camshaft alignments on various years?

I just installed a new "08" camshaft in my 2002 FC550. It originally had a "53" camshaft in it.

I compared the two very carefully before installing and noticed that the 08 cam was about 1.5mm shorter in overall length than the 53 cam. I installed the cam against the right side of the engine which put the lobes in the correct place, then I was left with about a 1.5mm gap between the cam bearing and the plug on the right side of the engine. I found an appropriate sized washer and installed it between the plug and the cam bearing to prevent the cam from walking sideways in the head. This positioned the lobes perfectly, and the cam sprocket is VERY close to where it should be, but it might be as much as 0.5 mm closer to the center of the engine.

Has anyone else encountered this? I could make a shim to place under the camshaft sprocket but just wondering what everyone else has done.

yes duane. we didn't know what and how till recently. seems that the '04 heads use a cam 1.5mm narrower which is pretty much what you have found it seems.

rule number one is to get the lobes squarely onto the cam follower bearings and you can do this by simply by turning the rocker cover over and laying the cam in the cover upside down to have a look-see.

next thing is to get the sprocket alignment right but would suggest complete shims the size of the camshaft face are made. the 1.5mm spacer is what I've been fitting and it always goes behind the back bearing. I don't think a shim is necessary.

regards

Taffy

then there are other cams that need to go further in (toward the RHS) and machining is needed,

while its not ideal my 08 cam wasn't aligned properly from the factory and its still going strong, ive tickled the shoulder so it does now but had to shim the cam gear to retain proper chain alignment, if it needed to go the other way as described in the post above with a 1.5mm shim you'd need to make sure the cam doesn't need machining on the LHS to bring the sprocket back. having cam sprockets out of alignment by up to 1.5mm is far from ideal, you want both to be right

Yes as Bushies says above all cams are different and need a bit of feterling , I've just fitted a 3015 Hot cam, this cam is for a KTM 520 525, but with the water pump shaft lopped off they drop straight in, when I put the cam in the rocker lid the lobes didn't line up with the rocker arms,so I had to relive the right hand bearing shoulder by about 1.5mm, perfect, and shim the sprocket to suit.

oh and Bushie, this cam does have top end, loads of it, mid range isn't to bad either. Did you find your 3015 cam needed the same as mine?.

Regards

Sparks.

yes i found the 3015 needed about 1mm off the shoulder

and about 0.5mm more piston to valve clearance than I have at present so testing will have to wait cause my headgaskets stopped lifiting and Im not touching it

Great info guys i will be testing the HC3015 also in a couple of weeks

the ktm 8/33 should be almost identical to the HC3015, i got the 3015 "free" because of the frequent buyer points system on rkymountain atv

#pn for the 8/33 is 590.36.110.000 its cheaper than the HC.

Sparks, in your bike how does the peak tourque of the 3015 compare to the X-2 ?

I meticulously cut a 1.10mm shim to go at the back of the cam sprocket to find out to my dismay it aint going to fit due to the lack of end float travel required of the valve lifter arm, this because of the spring being hard up to the shoulder cam sprocket fixing lug, only way round this would be to turn off 1.10mm from the fixing lugs, don't fancy doing that, might get away with it but don't want to risk it.

Regarding the torque of the 3015 Bushie against the LX-2 it's hard to say as the LX-2 went slowly south. But I find that 3015 pulls really well from really low rpm, but defiantly has more once you get up the top end.

I've got the revised version of the LX-2 in the mail to me, so I'll give that a whirl back end of the summer before engine strip down and rebuild, or before if I get the urge. I'm also waiting for a cam sprocket so I don't have to upset the valve timing that I have already on the 3015.

Regards

Sparks.

bushmechanic said:

the ktm 8/33 should be almost identical to the HC3015, i got the 3015 "free" because of the frequent buyer points system on rkymountain atv

#pn for the 8/33 is 590.36.110.000 its cheaper than the HC.

