dwracer15

.020 Over
Joined
Apr 18, 2012
Messages
37
Location
San Angelo, Texas
My 08 Rocket has 24K miles on it. I have been hearing the paint can rattle. It has gotten louder on start-up but I hear it most of the time. Yesterday I took out the spring to see how far the d-tent ratchet had traveled. Looking at some of the other writings on this subject at 16mm you could shim or make a spacer. However mine was at 26.09 mm. I took out the d-tent mechanism, and it is bottomed out. Do I replace the chain or is there a kit for everything I need? I have heard there might be an aftermarket kit but I don't know where to purchase it.

Thanks
 
Suzuki adjuster fits ... sure one of the fellas that has fitted one will chirp up and let you know which model Suzuki has the part. Its a manual rather than a self-adjuster.
 
First a warning do not just stick it back together as the valve timing has shifted and you will bend you valve or worse. the front end has to come off. While she is sitting there look inside the tensioner hole and see if the back of the cam chian guide is messed up this could be your problem might look almost as bad as the bottom one in the picture below.



If it looks like the one in top of the picture above then I suspect it looks like the one below (in the center)



I'll be back the wifey has chow ready :D
 
If you buy a kit you will get new cam gears and at that mileage I am thinking yours will be ok. It is weird that there is over 26 mm of depth on the tensioner plunger. I am wondering if what part of the inner pluger you measured for depth.
In the picture below you can see the pluger with a ink pen pointing at the surface of the plunger.



The ledge surface is what the 16mm drop is measured to. not the bottom of the plunger where the spring sits. if the ledge is 16mm or more you then drop a spacer (plug) goes into so the spring tension is increased.

26mm means your plunger is fully extended which is why I question whether there is another problem like damage to the back of the guide or a broke guide like the one that broke in my bike.
 
Sorry I got side tracked but Sal called from California he has clutch problems so I am helping him update his 05 clutch to the newer pressure plate and lifter piece used in our models. Sorry for the delay. Anyway you can order the things you need but in my opinion some more research needs to be done for a few reasons.
1 you might be ordering parts you do not need.
2 you might need to order other parts once you open her up which you cannot tell.
3 I must ask at 24,000 miles have you just recently had the vavles checked and shimmed? If so something might have been done wrong or might have been missed.
Are you comfortable with doing engine work? If not then you need to decide whether you can or should you take it to a dealer. If its a dealer you should look around and see who other captains reccomend. If a dealer just did the valves they should have seen is something like the chain was bad or anything else for that matter so maybe another dealer is better.
Not trying to insult you I just do not know your background and would not want you to have to take her to a dealer in pieces. it easier to push her on a trailer then put her back togehter broke just to get her on the trailer. Parts could get lost and the dealer will say you never gave them to him whether right or wrong.
Also the suzuki chain tnsioner supplied by APE will most likely screw up your guide if it is not already and will damage the new one if you need it. the head on it is smaller then the Triumph one. and will embed in the back of the new or ols giude which is rubber to absorb shock.
Ther are modified components made by Warp Aerospace Division along with machining modifications to adapt the manual tensioner made by APE. Also their is the same modifications made by Warp Aerospace Division along with machining modifications to the auto tensioner that will still alow auto tensioning plus eliminate the possibility of tensioner kickback failure that occurs which will save you from bending or breaking valves in the head. Below is a picture of what happens whenthe tensioner fails and kick back while the motor is running

you do not want to go there.
These modifications have been introduced to all Carpenter engine packages and I have 25,000 miles on the modified tensioning sytem which is auto tensioning and 59,500 miles on my original tensioner which is what I chose as I worry about setting the manual one right.
take some time and think about what course of action you want to take. feel free to ask anything I might have confused you on as sometime its hard for my written words to match my thoughts and I do not want to confuse you. So if you have more questions feel free to ask.
Another note you can run the modified auto tensioner with no guide modifications as long as you are staying with stock cams and valve springs. If you use the APE then you should also modified the guide for safety.
 
Thanks for all the information and especially the in depth explanations. I purchased the Rocket back in March of this year and have put over six thousand miles on it. The previous owner had done some modifications. They had replaced the exhaust with D&D’s cat removed, Power Commander 3 and the under seat air-filter. I have since put on a Power Commander 5 with Auto-tune. As far as experience, I have raced motorcycles over 40 years and have rebuilt many an engine. I also race circle track and Baja cars. We build most of our race motors. I have never torn into the Rocket motor but I understand how to degree the cams. As for the measurement I did read and see the same pictures you have. I measured to face and it was 26.09mm. Full detent appears to be 26.5mm. I went ahead and pulled the whole mechanism because at this point I wasn’t going to take a chance with a catastrophic failure. I probably could have unloaded the valve spring tension and not have the timing jump but didn’t really care. I was going to replace all I could. I’m pretty anal about noises in my engines. I talked with another Capitan and he didn’t sound excited about the service in Texas. I called one of the dealers he had experiences with and their tech told me he doubted it was the timing chain because in his words “the Rocket just doesn’t have timing chain issues”. I though there are a lot of capitan’s around the world might take issue with that. When I looked on the APE web site I didn’t see a guide. I noticed their gears had slots. Is this so you can degree the cams without the special tool? I was hoping my motor had the new lower gear with the good key way, since it was 2008. If you were to replace everything who would you buy from? I have several friends that have motorcycle repair facilities and between the three of us should be able to change the gears and chain.:D
 

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Ok so your knowledge is good to feel comfy working on the motor. I can not really tell if you have theo lder style guide in the beast from the picture but you can see it is not totally destroyed. I do suspect it does have the 06- 07 guide but you will have to inspect a little more. I will be looking to see if you have a aluminum guide like in the other pictures or a black guide. Photo bucket is slow from work so I will add to this when I get home from work. I can say this from the size of the wear spot on the back of the guide (vertical length) my guess is you have the older 06-07 guide which flexes way to much. If you had the newer aluminum guide which come in the update kits there would be a round diameter about the size of the plunger on the guide. If it was aluminum and the back of the guide has that much vertical wear I would be concerned that it has snapped in half.
The ape gears had a problem as they thought having both exhaust and intake slotted the same would work. They were wrong and I do not know if they corrected the problem. If you are not buidling horse power into it My bet is no matter what your Cam gears will look unworn once yopu expose them.
I will add more when I get home.
 
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