New ticking sound :(

Hey there,

Bike = 1982 Maxim XJ650J

I was happily cruising along two days ago doing 110km/h when a new kind of tick started coming from my engine. Next moment of happiness was when 20 minutes later I rolled into my driveway..

The next day I fired it up and it continued. Through some reading on this wonderful forum, I came across the notion that it could be the exhaust nuts. The side of the engine where the noise seemed to be most pronounced had one exhaust nut that was not quite finger tight (wrench dangled side to side when I put it on), and all the others took maybe 1/8th of a turn (wasn't going to risk snapping a stud so I was fairly gentle with my tightening.

Interestingly when I checked the spark plugs before I tightened the exhaust bolts, the plug for the piston with the loosest nut was a nice brown colour, the others rather light grey. Through my reading, a post from Chacal indicated that cold air can be sucked in around the gasket so I attributed the different colour to this. I swapped the plugs between the two outer cylinders (clutch hand lever side was the brown one), went out for a little boot around, then checked them again after 2 gears of WOT with immediate clutch in and shut down. They were all pretty light grey.
Seemed to make things better, so I took off to band practice for about a 90km trip. Ran great but when I got back the noise seemed worse. More reading.. Noticed Chacal recommended using a piece of fuel line as a sort of stethoscope. Seems to be that the noise is coming from behind the 2 engine covers under the cylinders. Was going to check valve clearances before I discovered that the noise seems to be coming from the bottom of the engine. Drained the oil and pulled off the two covers, to my surprise one of them has nothing but a big black dot behind it and some white powder accumulation. When I pulled off the other one to find the ignition components I left them alone..

I pulled the Allen head bolts out for the clutch cover, but then it got dark and I figured I would park it in the garage, post on here and clean up the covers.

After riding the 90km last night, the plugs look about the same. I can post pics if requested.

Any thoughts? Rather bummed - my band is playing a wedding tomorrow and the bike is sexier than my 2004 Lancer (and way more fun) - was hoping to ride home with something cute on the back. Now the oil is in a big ol' aluminum pot I was going to scrap - only 1,500 km on the Amsoil 10W50 so I'll likely reuse it.

 

The left cover is your timing cover, the other cover is called the "oil pump cover", but you're right--- all you'll see is the big black crank case seal. That's all that's there.

 

Is it worth popping the clutch cover off if the noise seems to be coming from behind those covers?

 

Or just ride..? The noise isn't too loud, and as mentioned it seems to be running fine.

 

If that exhaust was loose enough to cause " header tick" the gasket may have burnt out and even with tight nuts.. Lol ,it may still be leaking.

 

I was looking for the tick with the 'stethoscope' and heard nothing in the exhaust area. When I put it in front of the timing cover or oil pump cover the noise stands out pretty clearly.

I put the oil back in and took it for a boot - still seems fine. I took a couple of videos so I'll see how the sound comes through and maybe upload to Youtube.

 

Here's the video - any thoughts?

 

Not meaning to "hijack" this thread but I hear a similar noise on mine


Haven't really done any "diagnostics", as I'm pretty new to mechanics and even more new to motorcycles. But I'm trying!

 

Sounds to me like it's the cam tapping. There was a TSB about cam end-float, and repair was optional at the owner's request. My 750 does the same thing and it's not a problem. I had my engine apart last winter for other reasons, measured cam end-float and found it to be a tad loose, but within spec and also found no signs of unusual wear or damage.

Link:
http://xjbikes.com/forums/threads/xj550-cam-shaft-clearance-tapping-noise.47184/

 

k-moe - are you referring to my bike, or Andrew's?

 

Both.

 

Thank you so very much! Taking off to the show now

I love this forum.