You've got to love YouTube (Bonnie Valve Check)

four valves per cylinder, triumph twin perhaps?

Bugger it.  

Time to find some shims.   Ugh!!

Cams have to be lifted out hence my annoyance.......need to also buy a tool from Triumph to lock the backlash gear at around 65 USD.   Ah well. 

I treated the bike to a bling chrome valve cover which I have been intending to fit when I did this job.   CTB was keen to see a pic of it fitted (the magpie for bling that he is).....so I have just dropped it on tonight to show how it looks.   Hmm......I think you either love or hate bling but I think I will certainly stick with it after the valve job is completed.  If I get fed up with it, I can always return to the brushed alloy cover. 

you got me interested now, so had a quick read online, general consensus seems to be that its a bit of a pig of a job to do (one guy was so tee'd off after setting his that he sold his bike) I copied this snippet as it seemed the way to go to me

slimdog1
Registered
Joined Jun 29, 2012
8 Posts
#16 • Feb 20, 2013
After taking measurements rotate crank so no valves are fully open. Just loosen the cam caps(dont remove)and prop the cam up a little. Use a magnet to retrieve and replace shims. If you need to spin crank a little for some valves its ok. Shims are the same as the honda cb bikes and my honda dealer had a free shim exchange. All exhaust except 2 were tight. All intake were in spec. Tighten cam caps and re install cover.

couldnt find any mention of the backlash tool, maybe why people are finding the job difficult, also glad carl said it first but the brushed alloy cover suits the bike better IMHO

do you know any smokers? you'll need the traditional fag packet for the calculations

PS - thanks for the feedback on the cam cover guys......one chrome cam cover heading to ebay.

I wouldnt bother buying a backlash tool, it looks to me like you could get the same thing with a couple of m4 bolts and a bit of 6mm tube on each one?

I see what you mean from the video, its probably much easier to simply lift the camshafts out. probably take a couple of goes to get them back in on the timing marks, but I wouldnt think it will be that hard.

the shims themselves usually have their sizes etched into them, the chap in the video is nice and organised and sets them out in a sensible way ready to calculate the new shim size.