YAMAHA RZV500R
With all parts here and a few days to have a straight run at the RZV500R engine, it was time to build this complex and strange V4 stroker motor…
Jeff Ware gets closer to the finish line…
G’day! What can I say about the past six months? All jokes aside, what a nightmare. Fires followed by floods and now Covid-19. If 2020 was an engine, it’d be an RZV500R engine. Weird. Anyway, I hope you are all well, I really mean that.
We’ve been struggling with four kids at home for months, home schooling as we navigate lockdown and keeping our business afloat (we own a website called bikereview.com.au so check it out) and try to keep our employees and contributors in work as they too go through this. Winter is here now, so we are all nervous as school goes back and shops and so forth relax restrictions. Thankfully we are doing ok here. I feel for you guys over there. So, please stay safe.
Now, the RZV motor, where to start? It was screwed basically, as you know from part 5. So what we did was send the cylinders off to Serco in Brisbane, where Fred bored them out to the third and final oversize, as they were already on the second oversize (yeah, an original 11,000km bike, right?). We used Wiseco USA made (not Chinese) pistons, two from a TZR250 and two from a DT125. We machined the skirts of the DT pistons down 1mm to clear the crank as they were bottoming out, and we matched the cut-outs a bit closer to the OEM pistons. Aside from that, the pistons were spot on.
With the crankshafts, I bought outer main bearings and seals online and Chappy fitted those up and checked the cranks over. They were both good.
I replaced all bearings and seals in the crankcases, rebuilt the powervalves also with new seals, and then the process of the engine build began.
It took me two days and I got Chappy over to double-check the crank timing for me just so two pairs of eyes had checked it, and I had Tim on hand for the build to help hold things, get the cases lowered on, hold the engine for fastener tightening, etc.
In the end we got it done and painted and back in the frame all in two days of work, which we were happy with, and this was a week before Covid-19 restrictions hit Australia, so I was really lucky there as I would have struggled alone, and now I had a chassis with an engine to get on with while this crazy time unfolds…
Oh, and Malc Paul and I have been in touch! Y’know, the Pom who said I drink too much! We’ve agreed that, one day, we will somehow have a beer together. Or 10. Cheers, Malc!
Next time I rebuild and fit the carburettors, respray pipes and get the RZV500R running like a dream. I then finish the brake rebuild and prepare the bike for fairings and a final check. We are almost done!