Sparks, in your bike how does the peak tourque of the 3015 compare to the X-2 ?

Click to expand...

Hi bushie,
i requested a price for the 8/33 at my KTM dealer but it was more expensive than the HC3015!?

the 8/33s are about $140 USD from usa KTM

interesting stuff Sparks that even on the 550 the 3015 didn't seem to loose much tourque, re the shim i don't run the auto decomp. very curious about testing results of the revised lobes, hopefully they last longer than the old method

if people are wanting to replace the x-2 or its copy the "taffmeisters tourque cam" with a solid billet cam the 8/06 should be more tourquey than both the 8/33 and the hc 3015, the 8/06 pn 590.36.010.100 about 145 USD

the 8/07 is nearly exactly the same specs wise as the X-1 or its copy the taffmeisters "topend cam" pn SMS.36.010.000 its pricey though at about 250 USD a whopping $10 more than a regrind 8O 8O but you don't have to supply a core.... so not much reason at present exchange rates UK vs USD to go with a cheap regrind until the questionable lobe build up is sorted out and well tested.

Re the decomp spring and the sprocket shiming this might help

FWIW this is untested (hey I should sell it to everyone in my ebay shop )

the older KTM one is stiffer wire (same diam just better wire) it works better and has 1 less turn than the berg one.

the spring on the right is the spring out of my 08 650. I preloaded it more but the end broke off

to make it stiffer I cut off some coils from the lower end and bent the coil out until it worked properly you can see the end makes it more preloaded than the oem and less turns means its stiffer.

if you wind more preload on the spring it gets too small in diam and bottoms out on the shaft then the ends get deformed and eventually break like mine did it needs to be a stiffer spring not just preloaded more.

its truncated here but can click the link below


cutting coils off the end is easy the wire handles being bent just try not to have any sharp bends, wind the coil out straight untill you have what you want then snip off the end mine now has 13.25 coils total, the KTM spring has 14.5 coils and mine originally had about 15.5

I am working on the KTM 8/33 cam (see gallery for pics)
Ditched the waterpump-end
Found out i needed a 2mm shim for this cam to be aligned properly

My cam gear is 0,14mm off where it was on the old (53 regrind) cam. I suppose this little wont be a problem?

Is it possible to use 'normal' Philips screws instead of Allen type to secure the cam gear?
The allen screws on this cam are worn out, and i prefer philips srews.

Will post some more pics/info/questions tomorrow

My guess would be that the Phillips screw would not handle the tightening torque (eg the slot would strip)
these are DIN7984 so they should be 8.8 strength class i think (2 min google work)

On another mater.
Do you have older head pre 2004 i mean. just wondering what mods need to be done to make a cam like
this fit in my bike. We have established that the 2004 on bikes have a 1,5 mm shorter cam. Do you have
to, "Time" this cam in (grind the bolt holes on the sprocket) to make it fit?

Regards

The_Force said:

My guess would be that the Phillips screw would not handle the tightening torque (eg the slot would strip)
these are DIN7984 so they should be 8.8 strength class i think (2 min google work)

On another mater.
Do you have older head pre 2004 i mean. just wondering what mods need to be done to make a cam like
this fit in my bike. We have established that the 2004 on bikes have a 1,5 mm shorter cam. Do you have
to, "Time" this cam in (grind the bolt holes on the sprocket) to make it fit?

Regards

Click to expand...

Sorry my mistake, i would just use 'normal' 6 sided screw (8.8 strengt offcourse) instead of the allen screws used by the factory. I think this is possible?

Yes i have the old pre 2004 big-valve (37mm) head.
This cam just fits straigt in, sprocket is aligning perfectly, its just getting rid of the water pump piece, and shim it out for rocker alignment.

edit:
Other question:
I have 2x SKF 6203-2Z C3 Bearing lying here (new). the have a steel casing:


Can i use this as cam bearings or should i try to remove the steel insert from the bearing?

the hex heads should work fine that's a great idea actually

I would use rubber seal bearings with the rubber seals in, the metal shields should be OK but they won't keep out debris like the rubber ones, if using the metal shielded ones leave the shields in

Hi ElSnorro,

Just been looking at the photos you put up of the cam and sprocket, it looks like you have incorrectly assembled the decomp spring, the trailing part of the spring goes up against the camshaft not against the cam sprocket bolt.

