till I was enlightened. What a fantastic bit of road. On the way down I had a large slide on the centre gravel which served as a great early warning for Ken who was behind me at the time. The return trip was marred by Peter (leading) sliding off on corner gravel. Peter was able to continue on to Eildon, the bike quite rideable. Peter called it a day at this point, leaving the bike locked in the local garage and arranging for his wife to come and collect him. I must say I could not see the gravel until I was right on it. Then it was do everything ever so gently. Thanks for the wave down Ben.

(Update on Peter: no cracked or broken ribs, just bruising. Bike being repaired: new swing arm (scratched), new left hand side fairing panel (scratched).

Then back to Eildon for lunch, good food and fun conversation.

Third leg: Eildon, Skyline road through Fraser National Park with views down to Lake Eildon. On to Alexandra, then around the 16 km to Molesworth, picking up the highway to Yea with break-up at Kinglake West via Junction Hill. The last stretch from Flowerdale is a very scenic road through native forest which reminds me of back home. (NZ …Ed.) After the breakup I was lucky enough to ride through to Kinglake and St Andrews, eventually ending up at the bottom of Springvale Road.

Some guys have asked about the engine repair to my Kawasaki ZX9. The motor had valve recession. This means the valve face wears into the valve seat which reduces the clearance between the cam follower and the camshaft lobe. The valves do not open as far as they should, restricting the amount of air drawn into the cylinder via the inlet valve and the exhaust valve can burn out due to not opening far enough away from the hot exhaust gases. The end result is an engine down on horse power.

With push rod engines the valve clearances usually increase with wear resulting in noisy tappets. Whereas with overhead cam engines, the valve clearances usually close up (as the valves bash their way into the head) resulting in quiet tappets until a valve or seat burns out.

My engine sounded good, no tappet noise, and it ran okay (well, I thought so) but the odometer showed 49,000 km. It should have had it’s big service at 48,000km. So I sent it to the bike shop to carry out the scheduled service including changing the fluids and checking the valve clearances. The clearances were down to .0005”, so we decided to pull off the head and check the valve seats. The mechanic removed the valves from the head and measured everything. The valves needed refacing only (no replacements), and valve seats were okay, but needed to be re-cut. The valve stem oil seals were replaced as was a new head gasket.

Inconveniently, the cylinder head bolts also hold the barrel to crankcase. When the bolts are loosened the barrel to crankcase gasket shim arrangement is disturbed so usually a new one is installed for an oil tight seal. This meant the barrel had to come off. While apart, the pistons could be cleaned and de-carboned. The barrel was honed, and the pistons and gudgin pins checked for wear and new rings installed. The timing chain and tensioner were okay to reuse.

This work should have been straight forward but I couldn’t get a machinist. They were all doing work for the Superbike Round at Phillip Island so I had to wait until the race teams had completed their work. Then Kawasaki only had one piston ring set in Australia, so I had to back order another three from Japan which took three weeks to arrive. Apart from the delays, the rebuild went well.

Valve clearances were set at the wide end of the spec as they close up. The engine was run-in on mineral-based oil to aid piston ring to cylinder bore bedding in. Synthetic oil works too well and slows the bedding-in process.

Engine rpm was limited to 5000 for first fuel tank, 7000 rpm for second tank, and 9000 rpm for the third tank. I did not want to labour the engine so did not lug it below 3000rpm. Large throttle openings were used from approx 3000 rpm to the tank rpm limit. Deceleration was also used in large openings as pressure is needed to push the rings out and scrape the cross hatch pattern off the cylinder bores for 100% seal.

After approximately 1000 km the engine oil was drained (very clean) and the oil filter cut open and inspected. A new K&N filter was installed as this has a larger volume than the standard Kawasaki filter. Elf semi synthetic oil was used. The idle setting was reset to standard as it had increased slightly after the engine break-in period because the motor was now turning more freely.

The engine is running smoother and has more power than ever. A top job.

Some advice: if your bike reaches the first big service at approximately 24,000km, get the valve clearances checked. If the bike shop says on your model it’s not needed because they are always good, they’re not noisy and they should be right, or any other story, just say no, you would like them checked and recorded. You can then compare the readings for each valve, and see how much they have worn at the next service, say at 48,000 km.

Spending two hundred dollars to check the valve clearances can save two thousand dollars later on.

Thanks to Tristan Culvenor at Redline Motorcycles in Dandenong. Tristan did a great job on the bike, is a very good mechanic and a great guy to boot. He said to say hi to a couple of guys: Dave Ward and Marty Thompson. He said he knows you from 20 years back (small world).

One thing I did notice that made a huge difference was changing the brake fluid, front and back. I can’t believe the difference it made. The brakes work much better. I usually don’t bother with changing the brake fluid but it has made such a difference I will change it every 12 months from now on.

Randal Leacock