pete roper

Good pic that emphasises the development of the delamination. Around the lighter coloured exposed substrate you can see the discolouration of the DLC as it crazes and fragments. Unfortunately many people, even people who should know better, often think that because there isn't substrate exposed the tappets are fine, they aren't usually by 10,000 km you will see that 'Matt' discolouration appearing if you wipe the tappet surface clean and dry. I just went through this, or tried to, with some pommy bloke who turned up on WG and the Ghetto. He pulled a cambox at 4,500 miles and claimed everything was perfect and I obviously didn't know what I was talking about but then he went off in a huff before posting any pics. Pity as his 1200 Sport is a nice bike, it's a shame he's going to ride it to death, or worse, flick pass it to some other sucker while it still has the problem. You can lead a horse to water...........

'Bout time I did that I guess. I found a couple lurking in the workshop while digging through a load of 8V shite the other week. I know Scud wanted one. Anyone else? Pete

My guess is loss of oil pressure for the usual reason with the 'Broad Sump'! Phil's suspicion it's just been re-shelled makes sense.both Chuck and Phil are as smart as very smart things. Listen to them. Pete

Just do a fill and do the sums, it's not difficult and the figures don't lie.

The difference between the small valve heads and the mid valve heads is that the combustion chamber is enlarged for the bigger valves. That means that if you use them with the flat topped G5 Pistons you end up with a very low compression ratio so all the benefits of the bigger valves are lost. To make it work properly you need Pistons with a dome. Easiest way to achieve this is just buy a set of 88mm Gilardonis for a roundfin LeMans.

In case I haven't put it up on this board this is the simple sequence for tuning a W5AM bike, (Except Bellagio.). Set the tappets, change oil and oil and air filters. Connect manometers/Carbtune/Whatever you use. Connect Guzzidiag or your other tool of choice. Close both air bleeds. Start bike and warm to over 60*C Hold rpm at 3500-4000rpm and use the bell crank screw that moves the linkage rod to balance the TB's at high speed. Kill engine and ensure throttle is fully closed by opening it and letting it snap closed. Using Guzzidiag or whatever re-set the TPS value and the self learning parameters. Restart engine and let it idle. Whichever side has the higher manifold depression open the air bleed on that TB until the depression is equal on both TB's Remove manometers and diagnostic tooling. Reinsert manifold plugs or reconnect tubes to charcoal canister. Done! It really is that simple and takes about 15 minutes.

At 35, OE even 25,000 miles your tappets will be well worn. They may not of got to the 'Death Rattle' stage yet but they will certainly be on the way out. They aren't likely to be this bad But they'll likely be worse than this Until you pull a cambox you won't know how bad it is and until it's fixed there is no point in trying to tune the bike. If the tappets are severely worn even if adjusted 'Correctly' high points on them may be causing the valve to be held off its seat when hot which would explain stalling. Changes to cam timing will also play havoc with the fueling due to the lack of a MAF sensor. Other causes of high or low idle problems are often down to people insisting on keeping the oil filled to the 'Max' mark on the dipstick. This results in lots of oil being pumped into the airbox and fouling the TB's and stepper. Really, pulling the LH cambox is a 15 minute task on a Stelvio, (RH requires the tank and plastics off but they'll have to come off anyway for installation of a 'C' Kit for rollers.). When you rollerise is also the ideal time to remove the TB's and stepper for a thorough cleaning. Once that is done it can be tuned properly and most likely all its 'Issues' will go away.

NEVER! EVER! EVER! TOUCH OR ADJUST THE THROTTLE STOP SCREW ON A W5AM CONTROLLED BIKE! The idle speed is hard coded into the ECU and is governed by a stepper motor. The system doesn't use a MAF sensor and if you move that screw you completely @#!#$# the fueling as the throttle angle is set on a flow bench at the factory and if you mess with it it is virtually impossible to get it right again! Also if your mate's bike is a 2009 it will be a flat tappet model and unless he has had it rollerised there is no point in doing anything to it until it has been. How many Km on it now and does it have a service history? Pete PS? If you messed with the throttle stop screw on the Sport that might well explain the high idle. I'll give a full run down on tuning a W5AM bike a bit later, they are ridiculously simple but still after ten or more years in production there are still people, including many shops, getting it wrong!

