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It seems that now that the Honda line of motorcycles are getting older we see more and more posts on what the cost of the valve clearance check is. This task can get pretty pricey and it really doesn’t take a whole lot of know how. Just a few tools a manual which you can get here by downloading it, and one of your weekend days.

 

I’ve done this on a F4, 929, and 954 it’s all the same for each bike once you get the valve cover off.

 

This write up is using the 929 so most of the major stuff will be the same except for some of the more common things that most here will know how to do easily.

 

This write up is just to help you out and get the nerves gone before you try it out on your bike. I’ve seen write ups on the web before doing mine and they all say the same thing “Oh this is really easy and such” but you know what until I did it I was a little nervous.

 

So here we go….

Some things you will need before you go ripping into your bike. Get these things or at least have a friend at AutoZone on speed dial to bring them to you. It’s always best to start this early in the morning and make sure that your local motorcycle store is open just in case you find something that you need to replace.

 

Items required:

 

-  A tool kit that you have used on your bike to remove things that is complete. If you’ve been working on your bike in the past you will know what type of tools you will need.

-  A feeler gauge that reads either Standard or Metric…If it does both it’s a bit easier.

-  Some sort of light preferably not a lighter unless you have a fire suit ;)

-  If your like me buy a new Valve cover gasket you may not need it, they are made out of hard rubber and most likely won’t be damaged. Mine wasn’t and I’ve reused all of the ones I’ve done so far.

- You will need Non-hardening sealant. You can buy it from AutoZone it says that you can use it on valve covers and such. Just remember non-hardening.

-  If your in there you most likely need to replace the sparkplugs since they coincide with the valve check. If you don’t replace them then you will just need to do it later, your going to have them removed anyways.

 

- Now the big one to buy shims or not. So far I’ve not had to adjust the shims on any bike that I have done. Now that’s not saying that I won’t that’s just past experience. Call you dealer and ask them if they carry them, most likely they will say the have them but they need to know what size you need. Of course you won’t know until you have the bike all apart. They sell kits but like for major dollars and if you do need one it’s just one not a whole bike worth.

 

-  I do the valves check at the same time I do the oil, radiator change, sparkplugs and other small things. In the write up below I replaced all of these at that time. If you don’t wish to do them it’s up to you but you will need to do a few things different.

 

  Ok now I’m going to start off by saying that you can do this with just the tank, air box, throttle body cables removed buy you are crazy if you do.

  There is less then no room when trying to measure the exhaust valves, it can be done but I don’t. The valves are check at major maintenance periods for a reason.

 

Things to remove:

 

-         Steering Damper

-         Seat (2 bolts on the back)

-         Remove the air duct covers

-         Remove the left and right mid and lower cowls.

-         Gas tank…Good time to replace the fuel filter since the tank is off. You can remove the tank all the way or just strap it up. If you remove it all the way it will give you more room

-         Remove the air box all the way. The top of the box is held on by screws going around the out side and 2 screws are down those holes in the middle, and disconnect the electrical connector to it. The bottom is held on by the velocity stacks remove both of them and the air box will pull up. You have a few hoses on the bottom and the electrical connector. Also that is a hose that goes onto the white electrical connector you have to pull really hard to get it off, or you can unscrew it from the box and leave it on the bike.

-         Disconnect the throttle body cables.

-         If you have the Pair Valve you will need to remove that also, and once it’s off you can just cap those two lines going to the valve cover. It doesn’t need to go back on but if you do a search you will find a few how to’s on the removal.

-         Remove the sparkplugs, I tend to disconnect the connectors going to each coil, move it to the side and pop out each coil. Then I remove each one of the plugs and put them to the side.

 

Now besides the valve cover this is all that has to come off but I suggest it’s a good time to change the coolant out and make your life a lot easier.

 

I do the follow to make it a lot easier.

 

-         I pull the radiator completely off the bike.

-         I remove the complete upper cowl. On the 929 you have to remove the windscreen, gauges, disconnect a few electrical connectors, mirrors, and one bolt and the upper comes off. Once you do this you have lots of room. Also now that you have it off you can redo the hack job on your front blinker wiring.

