Engine swap: any advice?

[Aasland]

When you are putting the new engine in, pay attention to the plastic bits that run around the front of the frame. If they do not stay in place any later work around the cooling system and horns will be real hard.

You're not kidding. I just put the cooling system together and getting all the wires, hoses and plastic thingies together correctly up there is easily the worst part of the job so far.

I'm amazed my sleeping 14 month old son upstairs was not woken by the tools I used to get those parts to fit right (i.e. swearing and yelling).

 

[RaYzerman19]

You're doing great....... and I'm looking forward to hearing that baby fired up all happy!

 

[Aasland]

You're doing great....... and I'm looking forward to hearing that baby fired up all happy!

It fired up yesterday! Yippeeeee! No funny noises or clunks.

But it wasn't entirely happy. Lots of steam from the exhaust .. there was a pinhole leak in one of the coolant hoses spraying onto the exhaust pipes. I did use most of the hoses from the new engine as they were much newer and cleaner than the hoses from the hold engine, but one was apparently damaged. Tonight I'll swap that hose out and take a good look at the rest of the hoses too.

Tomorrow I'll fire it up again, get it warm and look for leaks, get the stethoscope out and listen for any unwanted sounds, perform a TBS, change out the sacrificial startup oil and then button it all up.

 

[Aasland]

Fired it up again, found one more leak, a host clamp I hadn't tightened. It ran well but chugged a little at low RPMS (1000), 1200 RPM it's fine. Revs nice an smooth.

Hooked up the gauges for a TBS and 2,3,4 are in the ballpark, #1 is waaay off (too high). There is no more adjustment in the air screw to bring it down. Ok .. time to do the RDCUA TBS Procedure

 

[Aasland]

Oddly, I was unable to get the TB's to sync. After dialing all the air screws all the way in and start to adjust #2 to match #3 .. I found that the idle went up to 2000 RPM and I was unable to bring it down again. Even added some slack to the throttle cables.

I pulled the TB's and swapped in the TB's from the 2007 (new engine) and that actually worked really well. It only took a few small adjustments to get them all lined up.

That's all for now .. one more evening to put all the plastic on, and then a warm day to test it, and another oil change.

 

[RossKean]

A little post-mortem on the old TB might be interesting. Was one of the air screws gummed up? All four TB butterflies moving correctly? This information could be helpful to anyone having TBS issues.

 

[Aasland]

A little post-mortem on the old TB might be interesting. Was one of the air screws gummed up? All four TB butterflies moving correctly? This information could be helpful to anyone having TBS issues.

I'll take a look at it when I get a chance - get it thoroughly cleaned out, do a bench sync, etc.

 

[RaYzerman19]

Also, could have been a slight vacuum leak, and perhaps the intital screw settings..... I have found some that were in too far (only a half turn out), idle can be hard to control..... best start with them all at 1 turn out.

 

[Aasland]

Well, I'm happy to say that it runs great, through all the gears, up and down. Thanks for all the information!

Now to go enjoy the summer... next winter I may tackle the old engine.

 

[garyahouse]

I didn't read all the posts, but was curious, did you gut the cat/converter? You mentioned it early on. I was thinking about possible consequences... my daughter used to groan about smelling like exhaust when getting off a long ride on my old Suzuki GSX100G. Never a problem on the FJR, thanks to the cat/converter.

Just a thought.

Gary

darksider #44

 

[maddad]

After I put my engine together (including PAIR mod) I was unable to do a TBS. Fought with it all season. Turned out to be the the fast idle valve was stuck open. Caused it to pop a lot on decelerating and TBS would not sync. Able to get a screw driver down there and pry but wouldn't budge. A little lube, wait, pry a little harder, snapped close, worked it over and over. TBS went exactly as it should and 6200 mile Coast to Coast and back, bike never ran better.

 

[Aasland]

I didn't read all the posts, but was curious, did you gut the cat/converter? You mentioned it early on. I was thinking about possible consequences... my daughter used to groan about smelling like exhaust when getting off a long ride on my old Suzuki GSX100G. Never a problem on the FJR, thanks to the cat/converter.
Just a thought.

Gary

darksider #44

No, I didn't. I looked at it, thought about it, and after reading all the comments decided there wasn't much of a performance benefit worth the effort. I thought perhaps it might help with the heat coming off the bike when in traffic, but I'm never in traffic and the heat doesn't bother me.

After I put my engine together (including PAIR mod) I was unable to do a TBS. Fought with it all season. Turned out to be the the fast idle valve was stuck open. Caused it to pop a lot on decelerating and TBS would not sync. Able to get a screw driver down there and pry but wouldn't budge. A little lube, wait, pry a little harder, snapped close, worked it over and over. TBS went exactly as it should and 6200 mile Coast to Coast and back, bike never ran better.

I hadn't thought of that - since I have the rack out I will check it.