Because the TPS reading is interpretive and the TPS is on the right hand TB's while the adjustment for the bell crank is on the left when you do the high speed balance it alters the TPS value. Therefore after the high speed balance you need to kill the motor and re-set the TPS otherwise it will have weird effects on the running, most usually a high idle issue due to the ECU advancing the spark. Pete PS? What year is this shitbox Stelvio and what is it doing?

Well you could, but the tiny nature of the change means it's easier to do with a feeler gauge than by trying to hold the throttle. That's all. Really though if the TB's and stepper are clean and operating correctly it should be fine as long as nobody has arsed about with the throttle stop screws. You know the procedure for balancing the TB's on a W5AM bike? Pete

Another thing is that those flywheels are anodised regal and hard as buggery. While my hatred of aluminium timing gears is legendary I have installed a LOT of alloy flywheels both with and without lightened ring gears and I've never had a problem. Set the idle too low, sit for long periods with the clutch pulled in, run unbalanced throttle bodies? Yes, you may have problems! But that would be true of a flywheel made of any material, or any common material. Pete

I'm I'm in the UK at the moment and for some reason my pad of eyes won't allow me to view it. I'll have a squizz when I get home. Pete

Only the Guzzi system doesn't use an automotive type release bearing and yoke. The release bearing is at the back of the gearbox nd is acted on by the piston of the slave cylinder directly. On the subject of lubricating the splines? I'm with Chuck nowadays. I see lubricating them as pointless and if too much slippery is applied actually counter productive. On the subject of the noise? I haven't been able to view the video but looking at the flywheel I'd say it's been the victim of three things. 1.) What Chuck described. 2.) Poor throttle body balance. 3.) Too low an idle speed. If your idle speed is low and the TB balance is off the rocking couple caused by the uneven firing intervals will be greatly exacerbated. Any 'Knock' will most likely be the primaries in the gearbox flogging to and fro as the input shaft accelerates and decelerates with the crank. Give it a tune up and get the idle speed up to a minimum of 1100rpm. See if that fixes it.

A forcibly aspirated small, high speed diesel! Now yer talkin'! I'd be all over it like a rash.

You have learned well, grasshopper.. You haven't met Jude yet have you Chuck? A huge brute of a woman with arms like Popeye and a mouth like a Glaswegian docker! She also has a mind like a steel trap, she wouldn't miss something like that because she was 'Distracted'! The punishment she would meet out would be medieval in its ferocity and biblical in its extent.

Having sold the Scura RC to Chuck and since regretted it if you do want to sell the LeMans once it's back together I'd be interested. Whether I'll be able to afford it is of course a different matter but I might be able to persuade Jude that bringing two bikes back, (I have my Mana GT in California I'd like to bring back too.) will be little more expensive than one. Actually the chance of Jude falling for such pathetic artifice is so remote I wouldn't even try it! The last time I tried to pull a swiftly like that the welts didn't fade for several months........ Pete

The hanging idle is a weird one. While early W5AM bikes had a stepper motor with a metal body and later ones had a plastic stepper there is some evidence, which I can't say is conclusive, that the metal bodied ones are more prone to sticking which can cause high idle problems. One perennial problem with almost all big blocks is that the factory recommends too much engine oil and this is reflected in the dipstick marking. On the CARC bikes with a screw in dipstick, (Bellagio excepted.) you are told to check the oil with the stick unscrewed and simply resting on the threads. If you then fill to the 'Full' mark on the stick all that you will ensure is that a shitload of oil will get expelled through the breather system and into the airbox where it will gum up the throttle butterflies and can easily contaminate the stepper motor. If the stepper jams? High idle is often the result. If the throttle plates get contaminated and the bores of the TB's coated in grunge there is another odd little syndrome that can occur. After the throttle body balancing procedure has been carried out the TPS needs to be re-set. This is an electronic, interpretative adjustment that has to be carried out using Guzzidiag or one of the other available diagnostic tools. Once this is done the TPS value will be re-set to its baseline which will of been altered during the high speed balance procedure due to the TPS being on the right hand TB but the bell crank adjustment being on the left. (This is one of those infuriating things. If they'd put the TPS on the left hand TB it would to all intents and purposes NEVER need attention! GAKK!) Anyway, if the throttle plates are badly contaminated or the bores of the TB's worn or cruddy the TPS reading, (Let's pretend this is an 8V for this example.) will be 4.8 with the engine off, (Which it has to be for the re-setting function to be carried out.). When the engine is tarted though the air pressure working on the back of the butterflies may alter their position slightly causing the TPS reading to rise, sometimes by as much as 0.5 of a degree to around 5.2-5.3. The problem then is that at that TPS value the map is already beginning to advance the spark so once again the idle rises! While the *Real* solution is to remove the throttle bodies for a damned good cleaning and then never run the oil higher than about a third of the way up the stick from the 'Add' mark you can try a nasty little kludge I've discovered which may buy you some time. With the engine off but the ignition on get a thin feeler guage, no more than 2 thou and slip it in between the throttle stop and the 'Never touch' sacred screw it stops against. Check with Guzzidiag that the TPS reading is now about 5.2 degrees and adjust thickness of feeler guage to suit. With the feeler guage in situ now re-set the TPS and remove the feeler guage. As the throttle stop re-seats against the stop screw the value will actually drop to 4.4-4.5 degrees, actually too low BUT when the engine is started the throttle plates get tugged round and the TPS value elevates again, but just to about where it *Should* be at 4.8 so the spark doesn't advance and Ta-Da! No high idle! As I said it's a nasty kludge, but if it works until such time as you can get the TB's off WGAF? Finally, there may on some of the 2V-W5AM bikes be a hard coding error in the temperature correction table that is non adjustable as I've seen a few of them that no matter what you did to them at certain ambient temperatures they will tend to idle high. Neither I or Mark have managed to identify a cause which leads up to believe it must be a non-adjustable hard coding glitch. If that's the case? Well, there's bugger all we can do. But it's worth trying the other alternatives before throwing in the towel. Pete

