Saturday, July 9

Oh dear... so what do I do now?




Pete rode over this afternoon and gave my rear cylinder head the OK... but once we'd got the cylinder off and Pete had removed the piston (seems to be a Shovelhead piston with the later spiral keeper), the evidence of heat damage was finally revealed.

The piston and cylinder wall are toast. Even better news, the cylinder is at the end of its life: already .070 over.

My fault really, for pushing a sick bike 200 miles to the Linkert.

So, what now?

I have heard that sleeving cylinders can be dodgy. I have heard that aftermarket cylinders can be dodgy. So do I try to find some used OEM cylinders and pistons? Would they have to be early cylinders to work with the '52 bottom end?

Panhead owners, I need your opinions.

8 comments:

Rowan said...

there was quite a few pan barrels in that barn find of mine... you know where all that went guy !!!!

Guy@GK said...

Ebay? Or do I call the boys in Bromsgrove?

Rowan said...

call them boys... i think there was about 8 pan barrels there that were servicable... not sure what they have left but i'm guessing they aint sold many... its just a thought!! worth a call

Benny said...

call bobby, there is some left but i'm not sure what, he measured them all up......

Pete Stansfield said...

Get a hair transplant !

Dr Boots said...

Yeah, Jeff sorted me out with a pair for my Pan.

That said, I've had new liners (on my Ariel) before and never had a problem *but* you need to make sure it's a proper job. Clearly, if the liner fit is poor and the cylinder expands it could slip down ...

matt machine said...

ive had heaps of resleaves done. ...a good machineshop will do a proper job.

however...when i resleave, i then order 10 or 20 over pistons...and match each piston to bore with 4 thou over to avoid the nipping up you seemed to have had...modern fuels with no lead in traffic cause motors to run hotter...more expansion.....more clearance necessarybut question is....is there a score mark in the bore?...

matt machine said...

sorry...just scrolled down and saw the bore score....good name for a band...the bore score...