I'm looking for an air box to cut up a bit. A broken one will work as if it's the front part or the bottom that's damaged. I'm just looking for the top, battery tray, and rear mud guard to be intact. I'm thinking of running pod filters I would like to use the top of the air box as a tray to keep the electronics and battery mounted. A damaged piece would be preferred since I don't want to destroy a good air box if I don't have to. If anyone has something please let me know. Thanks
I have the air box with an enlarged inlet hole that should work. I have the rubber boots and an air box cover, if anyone needs them also.
The only thing with that is the hole on top might make it flimsy once the whole bottom of the box is cut away. I wish I would have looked at it when I was over there but I wasn't thinking about pod filters at the time. What I found today is what gave me this idea.
To catch everybody else up I bought an XL600R motor off of MentalGuru here last week. He said it the motor made very good power when he was riding it, but doesn't know much about what modifications, if any, were done to it. All he could tell was that it had aftermarket valve springs and ran very well with about 12 disks on the supertrapp, when he tried backing it down to 6 disks if felt much slower. I took the rocker cover off and confirmed that the valve springs look like aftermarket ones, but I can't tell if it's got a cam or anything else just by looking at it. He told me the jetting felt spot on when riding so I did some detective work today and took apart the carbs to check jet sizes... Now I can safely assume this motor must have been a heavy breather cause these jets are HUGE. It's got a 140 primary and 130 in the secondary! With a 70 pilot jet! Those things are like shower heads compared to the dynojet kit in my carbs. So the evidence shows that Mr Mental Guru wasn't pulling my leg about that motor being powerful because it certainly was thirsty. Knowing this and considering I ride on the street I think it may be beneficial to run pods with this top end. If anyone has ever run any pods on this bike I'd appreciate any info you can give me. Things like filter type you've used and fitment issues, etc. I have jetted bikes with pods before so this isn't exactly my first rodeo. I know to start I may be getting an even bigger pilot jet. :eek1
Try it was wicked with 15 discs and was gutless with 9 discs(needed smaller jets). At least most street bikes around here are real loud too... I was careful when I cut the stock hole larger, it should be easy to cover the hole and put a one pound sealed Shorai battery above it. That would help clean up the air filter area looks wise. Opening the stock snorkleless hole about 40% made a big difference in power. It should run really good with pods on it. CW stated downswept megaphone pipes will gain about 4 more hp up top with the gain starting on the very bottom.
Front fender appears to be a yamaha MX fender somewhere in the 2002-2010 zone, and the rear fender appears to be an Acerbis Baja rear fender, but Polisport also makes one exactly like that, and I think Cemoto does too.
Cheers SBG, much appreciated :) Fitted my knobbiles and took to the lanes on the XL for the first time on Sunday and loved it, thinking it may be even more fun if I alter the gearing a little, currently running 15:40 which is great on the road for the odd motorway etc, but, probably a little tall off A bit of a steep one... and the wet chalk hill wasn't too easy as my friends BMW can testify but, had a great day out and the XL was great fun...can't wait for next time now :)
Definitely agree with that. I've been enjoying it on the road, but, off road it definitely came into it's own for me...best purchase I've made in a long time, still got a few issues to iron out mainly with cold starts, but, I'll get there
There it is, the spare motor. What's going on inside that thing? I don't know, but I'm gonna throw some wrenches at it until I find out. Look at that, looks like aftermarket springs and retainers. What's that camshaft all about then? I'm gonna get that piece otta there. There you are you little bastard, what that stamping say on there? 148x9? That looks like a Megacycle number to me. Off to the megacycle site to decode that number. What do we have? Sweeeet. Racing piston, springs and guides? Looks like I got all that covered. Gotta send this head off to Cycle Wizard for a once over, rebuild if necessary, (maaaaaybe some other work) and I got myself a hot rod top end.
Carter, I told you it hauled a$$. I never had anything but the rocker box off of it and I knew it was special. I never knew what was done to that engine... I want to know!!! The carbs seemed to be in great shape too. The outsides not pretty, but it's the inside that counts. It shifted great and probably has HD clutch springs and such in it too. I also have a XR600R twin carb air boot and a XR box.You could use the twin carb boot to mount a pair of pods on a custom mount I think. I knew I gave you a great deal. I knew should have kept it
Yes. Although you have to lower or remove the right foot peg mount and brake pedal in order for the clutch cover to have clearance to come off.
