The other Alex
(Jetdude)
- Location
- Lake St. Clair--
Haven't posted in a while...but I finally ripped apart my XL 800. The September before last I was out on the lake using it to water ski off of, shut the motor down and it wouldn't start back up. Started up out of the water with some effort and a lot of gas, checked the compression and was getting much lower in the rear cylinder (About 50% lower than the front was) and the spark plug was chewed up on the end. Assumed the worst and put it off until I had time and money to take care of it.
So a year later I finally just pulled the whole motor out of the ski and tore it down and here is what I found.
The powervalves were actually fine and working well (The rear one was a little sticky but still holding up well) which was surprising because I have never touched the powervalves on this motor not even to install clips. I'm not sure what went through it if anything, it looks like part of the ring broke off and went
wild. It actually looks like there are pieces of the ring stuck in the top of the piston. Damage is only in the rear cylinder, front cylinder looks great, I think the crank may be okay...I was originally planning on just replacing the whole motor in fear of the crank going bad shortly after but it would be a hell of a lot cheaper to just replace the cylinder/piston.
Any thoughts on what happened? The rest of the motor looks good, reeds look good (from inside the crank case), powervalve system looked okay, just that trashed cylinder.
So a year later I finally just pulled the whole motor out of the ski and tore it down and here is what I found.
The powervalves were actually fine and working well (The rear one was a little sticky but still holding up well) which was surprising because I have never touched the powervalves on this motor not even to install clips. I'm not sure what went through it if anything, it looks like part of the ring broke off and went
wild. It actually looks like there are pieces of the ring stuck in the top of the piston. Damage is only in the rear cylinder, front cylinder looks great, I think the crank may be okay...I was originally planning on just replacing the whole motor in fear of the crank going bad shortly after but it would be a hell of a lot cheaper to just replace the cylinder/piston.Any thoughts on what happened? The rest of the motor looks good, reeds look good (from inside the crank case), powervalve system looked okay, just that trashed cylinder.