You mean this, Pete?: "Seemed to work very well, yet there is no resounding confirmation that those last two actions do anything." How so? It just seems to turn the dialog box off. There are no values displayed (that I saw) . . . no bells ring, the sun did not break through the clouds, no gratifying hiss of steam . . . If the tune has been done properly it will of changed the TPS value. If it isn't re-set it will mean that the ECU will assume that the throttle is in a different position to that that it is. Once the TPS value moves more than 0.2-0.3 degrees above its calibrated position the spark will advance leading to a high idle occurring. This can also be exacerbated by ambient and engine temperature fluctuations. Re-setting the self learning parameters, (Also known as clearing the trims.) restores the learned parameters of the CL map to the factory baseline. This can also be achieved by simply pulling the main 30A fuse for a few seconds. Few bikes have EVER been as easy to tune as a W5AM Guzzi yet after ten years in production I'm still seeing them all #@$&@#@ up tuning wise on a weekly basis. It makes my brain hurt!

The Sport C's had straight cut gearboxes but also lacked a Cush drive in the rear wheel and used the then new 'Stacked Washer' face cam shock absorber spring and only three dog engagement rather than the earlier six or later five. This meant that the driveline was very unforgiving and the distance in wheel rotation between 'Power Off' and 'Power On' is much higher. The long and the short of it is that the gearboxes beat themselves to bits! It's usually third that goes first as it works twice as hard as the other pinions as that is where the primary drive goes into the box. After that it's usually fifth and then a crap-shoot! The boxes that last best are the ones that are thrashed mercilessly! Baby them and they're history! Pete

The way I install the Valtec type tensioners is to put the plate on and then the chain and sprockets before finally slipping the blade and Spring over the pin and pushing it home. Then install the washer and nyloc nut. Easy. Pete

What the absolute @#!#$# is happening? In the US, Oz and seemingly the UK anyone with any skill or product and history knowledge is bailing out or has been pushed into receivership! What is the *Plan*? The mind boggles.......

Perfectly aligned is obviously best but there will always be some manufacturing tolerance. While 2 degrees will impose some unwanted forces it probably won't be noticeable. 16 degrees definitely will be!

One tooth is, what, like 5º ? Or more like 10º ? (not sure how many splines there are on the shaft mate-up . . . ) If the shaft is one tooth off, can that be easily seen with the bike fully assembled? More importantly, with just one tooth off, will the rhinoceros feel quite that frosty? Twenty splines, 360 degrees. 16* per spline. It's easily visible and you should be able to sight I by setting the back one up and then lying down behind the bike and squizzing up towards the front yokes.

It'll ride like a three legged rhinoceros with a spear up its chuff.

If misaligned the driveshaft will wind up and down like a big torsion spring puting high loads on the splines and pinions in the transmission but also loading and unloading the reaction rod making the suspension incapable of working correctly! The forces are quite high. I've seen the splined part of a bevelbox pinion twisted off by them after a long period of misalignment! Pete