cowpuc

I just take the gear ratios of the shaft drive unit and convert that ratio to a chain drive sprocket combination that matches the shaft drive ratio I have to work with. Then I plug in those chain drive ratios into the equation on the site requiring those figures and BINGO = works perfect!! Been doing this for a good while.. Remember BOKO,, necessity is the mother of invention .. By the way,, works just as well with belt drive too.. Just have to know the OEM ratios and your off to the races,, those ratios are available on any worthy spec sheet..

Yep,, my little brother is ALWAYS :witch_brew::stirthepot:!! Dont tell @YamaMama though,, she still thinks her little frenchy is a perfect

Genius shines brightest when necessity becomes the mother of invention - Puc

EXACTLY!! Matter of fact,, I have always enjoyed that auto guys call in radio show emensly,, only difference between our VR Chat is our family has wayyyyyy more guru's to answer questions who, IMHO,, are also wayyyy more talented in fixen than those car guys in that show ever thought of being!! Learn something new EVERY TIME you convene a chat Mama!!

Yep,, says right at the end,, CANCELED DUE TO WEATHER .. That must of been a tough call for @Flyinfool and his http://WWW.. I also got the impression that his love for flying was right on par with his love for torturing the planet with his evil :cold: machine.. Having always leaned on the old saying of "no one can serve 2 masters",, guess now we know which master Fools heart serves !! Hey Jeff,, as long as you got us all stirred up here,, how's about a little show by that little WWW rattle can man? (WWWRCM!!) Personally @saddlebum,, I would much rather be up there watching those AWESOME Canuckian SNOWBIRDS!! JUST BEAUTIFUL!!:thumbsup::thumbsup:

Sorry to read this TuffTom, you and your family have my deepest condolences for your great loss.. Prayers Up my brother!! Puc n Tip

Soooo much fun:crackup:!!!! Love you my brother:happy34:!!!

Jeff!! Glad I twisted your night up a little.. Thanks for correcting that for me brother!! Short vid showing location of solenoid if anyone ever goes lookin and cant follow our fun here

Last call on doing the Poll little brother.. If you dont do it I am going to!! I aint scared!

So a guy walks into a doctors office and says Dr.,,, I feel like others are just smarter than me.. The Dr. says I got just the thing for you and hands him a brown RX bottle.. He tells the guy they are Smart Pills and tells him to take 1 pill 3 times a day.. Guy comes back a week later and tells the Doctor he is not feeling any smarter.. The Doctor ups the dosage to 2 pills at 3 times per day.. The guy comes back a week later and says still nothing.. The Doctor ups the dosage one more time to 4 pills at 3 times per day.. The next week the guys came back, says he still feels no change but then makes a comment to the Dr. that those little round pills are starting to taste like Rabbit poop.. Dr. says,, you are getting smarter Patch my little brother,, your getting smarter

You tell em Mama!!! Here are pictures of us helping just to prove we know our business!!

A leak down test uses compressed air to see if the compressed air will leak past combustion chamber components so a good leak tester can easily used to skip the step of using a compression tester in the first place.. Years ago I stuck a spark plug in a lathe and knocked the center out of it and installed a shrader valve in to it,, roll the engine up to TDC on the compression stroke,then I would screw the plug into the head of the unsuspecting engine - hit with compressed air like filling a tire using low pressure (careful if doing this to a lawn mower - watch the blade if your hanging onto it - it will instantly take off and can get ya) and listen.. I found many bad valves/seats/rings/blown headgaskets and on and on using that cheap little tool.. Got to the point I very seldom used my compression tester..If I suspected compromised compression I just grabbed one of my altered spark plugs..

Noooo,, not kidding at all!! You take that Poll yet? Dont make me do it little brother,, you know how that will turn out!!

