Help for stuck valve adjustment shims

Help for stuck valve adjustment shims

I’m helping my friend with the valve adjustment on his 82 XJ650J. I used the “zip-tie” valve-holding tool describe here and elsewhere, and it works great!!

After securing the valve & raising the shim holder up, I encountered a couple of “stuck” shims, and then remembered a trick I learned years ago, as a young padawan learner... I mean, VW mechanic....

Try shooting a little compressed air at the bottom of the shim to blow out the oil. The oil film under the shim has great holding power and blowing it out helps with removal. I did this AFTER raising the shim holder up as high as it would go. This minimizes the amount of oil blown all over your garage.

This is what we did to help get the shims out of VW Rabbits & Dashers.

 

That has been posted here before.

For those of us without compressed air its no help.

I have one really good screwdriver that easily pried all but one out of 12 that I did over a two day period. The worst one required 10 tries at repositioning the hold down tool and prying with the magic screwdriver.

RickCoMatic suggested sharpening a monster nail and using that to pry with.

 

It is too bad you are having such difficulty removing your stuck shims; I can relate tou your frustration.

Most of what is posted here is of no help to some one; be thankful some people are willing to step up to the plate and share -rather than complain.

-It is better to light a candle than to curse the darkeness, my friend.

 

would someone be nice enough to show us or explain how the zip tie works to remove the shims. thanks grm

 

Use a massive zip tie, or a piece of 12 gauge household wire which is said to work even better, fold it over, shove it down the spark plug hole while the valve is fully open, rotate motor 360 *, remove shim.

Can someone post a pic?

 

grmeyers,

Go to this link; they have photos. I just took the square "block" end of the zip tie [the end that you feed the tail thru] as the part that is used to block the valve. I just bent the ziptie head to about a 45 degree angle. Worked great:

http://www.imrisk.com/yamaha/xjwiretie.htm

 

I never could get the wire tie method to work.

I purchased the shim bucket hold down tool. The tool is AMAZING. Its picky about where you place it. It requires some self-education to use but not difficult to learn.

The tool is inexpensive compared to the cost of the bike. Same with the YICS tool.

 

I agree wholeheartedly. The tool isn't so much picky about where you place it as it is about the angle of the cam lobe when you attach it. As Half says, once you learn the trick it's definitely worth the less than $20 purchase price. I'm always leery of shoving anything down a spark plug hole.

 

Even with the cam lobe at 90 degrees the tool has huge holes and you can place the tool such that it does not hold down the bucket.

If your oil is dirty you cannot see how the tool is positioned. It pays to have clean oil when using the bucket hold down tool.

 

for those without compressed air - Go to your neighborhood office supply store and get a can of compressed air, the kind that comes with a straw nozzle. Point the straw at the slot in the shim bucket, and let 'er rip... the air pocket makes the shim pop right out, so you can grab it with pliers or forceps.

there are pros and cons of both the wire tie trick and the hold-down tool. if you use an old, brittle (or just weak) wire tie, there's a chance that the force of the valve spring will shear it inside the cylinder, which could be a pain (you could still retrieve the pieces though). With the hold-down tool, you're running the risk of cracking the valve body if you rotate the cam lobe into the tool...

you say potato, I say... use whatever suits you best.