 

Now you have a pretty naked looking front end, no worries about scratching you stuff up or breaking something.

 

The manual says that you need to remove the CCT don’t. Unless you find the valves out of tolerance you don’t need to touch the CCT. On the 929 it’s pretty hard to get to that inside bolt even with all the stuff off of it.

 

Here is a picture of the CCT on the right hand side not a good one but you can see it’s not easy to get to.

 

Ok here is some pictures of the valve cover still on the bike. The 929’s cover is held down by just those 4 bolts not a whole lot.

 

Ok loosen the 4 bolts on the valve cover and remove it out of the bike. If you removed the radiator then it comes out really easy out the front. If you didn’t then work it out the back and be very careful not to damage the rubber gasket on the bottom.

Here are a few pictures of what you will be looking at with the cover off.

As you can see it's not like anything is going to pop out or anything

You can see the cams and how the push the top of the valve spring covers, and under those are where the shims are.

Ok on the right hand side of your bike is the clutch. On the front side of the clutch cover you will see a timing hole cap, remove it. It feels a bit weird when it’s coming off that’s because it has a O’ring and it’s moving on the threads. Here is a good picture of what you will see. The manual makes it nice and easy to see what you are looking for. Well on the bike it’s a different story, the index mark is really hard to see and the whole T mark deal have me confused for a few minutes.

Now here is what it looks like without the clutch cover on it.

 

 

In the timing hole you will see a the timing marks. You are looking to align the T mark not the T with the index mark, at the same time you will need to look on cam sprockets to make sure that the IN and EX are flush with the case. The T mark is a line to the right of the T it looks like an I more then anything. This is what you align with the Index mark on the case cover. Now to do this I put on a 14mm socket on the bolt in the timing hole and rotated it.

Now if your like me I had to read and re read the darn book a few times to understand what I was doing. On the first marks you are checking the 1 and 3 intake valves well the picture in the book is up side down for me. Since I was trying to measure them from that gas tank side. So be aware of how the picture is in the book intake is on closes to the throttle bodies and exhaust are by the headers.

Here is what it will look like while you are trying to fit the feeler gauge into the small space to check them.

 

Now without going into the whole thing the manual says to do, just remember you will check 2 sets of valves then rotate the timing mark 180 degrees and check 2 sets of valve and so forth.

 

Here are a few pictures of what you will see when you have the valve cover off. Not too scary in there just a bit of oil.

 

Now if you have a valve that is out of tolerance rotate the cam back and forth make sure it is aligned up correctly and you have the correct feeler gauge. If you do have a valve that is out of tolerance you will need to remove the CCT and pop off the cams. This isn’t a hard job if you have it this far it’s just a bit more of a job. Just remember you’re saving your self several hundred dollars and your bike isn’t in the shop for a week. The shims are under those caps that you are sliding the feeler gauge on top of and between the cam.

Here is a part of the manual to help explan what you will have to do if you do need to adjust them.

 

Now before you put back the valve cover you will need to use a bit of non-hardening sealant and apply it to the engine case, just on the half circle cut outs. You don’t have to apply it all the way around. Slide the cover back in and please use a torque wrench to apply the 108 inch pound torque. If you noticed what the bolts look like you will see that by over torqueing it you aren’t pressing the cover any tighter you are just going to strip it out of the engine mount. Apply a bit of lock tight to the bolt if you are worried about it coming loose, red lock tight adds about 100 inch pounds of break force. Once again you aren’t going to stop the cover from leaking by gorilla torqueing them down you are just going to destroy you engine block.

 

Now this write up is more to show you what to expect when doing a valve clearance check, it doesn’t show you each step by step. The manual does a really good job at that but it looks hard. I did this write up in hopes it will convince a few here that you can do the maintenance and not have to rely on the dealership for everything.
Assembling the pieces is simply the reverse of taking it apart. Take your time, triple check all torques and make sure everything goes back the way it came apart.

I am still adding pictures so I will edit this to make it more useful.

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