You absolutely can jumper across the solenoid without being in danger of doing damage to any of the circuitry external of the starting system,, have done it numerous times on both the V-4's and many many cars/bikes/boats thru the years.. What will probably be damaged if you do it on the solenoid posts though are the post themselves due to the amp load. It will also damage the ends of a pair of needle nose pliers or screw driver tip to as they instantly think they have become part of a welding process when you use them as jumpers.. Perhaps a better way to test it this way would be to disconnect the negative side of the battery, move the cable on battery side of the solenoid over to the starter side of the solenoid, now use the disconnected negative battery cable as a contact point for testing the circuit.. When you touch the negative cable to the negative post on the battery the starter should roll whether its in gear or not so beware.. Use this just for testing,, not for starting the bike with the key on.. Also,, just an FYI,, you can use any solenoid (I used a lawn tractor solenoid once to get me home on a month long journey out CTFW in the west - worked fine) as replacement.. Neighbor got a garden tractor? PS - you can also pick up 12vdc off the battery side of the solenoid to hit the 12 volt coil inside the solenoid with 12v to see if the solenoid with close.. I am sure you know this but others reading here may not realize it..

See little brother,, there ya go again,, making another claim I simply do not subscribe to... Have I ever dealt with a stuck ring,, of course, but never ever in one of my V-4's - no common issue there IMHO. Have I ever experienced rings gone to high limit or had valve lash gone tight, dozens of times but again,, never ever on one of my V-4's - no common issue there IMHO. Frankly,, this is one of the reasons I chose and have ridden the V-4 Venture as my CTFW cross country family go-to bike since 1987.. Besides never needing to spend more than a grand for one (less than 1/2 that for a couple just cause they were already missing 2nd gear) and getting well over 200,000 miles out of that thousand dollars coupled with the durability of these machines has just been amazing!! IMHO,,, most of the sync jobs on these V-4's end up being just that,, a simple sync job (because they do go out of sync due to the mechanical nature of the carb linkages).. My advice,, pick up a set of vacuum gauges or a Carb Tune or make a set of Manometers (used to have and used a mercury sticks but those days are longgg gone) or what ever and learn to just do a simple sync job.. Your scoot will love you for it!! ,, you ever make a Poll little brother? Its kinda fun!! You should make a Club Poll asking how many of these lop eared Yamaha V-4 riding VR club varmints have experienced stuck rings or worn out to high limit rings or valve lash gone tight (If I had to bet money, I would bet that the valve lash going tight will have wayyyy more positive votes than the ring wear as, even though I have never needed to do one in any of my bikes, I have read of numerous occasions of varmints setting their valves) just to see exactly how accurate your claim above is!! Unless your skeered too:witch_brew: :rasberry:

Boko,, here is a free tool for your tool box that, as I, I have a hunch you will really enjoy!! https://www.blocklayer.com/rpm-gear-bikes.aspx Not long ago, I posted a thread about this tool and that read is found here,, thought you might get a kick out of it too.. Here is a link to that thread: https://www.venturerider.org/forum/showthread.php?144839-Something-refreshing-to-think-about-Wayy-cool-FREE-tool-for-that-tool-box!!