When the decomp arm is fully open is it clear of the cam sprocket bolt head.

Regards

Sparks.

Hi Sparks,

i dont fully understand what you mean.
My decomp stops against the cam bolt (like the 04+ cams) but it is clearing the cam lobe so its not opening the valve.

Do you mean this?

Just fitted a HC3015

engine apart so could check sprockets etc with straight edges, the tooth fairy couldn't find any teeth so she stole one off 4th gear

needed a 1.2mm shim to align the sprockets and the cam tensioner slider needed moving about 1mm, and a bit ground off one side further down to clear the cases

sounds nasty but the original 08 cam had the same issues just a bit less wrong (about 0.6mm out)

to get the LCs as per the spec card I had to advance the timing about 5 degrees from "central" this amounts to about a 1mm gap between the top of the exhaust lobe and the straight edge if aligning to the top of the head.

the durations and cls for 40 thou I could only get close with zero lash, depends what you call zero as well

intake open 21 close 66 duration 267 CL 112.5 lift 10.6mm
Exhaust open 63 close 21 duration 264 CL 111 lift 10.3mm
LSA about 111

Sparks got the same as the spec card with the lash set so I dunno what the G.O is maybe some quality control issues, we both checked numerous times.

bushmechanic said:

Just fitted a HC3015

engine apart so could check sprockets etc with straight edges, the tooth fairy couldn't find any teeth so she stole one off 4th gear

needed a 1.2mm shim to align the sprockets and the cam tensioner slider needed moving about 1mm, and a bit ground off one side further down to clear the cases

sounds nasty but the original 08 cam had the same issues just a bit less wrong (about 0.6mm out)

to get the LCs as per the spec card I had to advance the timing about 5 degrees from "central" this amounts to about a 1mm gap between the top of the exhaust lobe and the straight edge if aligning to the top of the head.

the durations and cls for 40 thou I could only get close with zero lash, depends what you call zero as well

intake open 21 close 66 duration 267 CL 112.5 lift 10.6mm
Exhaust open 63 close 21 duration 264 CL 111 lift 10.3mm
LSA about 111

Sparks got the same as the spec card with the lash set so I dunno what the G.O is maybe some quality control issues, we both checked numerous times.

Click to expand...

Hi Bushie,

Good to hear you have got the cam fitted at last, strange about the setting though, I had no problem with mine, like yours about 5 degrees required to centre everything but that done all the figures fell into place at 40 thou lash.
What do you think of the performance or have you not got it up and running yet.

Got about 1500 miles on mine and it performs great, even the bottom end and mid range torque is good.

Had to carb in bits last week due to over zealous with the hose pipe. While in bits and on inspection I noticed fairly bad grooves worn in the throttle body from the slide wheels 4 front and 4 back, so filled these in with my red encapsulation compound and made everything perfectly flat, to do this I had to remove the D shaped casting in the throttle body.
After reassembly I fired her up, ran like a bag of crap, massively over rich, turned out to be the complicated little O ring seal that sits on the D casting, this is not a serviceable part so I had to use the smallest amount of Wurth sealant around the existing O ring, reassembled job done perfect.
So anyone who is wanting to take on this minor repair just be aware of that O ring sealing properly.
Now there is a good seal between slide and body the engine runs a lot better at the bottom end, must of been sucking air before leading to over leanness at the bottom end. It also gets rid of all that clacking ratterling noise.
Wonder how many other people are suffering the same symptoms and are not aware of what is causing it.

Regards

Sparks.

Sparks please open up a new thread in the fuel department (if possible with some pics??)

Very useable info i gues!!