Cylinder to Case bolt hole stripped..Options?

nightrider05

nightrider05

Location
St.Louis Missouri
When I bought this RN, it was completely missing a corner bolt going through the cylinder and into the cases. Its apparently been run this way for quite some time without any issues...but I don't want to take that chance. When I went to put a stud in to run with my girdle kit, I can only tighten it down to around 10 foot pounds before it stops tightening and strips out whatever remaining threads are there.

What are my options? I looked at Timeserts...but those kits are around $75 from what I found.

Would a Helicoil hold up in this situation? It seems like that would be a cheaper route. Tapping it to a bigger size is not an option..I want to keep it using the stock size bolts/studs.
 
Waternut

Waternut

Customizing addict
Location
Macon, GA
Whatever you do, don't tap it bigger. A helicoil should be fine. Everyone swears by timeserts but I've never seen a helicoil fail. I even screwed one up on my pipe manifold and only got 3 threads in before it got all distorted because I screwed up the tool. Those three threads were still able to hold 35ft-lbs of torque (another story). Helicoils are stainless as well.
 
nightrider05

nightrider05

Location
St.Louis Missouri
vomitspot said:
time sert all the way
well worth the $ and you can get them in stainless
Click to expand...

I would love to do a timesert...however I can't really justify spending $75 to just fix one hole.

superjetkev said:
when done right heli-coils will work great.
Click to expand...

Waternut said:
Whatever you do, don't tap it bigger. A helicoil should be fine. Everyone swears by timeserts but I've never seen a helicoil fail. I even screwed one up on my pipe manifold and only got 3 threads in before it got all distorted because I screwed up the tool. Those three threads were still able to hold 35ft-lbs of torque (another story). Helicoils are stainless as well.
Click to expand...

I believe we are gonna helicoil it tomorrow. I talked to a couple other guys and they both said do a helicoil as well. My buddy has a complete kit so im just going to have him do it for me most likely for free.


Thanks guys
 
Waternut

Waternut

Customizing addict
Location
Macon, GA
That's awesome you know someone with the kit. The inserts themselves are less than a dollar but the freaking kit is like $40-$45.
 
nightrider05

nightrider05

Location
St.Louis Missouri
Waternut said:
That's awesome you know someone with the kit. The inserts themselves are less than a dollar but the freaking kit is like $40-$45.
Click to expand...

Yea my buddy works for a local powersports place...as long as I cover the cost of the insert(which like you said..they are next to nothing) then he will do it.



Is there any reason why the ski would have 2 base gaskets? It had a black one, and a green one. I have a replacement, but just a green one.

The only thing I can think of is if someone had adjusted for squish? I sorta wish I would have just left this thing ghetto rigged without a bolt. Would have kept me from having to pull it all apart.
 
Waternut

Waternut

Customizing addict
Location
Macon, GA
Could be the squish was too small, he wanted to lower the compression, or it could be that the last owner was a lazy @ss and just put a new gasket on the old one because he didn't want to deal with scraping the old one off. I'm no engine builder but I think two base gaskets is a bit ghetto.
 
nightrider05

nightrider05

Location
St.Louis Missouri
Waternut said:
Could be the squish was too small, he wanted to lower the compression, or it could be that the last owner was a lazy @ss and just put a new gasket on the old one because he didn't want to deal with scraping the old one off. I'm no engine builder but I think two base gaskets is a bit ghetto.
Click to expand...

Seeing how some of the other stuff was a bit rigged...im assuming its the latter of the two(the ghetto part)

It seems like at one time this was a really nice ski...then it seems like it got in the hands of someone who didn't know what they were doing. The bilge switch is an absolute rusty joke, case bolt missing, ski wasn't rejetted for Bpipe..and much more.

I already cleaned off the old gaskets. Going to reinstall just one and see where that puts me. Compression was around 175 so even if it bumps the compression up a bit im still ok.
 
the WaTeRhAwK

the WaTeRhAwK

fryin' up a/m electrics..
Location
okc
fiber gaskets aren't a very accurate way of compensating for squish because they compress. copper would be the way to go.
 
Waternut

Waternut

Customizing addict
Location
Macon, GA
I actually rattled one of the rear case bolts out more than once before due to an alignment issue but it couldn't fall completely out because it was too long. Assuming you have a stock engine the squish should be fairly standard...and no it doesn't matter what time or what side of the world you're on. I want to say it's in the 0.050"-0.060" range for stock engine and head but you'll want to do a quick search on that to be sure because that's coming straight from memory. There are some good threads on it.
 
the WaTeRhAwK

the WaTeRhAwK

fryin' up a/m electrics..
Location
okc
I was using that at a comparison to his question WN, without knowing the exact setup he has and what's been done or not done to it, I'm very reluctant to just throw out numbers.
 
nightrider05

nightrider05

Location
St.Louis Missouri
Thanks for the help.

We put a Helicoil in it today.

All went well. I had to shorten the stud just a bit because apparently we didn't get the helicoil bottomed out in the hole. However it tightened up and held torque just fine.

Now to buy a dial caliper so I can find out what my squish is at....hope I don't have to pull this thing all back apart!
 
nightrider05

nightrider05

Location
St.Louis Missouri
Mark44 said:
.045

Mark44
Click to expand...

Thanks Mark.



With it all reassembled with only one base gasket, im getting 200 psi..however there is a bit of oil on the pistons from when I assembled everything...hopefully its down in the 190 range or a bit lower would be great.

Going to measure squish here as soon as I can find a dial caliper.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom