83 CR500, here begineth the lesson

Looks good although I can't get my head round the gloss black...

From the pics it doesn't look like you have fitted the additional lug to the case to match the HVA billet primary case...are you going to ?

Not sure, probably not then regret it I expect. I'll talk to Andy next time see what he says.

They are put on there to stiffen up the area around the kick start....I fitted it to mine and that's when i noticed the casing is cracked...

No the original 430 piston doesn't have any spacers..


The 430 wrist pin bearing is made wider so it does not float from side to side.

Really sharp Vapour Blasting - Did you have an 82 or 81 head ?? Just wondering it you had the old paint removed on cases and head first before being blasted for final finish ?

On aftermarket pistons and smallend bearing combinations, the bearing end float may be too big and using washers or collars to keep that under control is required. Just one caution, those washers groove the gudgeon pin over time and I have had a washer split after about 2 years of hard racing, the pieces were caught up in the bigend and some was coughed into the topend via transfer ports, with the dectruction of a prime engine as result. I reckon after about 30hrs of running tear down, inspect and replace gudgeon pin, circlips and washers.

Check out the thread '430 case composition' on the main vintage page. It starts and ends about the vapour blasting but wanders off into the realms of magnesium theories in the middle.

Cheers, that looks good. I won't read it until I'm there though. My brain only has finite space and it hurt just now doing comp/squish calcs.

Ordered one today.

When I picked up the barrel after vapour blasting the guy noticed its picked up by every stud. The cause apparently is over torquing. The piston I'm using is run in to this barrel though and I guess the next rebore will take care of it proper.

if you have not gone oversize on your piston..you can cross hatch (Knerrell- spelling?) the piston & hone your cylinder... this will work well for quite sometime before you need to rebore & new piston

It's well run in so will leave it and see how it runs. Tolerances on rings and piston good, dressed the piston a little so will see how it goes.

Having a battle with the kickstart/new bush and case but.... made some nice shiny stainless chain adjusters today.

very nice!

So, I get the kickstart sorted, modify the new ally clutch case slightly and vapour blast it. I go for a final fit and find I've got a 6 spring '403' one piece clutch basket that wont fit in the new case. What the FFFF. Is it an LC clutch? I won't find out til tomorrow I guess when I talk to HVAf UK. Feck Feck Feck !

Big 6 spring clutch basket stays and a late 4T case with a removable clutch cover is on its way. Disaster averted, I will now have available a one owner never used brand new shiny ally case.
Made up some small spacers to go behind the remachined stator and got timed in tonight. Got the hang of it in the end, 2mm BTDC to start with.

I'm flying blind a little here, please tell me if this doesn't look right. Everything went together well though and felt right, 2mm pin etc.

Looks like that would work, but usually done with the head on. Then the dial indicator is placed in the spark plug hole with an adapter.

I will make one up but thought as its still not complete I drilled a bit of angle to bolt on and used a mag base DTI straight up. I wondered if the plug being at an angle wether that would give a very slightly inaccurate measurement? A bit complicated maths for me.