It's a copy/paste from a recent thread asking similar questions, I hope you find this applicable: [h=2]Re: To Kreme or not to Kreme[/h] Having been in the restore business I have tried many many different methods for restoring tanks including electrolisis, acids, sand and bead blasting, rattling bolts in a paint shaker for rust removal/prep for sealing.. Best of the best I have found for prep is White Vinegar - straight strength - filled to the brim and let the tank sit for a week.. Rinse good with water and dry with a heat gun or sit it in the sun.. I welded pipe for years, both Tig and Savick and also did a fair amount of shop tigging/shear work and applied those skills to both restoring tanks and building new. Unfortunately,, with vintage tanks, repairing and repainting takes away from their value.. I learned many years ago the Kreme Coating was not for me. I got pretty good with the stuff but had serious failures with tanks lasting out past 10 years.. The coating would always separate and cause issue with leaking again and get really ugly.. I did a bunch a tinkering with inventing my own coating and had good result using Seal All (yellow tube) as a base and MEK as a suspention/liquifier.. I actually had much better results long term with my homemade coating than I ever saw out of Kreme Coat.. Then I discovered Red Kote ( https://www.ebay.com/itm/Red-Kote-Qu...4AAMXQ1PNRauxA ) and WOWZY,, my tank restoration/repair process was changed for ever.. This is some SERIOUS stuff that I have used very successfully for many years!! Because I never did have access to the Zinc process that large manufacturers use to protect the inside of the new tanks found on all modern steel tank bikes (what happens when a bike tank rusts from sitting is the inside of the tank that is coated with Zink looses it zink, this is why after you acid a tank out to prep it it rusts again very quickly - IMHO of course) I always strove to get the tanks as rust free as possible for adhesion of the coating.. I discovered that this was not necessary with Red Kote.. A simple handful of bolts in the tank, shake it some to knock off the stalagtites,, a quick rinse with vinager and rinse with water, dry with heat gun,, apply the Red Kote and its done.. Complete job in just a couple hours. ANother extremely valuable thing about Red Kote is that it actually makes a tank within the tank and this is HUGE.. NO more patching/welding needed as the coating fills the holes/leaks so you can keep the OEM paint job intact.. I now have bikes out there that I built/restored using Red Kote with +25 years on them and still going strong!! Thats all I know about that Unc! Puc

IMHO, not really.. It's really not apples to apples though because the non-balanced 70 horse V-4 motor only spins up to 4750 rpms which doesn't even cross over the 5252 rpms line where it is performing in HP Heaven (what I call it).. The balanced V-4's are a capable of, and are designed to run well beyond that 5252 rpm line (due in big part because of the balance shaft) and they all develop wayyy more HP then the putzy/lazy unbalanced motor.. I have rode them both and, IMHO, the vibration comparison you are referring to may or may not be relevant as up to their perspective red lines (4750 for unbalanced,, 10500 for a balanced V-Max, 7500 for a balanced MK1) the vibes I felt, in a properly tuned/properly synced/similar tires/lubed drive shaft system was the same.. I have a hunch (and am fairly sure of this) that the balance shaft placed in the V-4 was placed there just as much,, and maybe more,, for engine longevity as it was for rider comfort..

You got siblings?? May be different in the far north but down here big brothers ALWAYS pick on little brothers,,, its actually a way of showing love and that big brother cares for you (hope that got me out of another whoopen Mama:fingers-crossed-emo)

makes more sense then pulling the top of the motor all apart everytime you wanna do a simple syncing of the carbs little french brother of mine!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :rasberry:

All good advice that I have read here IMHO.. Only thing I might add is that I would double check interlocks while having fun with it.. That sneaky kickstand switch has caused me pause at times but it sure sounds suspiciously like a solenoid/relay issue to me too..

The link in the post above will take you to a complete explanation of the correct procedure IF you are working on an RSV and not a MK1 or MK2 Recycled.. Click and take a peek!!

ahhhh,, not necessarily so IMHO.. Thinking back in history of my times spent furiously CTFW on these 1st Gens I can count on a hand with no fingers how many times I have pulled the covers and checked/set the lash on one of my V-4's,,, translated Frenchy - means in well over 1 million miles ridden aboard 6 1st Gen MK1's I have never,, not even once,, opened one up and even checked the valve lash.. On the other side of the coin though,, because the quad carb bank is mechanically linked (easy to lose sync) and knowing how easy it is to sync them up (20 minutes max) I always checked sync at oil changes when home,, usually ends up being at least a dozen times a year. Same with checking compression,, I only do/use that when I am seeing something happening that I dont like and I wonder if it involves a compression issue.. That said,, I can only think of one time that I did a compression check on one of my V-4's - yep,, these V-4's have been that reliable/durable in my situation..

Yep,, I hear that Sky!! Had my weathered eye not noticed I was for the RSV tech section when I innocently got drawn into this discussion I would have easily of done the same.

and a reminder to you and all other lop eared VR past/present/future varmints,, fact is according to our Club theme song,, you can join but you can never leave!! Here,, I'll translate that for you Frenchy: https://youtu.be/niIX0QcYRzE