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Another bloody RZ500?! Yes, what could be better than one RZ500? Two RZ500's clearly! Found this baby on eBay, in "used but working" condition, starting bid $2000. The fact that it was working (a huge plus over my other peice of crap RZ500) and had NSW rego got it over the line for me. Winning bid was $2650, it would have been $2124 but a bloody Canadian (it was open to international bidders) bumped it from there. Oh well, that's life.
When I picked it up it didn't exactly fit my definition of "used but working" as the right hand carbs were off it. Grrr. Anyway, got it back and bunged the carbs on and battery in (very desperate to go for a ride on it you see) only to discover that I'd forgotten to get the screws that hold the right hand air box onto the carbs. When I got it home I flogged bits from non working RZ (eBay seller mailed me the missing bits but I couldn't wait!) and fired the new one up. It ran, but not too well, only 3 cylinders and a bit of backfiring, but at least it did run.
Cleaned the carbs out and tried again. Nothing. Dead as a certain other RZ500 I could mention. Can it be that I have the RZ500 kiss of death? Have I killed another one? Seriously considering throwing the whole lot on eBay at this stage and never mentioning RZ500's ever again, however while checking the resistance of the stator I noticed that the pickup seemed to have one wire unplugged. When I plugged it all back in, away she went, running like a top. I think I must have knocked the wire loose when removing the left hand carbies. You could feel the relief in the garage when the spark was restored and the beast fired.
Even the alarming rate at which fuel was now pouring from the carby overflows only took the smile off my face momentarily, I couldn't care, I was riding a registered, legal, RZ500 on the road for the first time. Glorious! Strange that fuel was leaking since I had cleaned all the carbs and fitted a fuel filter. I had one spare needle and seat and used that to plug one leak, but another promptly sprung up so I ordered 3 new needle and seat assemblies at $60 each, yikes!!
Fitted them, but one leak persisted, the upper left hand carb. I tried swapping the float pin as the one that was in there was quite worn. This worked, at a standstill at least, once running, the vibrations from the motor made it flood furiously out the overflow. Apart from the fire risk, fuel at this time was $1.17/litre (I'm sure I will look back fondly on this already disgracefully high price in years (months?) to come!) so it was a problem that had to be fixed. When trying a spare float, I noticed that the seat itself seemed a slightly loose fit in the carburettor body.
I tried a different o ring but it made no difference. Likewise a different retaining screw, I even tried a washer under the screw. I swapped the seat between the upper and lower carburettors but the upper carb seat was still loose. I swapped them back and thought about the inevitable conclusion. The seat was not being retained by the screw because it couldn't push it all the way into the carburettor body. The only solution was to remove the retainig screw and seat itself and remove some material from the carburettor body so that the seat could go all the way into the carburettor. Taking a file to a genuine RZ500 carby? You bet I wasn't keen, but it was the only way. File file file file file, blow filings away, check seat fit, repeat. It only took a couple of test fittings and I had removed enough material for the seat to seat if you know what I mean. Clean it up, put it all back together and success! No more leaks.
In the meantime, the beautiful V4 howl was a little *ahem* shall we say, raspy, so I flogged the mufflers and baffles (for the upper pipes) from my non runner temporarily. Someone has removed all the baffles from the new bike and it was too loud for practical round town use. The long term plan is to use the working RZ to diagnose the non runner and thereby end up with two working RZ500's. I will start with swapping the stators, but not for a while.
26/7/05
Well, after I got over the initial thrill of actually having a registered, running and dare I say it, reliable RZ500 to ride around I became aware of how truely, horribly, appalling, woefully, aweful the handling was. I was enjoying riding my Freewind much more than the RZ (anyone who's ridden or owned a Freewind will know why this is). I thought it was just because the RZ500 is a dinosaur from the deep dark 1980's where bikes weighed 200+kgs and only put out 70hp, but no! I found out that once I lifed the front with my patented made-from-scrap-timber-RZ500-front-bit-lifter (see here and here, only works with a race stand supporting the rear) I could barely turn the handlebars!
