Raptor Chapter

The purpose of this topic is to follow up on events happening to my Rap and section seems appropriate but the mods can move it if not.

I have to open with a rather alarming story.
The bike has been plagued by a leaking fuel tap and i've been haveing a puddle of gas underneath it and a flooded front cylinder. Gotta love vacuum taps i guess.

So i ordered a new one (Rubinetto) from a ebay store ultimate_parts_uk, which was leaking aswell (i guess it sat too long on the shelf).

Saturday comes and i find the bike in the garage with gas on the floor again. I check the front cylinder and this time its not flooded, so i decide it all wen out the carb to the ground so all is ok. I should have bothered to check the oil which i tend to do often. I go for a ride and notice nothing strange untill I open her up to 100 km/h, and press the clutch - the engine dies. Releasing the clutch gets the engine back but i'm convinced enough that something is quite wrong. Home is not far, I pull up and the bike doesn't idle anymore, the engine is running only with the help of the throttle, hard starts aswell, and clacking noises on turning over.

I check the oil and its well over F, and I understand I probably don't have a bike anymore.

I drain the slush into a clean can and its approx 3L instead of 2.3 there should have been. No shavings on the bottom of the can. Change the oil, start her up and i don't notice much difference, it idles and generally seems ok. In the evening I take her out for stroll, me and the GF. On our way back I open her up a lil (revs to 7K) and after seconds it seems to die, with lights going out and then engine and lights coming back. It did that a few times and i dropped the speed and kept the revs below 5k and did make it home without much hassle. The oil was alarmingly below lowest mark.

So far I get the impression the engine is trashed and consumes as much oil as fuel and what ive experienced is pistons grabbing the bore when under load. That would explain lights going out (it was night, so) But the bike should have billowed smoke if using so much oil, so im leaving the garage baffled.

Next some buddies come over and we ponder about the unfortunate events. I drain the oil and find no shavings which indicates no piston grab has occurred.

Experience says filling up oil requires filling, running the engine a little and checking the level, and adding more oil to have it at safe level which i didn't do. Mild piston grab therefor might have ocurred due to oil starvation at high revs.

Checking the rear cylinder cams reveals no scoring so the bike is filled up to a level and a 1km run shows no problems.

I will do a compression test, which is a good indicator of an engines health, but so far everything is just guesswork.

Wall of text, but oh well.

P.S. i did write to the ebay seller but no answer yet probably means hes aware of the shabby stuff hes selling.

sounds like you had 2 problems the leaking tap and sticking carb float. When you drained the oil did it smell of petrol? And yes if it was using that much oil it would smoke badly. Hope you get it sorted.

2.3 Litres and i drained approx 3L thats 0.7 excess of gasoline, i guess its just too much text and its easy to get lost

Oh dear, doesn't sound good, hope you get her sorted soon!

sounds like rings

The engine cutout problem has been traced to happening while the lights are on. Under the seat I found four thick yellow wires which have the insulation eaten away against the battery box, i will isolate those with a electrical tape.

Went to a local mechanic to measure compression but the tool he had doesn't fit the small plug bore of a motorcycle, so i've scheduled a visit to a bike mechanic who will measure the comp, do carb float needles, mixture (plugs have always been gray so its running lean) and adjust valves.

Adjusted the TPS according to these instructions:

http://www.svrider.com/forum/showthread.php?t=95340

Bike is less jerky on throttle on / off situations and low rpm cruise is more calm

urmas wrote:55 years agoThe engine cutout problem has been traced to happening while the lights are on. Under the seat I found four thick yellow wires which have the insulation eaten away against the battery box, i will isolate those with a electrical tape.

I would try to get some heatshrink over them rather than use tape.

Bike's back from the mechanic - valves have been adjusted and carbs are set. Bike pulls better and is less harsh in low revs.

There is a noticable difference in compression between the cylinders but i wont do anything about it.

Also, ordered a Metzeller Z6 for the rear.

We have some really shitty roads over here.

Things break due to vibration:

Wow, never seen anything like that! Have you double checked that the three bolts holding the footrest hanger are torqued up appropriately? Looks like yours has seen some miles, but it should still hold the hanger firmly in place! I wouldn't have expected it to go at a wide point like that, wouldn't you expect a narrow point to be more vulnerable?

I have exhagerated the thing a bit, but anyway the roads here are on par with some African countries.

The lower part had been broken when i got the bike, probably die to a fall or someone putting his whole weight on the hanger. The upper part broke while riding on gravel.

Bike has 53k kms atm, thats almost 33k miles.

When I took my hangers off to have them powder coated mine was cracked in the same place. I had it welded.

I dont think that was vibration , probably the bike fell over and stressed the casting, it might not have broken straight away, but it remembered the knock and broke eventually.
I have a bent/ broken one the same somewhere.

Me and a buddy thought it to be a good idea to gut the cans to get some beefier noise out of them. We cut the exit end of the can only to find a mesh inside that was spot welded to the outer shell. We proceeded to bore the welds out, including the welds on the entry part of the can, in process destroying some drillbits and one drill. Bored out the innards still didnt budge and we gave up. I reckon a welder would ask 50 euro or more to weld the carnage back together and it would look rather ugly, therefore I have decided to get Roadsitalia carbon short cans. They sound dope and look awesome:



Now to save up the cash while bike is unrideable