Hello- This is my first post on this forum, although I've been using forums for years to help me through many other vehicle projects. I had XL bikes (250s and 600s) when I was in my teens and twenties, and now in my early 40s I find myself with another 1986 XL600R! (It's kind of a beater.... 28,000 miles) I rode it a few times about 2 years ago, and it ran fine and was lots of fun. But the last time I tried starting it, which was about 2 months ago... no go I figured out it had no spark, and somewhere in that process I opened the little sight plug on the stator cover (left case cover) as well as the center plug on that same cover to find TDC, and I was quite surprised to see oil in there. I was sure that area would be dry and free from oil. I figured an oil seal must have given up, and that must be the cause of the no-spark condition. So yesterday I pulled the engine from the bike (I totally remember doing that multiple times in my 20s... so easy!!) and pulled the stator cover off to see if I could get a better idea of the problem, and to my surprise there are at least three holes connecting this area with the gearbox, so oil is apparently free to flow into the stator area. Is this right? Is the rotor/stator area also supposed to be semi-filled with engine oil? And if this is the case, then where do you good XL600 folks suggest I start looking for the cause of the no-spark condition? While the engine is out, I suppose I will start tearing down the head a little so see how bad things look in there. I sorta want to do as little as possible to just get the bike rideable again, (spend as little $$ as possible) but I guess I will do what I gotta do. (As a side note, I am very familiar with the "read the forum before asking your question, noobie!" attitude which I think is justifiably applied to new members' posts on these forums... To be honest I am blown away by the sheer volume of posts in this thread, and don't have the time right now to wade through it all. So, any insight about my situation is appreciated, and if you just want to point me to relevant prior posts, that sounds good too) Thanks, Christian
yes, the stator runs in oil. are you 100% sure, there is no spark ? places to check: 1. the sparkplug plug/cap. there is a resistor and contacts in there. moisture can wreck havoc in there. 2. ignition coil (especiall if moisture got in there) 3. stator (check the resistance for the ignition coil) 4. pickup coil (measure resistance for that) 5. CDI (last resort, there is really no easy "test", eliminate other causes first) also, "cracked sparkplug" has bitten me on several occasions after I couldn't find a fault anywhere.it should really be the first check, i.e. 0. replace sparkplug most often, however, they won't start after standing for a while, because old gas will gum up the carburetor and it needs to be cleaned. -ingo
XL600 with no spark. Pick up the phone and Call Ricky Stator for a new stator. 9 times out of 10 it's the stator.
Hi guys, Like Crobox am new to this, also have an '86 Xl600 which i bought as a project. Stripped and painted blah blah etc. Didnt do anything to engine other than carb clean and gaskets. Tried to start it using the many techniques written about here and elsewhere and had all the dificulties everyone else had. It finally started and seeme to run well .After a few minutes i stopped it cos i wanted to check oil and it wouldnt go again. Decided to listen and took off the stator cover to check the stator. It looked abit blackish and three of the coils can be moved radially about 1/2mm so suspect the insulation my be damaged due to vibration. Ordered new Rickysator today!! Couldnt get any resistance readings other than 1/2ohm on ign coil to ground. Weird or what! :eek1 Really great site for info, am amazed at the number of posts about ths old thumper. Hope this fixes my problem, Cant wait to get on the beast (Love these smileys!) Any reply appreciated. Wayne
If the bike was running fine, I wouldn't go digging into the head. Not only will it cost extra for all the gaskets and stuff, but those head bolts are know to strip easily if they aren't torqued exactly correct (and sometimes even when they are). You could be opening up a can of worms. I've beat the heck out of my '83 for a decade or so, and never done anything but oil changes and valve adjustments. If you do pull the head, you may as well plan on big bore kit, new timing chain and tensioner, and all the gaskets while you are in there. If you are going to open the can of worms, you may as well make it worth it.
OK, thanks guys. I did pull the head cover off, and the cam and rocker arms all look really good and clean (even though the outside of the engine is pretty dirty). I also measured the cam lobes and all are well within spec. So I am inclined to button it back up and leave it alone. I will, however, need at least 2 gaskets at this point... the stator cover gasket and head cover gasket. I could make them... or order a cheapo full set on eBay... or....? Any other ideas, such as a place to order economically priced individual gaskets? I'm going to do a search on here for "leakdown" to see if I can find guidelines for how to properly do a leakdown test on the head, what I'm looking for etc. But, if anyone feels like chiming in about that procedure, feel free. I will probably do one before re-installing the engine just to be sure. Thanks again
OK... no hits for "leakdown" at all. Anyone ever do that? Compression test will be harder with the engine out of the bike, and from what I remember a leakdown test is the better of the two tests to do because simply by listening here and there you can tell if the air is escaping from the valves or from the rings... I suppose I could just do compression by turning the engine rapidly with a big drill on the stator nut....