Time for some new headstem bearings, and while I'm at it I reckon I might ditch the tyres since the rear wheel is so squared off it supports itself. Then I thought since the tyres are off why don't I paint the wheels, and those wheel bearings are looking a bit dicey. Hmmm, that chain and those sprockets have seen better days too... So it all got a bit out of hand, as my projects usually do. Anyway after about two or three months I got it all back together and it even started up. I fixed the fuel leak, the coolant leak took up as it always does, but I happened to notice a oil leak coming from under the plastic cover on the end of the upper crank where the oil lines feed out from the oil pump. Hmmmm. I pulled the cover off and the blind seal is rattling around in it's grooves in the crankcase. Bummer. The only way to replace this is to split the cases and we all know what happened last time I did that on a RZ500! Add to that the fact that the lower right hand pipe is smoking furiously which hints that it's drinking copious amounts of gearbox oil and my heart sinks to my boots.
I ended up pushing the blind seal as far in as it would go then I worked slastic into the gap between it and the crankcase. After curing overnight it actually seems to have worked! As for the gearbox oil, well I still couldn't see through the sight glass cause there was gunk on the inside, but every time I drain the geabox oil on this bike, there's only about 200mls. I keep putting 1.5 litres in, but only getting 200mls out which is a bit concerning. I decided to whack a bit of gearbox oil and a bit of diff oil which is much thicker, in there and hope for the best.
On Sunday I took her out for a magical ride, it was really fantastic, the handling was absolutely perfect, a complete transformation. The engine was smooth as silk, everything finally came together for a perfect ride.
I decided to remove the sight glass and clean it (or break it trying) and replace the oring which caused the intermittent coolant leak. Naturally I broke the sight glass, but I did get it out. I could hardly wait for the parts to arrive and throw it all back together. I was out of gearbox oil, so I chucked the one litre of 15w/50 engine oil I had handy, plus 500ml of diff oil in. Then I added more and more until I could see it was at the level on my brand new crystal clear sight glass. It's weird to check the gearbox oil on this bike, it seems to take ages for the oil to run from the left hand side of the motor and level out so I can check it in the sight glass (probably because you're using thick diff oil you dumbarse!) Anyway, I was adjusting the headstem bearings last night and had it on the race stand for ages, when I checked the sight glass the oil was over the top. Obviously I have too much oil in there, however I don't think it matters too much (I hope!).
So that brings us up to date with RZ#2. I have a set of new unpainted faring panels and fasteners which I scored for $300 but I haven't decided which bike it will go on yet. For the time being, I'm just happy to ride my RZ to work and for the occasional joy ride out of town. I'll take it down the Oxley one of these days, but I have to replace all the brake discs as they're all stuffed (same as RZ#1).
27/7/05
Well not quite up to date. This morning I found out that reserve doesn't work, well actually reserve does work, it's just that the bike is always on reserve! Lucky it was flat with one downhill section to the servo, but I was still drenched with sweat by the time I got there. She took about 21 litres so it was pretty much bone dry. I'll have to have a look at the fuel tap later and see if I can fix it, you really need reserve on a bike so you know when to head for fuel. Also someone posted on the RD/RZ website http://www.yamaha-rd.com/forum/ that Yamaha changed the float height to 24mm in a service bulletin after it's release (manual says 21mm). So I will have to check that, I have a feeling I set mine to 21mm as per the manual and it does smell a bit rich at idle. It will also hopefully clear up the smokeyness around town (only really does it when cold, but annoying all the same). Either way, it'll give me a chance to use my new digital vernier calpers :-)
Gave Dan from Supermoto a spin on the RZ yesterday, he came back with the biggest grin on his face so I reckon she must be going pretty good. He was impressed by the handling and torque so it's not just my imagination!
