09 FE450 valve adjustment

bowser said:

what are the specs for the valves?
what is the procedure? how do you know it is top dead centre?

pain in the butt not having a manual. Happy to take pics and do a thread on it when i know the details.

Wayne

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Check back tomorrow, mate. I am putting together a thread on the "care and feeding" of a 2010 Husaberg FE 390. Adjusting the valves is one of the items. I'll post the link here tomorrow for you.

Cheers! E-Ticket

bowser said:

any luck?

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Yes! It went quite well ... changed two shims out ... and took a ton of pictures for you.
But my "tomorrow" turned into "later tonight" on posting the steps and pics .... sorry about the delay!

Cheers! E-Ticket

The following is the bare minimum that you have to do to check the valve clearances on your '09 FE 450. Exchanging shims get's more involved and you have to remove the cam chain tensioner (CCT) and camshaft. Still quite straightforward - but you need all the steps including resetting the CCT.

"Checking" the valve clearances on your '09 FE 450:

1. Wash off the engine and clean any loose dirt from overhead hoses, cables, etc.
(You don't want sand and dirt falling into your engine, do you? It's easiest to do if your remove the gas tank first - but that's a whole 'nother story.)
2. Engine needs to be at room temperature: ~ 20 C degrees (68 F degrees)
3. Put the bike on a bike stand (so you can rotate the rear wheel).
4. While rotating the wheel, use the gear shift and put the bike in 6th gear.
5. Pull off the engine vent hose from the top of the valve cover.
5. Remove the valve cover (4 bolts).
6. Put a socket and a breaker bar on the countershaft sprocket (the front spocket on your drive chain).
7. S-l-o-w-l-y, using the breaker bar, turn the rear wheel forward via the countershaft bolt.
9. You should see the camshaft rotating as well in an anti-clockwise direction.

Finding Top Dead Center (TDC):

10. There is a small punch mark on the camshaft gear .... and a corresponding small punch mark on the cam tower itself (next to the small fixing bolt on the camshaft location plate). As you rotate the rear wheel and camshaft .... you should see the two punch marks begin to align.
11. When the punchmark on the camshaft gear is *directly below* and aligned with the punchmark on the cam tower.... you are at Top Dead Center (TDC)! It's that easy!
12. You can now check the valve clearances using a feeler guage:

Temperature: 20 C degrees (68 F degrees)
Exhaust valve clearance: 0.12 -- 0.17 mm (0.0047 -- 0.0067 in.)
Intake valve clearance: 0.10 -- 0.15 mm (0.0039 -- 0.0059 in.)

Record your engine hours, mileage, and your valve clearances. If your clearances are within specification ... then you're done!

13. Re-install the valve cover and torque the mounting bolts to 10 Nm (7.4 lb/ft.)
14. Re-connect the engine vent hose to the valve cover ... and take the engine out of gear.

15. Give a big sigh of relief and go grab a cold Fosters. :^)

Cheers! E-Ticket

Awesome.

Got any pic's to go with that excellent "how to do valves"

Thanks

Just remove the rocker arm shafts and the rocker arms,replace the shims and then mount it back together again.

bowser said:

checked my valves today, bike was hot
both Exhaust valves were on the limit at 0.178mm and the inlets were outside the limit at 0.19mm and 0.203mm.

Click to expand...

Before you proceed with cam removal, etc, make sure to check the valve clearances again when the engine is cold.

The 2009 and 2010 Husaberg's are the same top end as the KTM XC4 engines, correct? If so, DJH has a great write up on KTMTalk about doing valve checks.
http://ktmtalk.com/index.php?showtopic=254389

Fourstrokeforce said:

Just remove the rocker arm shafts and the rocker arms,replace the shims and then mount it back together again.

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Two important points if you use the "pull the rocker arm shaft" method of changing your shims:

A) Make sure that you that the rocker arm shafts go back in the original spot (intake versus exhaust) ... and in their original orientation (up or down). Swapping or rotating the shafts can change your valve clearances due to uneven shaft wear.
B) Be sure to properly torque the bolts for your rocker arm shafts. "Wingin' it" won't cut it.

Cheers! E-Ticket

bowser said:

Checked my valves again today (09 FE450 50 hrs, 2200km's) as ii was concerned the measurements i got the other day were wrong somehow. but they were the same as what i got last time.

today (hot) i got
LHS IN = 8 THOU (4-6 THOU IS SPEC)
RHS IN = 9 THOU
LHS EX = 7 THOU (5-7 THOU IS SPEC)
RHS EX = 7 THOU

I then pulled out the rocker arms and measured the shims ready to go order some harley davidson shims tomorrow. However, i noticed the inlet rocker has some hard facing coming off it (as shown in the pics below)

.............

Is it common for the late model KTM's/Berg's to have this wear?
Is it still useable or get a new one?

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No, it's not typical or common! And yes, I would replace that puppy immediately ... and would replace the rocker arm shafts as well.

And of course, verify that your cam lobes are in good shape.

BTW, you're not checking valve clearances with the engine hot are you?
'cause they're supposed to be checked with the engine at room temperature.

Let us nkow as things progress, bowser ... as you now have our full attention!

best of luck, mate. E-Ticket

bowser said:

I wouldn't say it was hot hot but was checking them after about 5 mins idle so warmish.
Will take the rocker into the KTM shop today and see what they say

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Yah, the manual calls for the following valve clearances at the following temperature:

Temperature: 20 C degrees (68 F degrees)
Exhaust valve clearance: 0.12 -- 0.17 mm (0.0047 -- 0.0067 in.)
Intake valve clearance: 0.10 -- 0.15 mm (0.0039 -- 0.0059 in.)

And it doesn't take much to warm things up and affect clearances.
This is one area that you probably should the follow the repair manual's recommendations.

Best of luck. E-Ticket

bowser said:

Tonight i had a few mins to look further at it and inspected the shafts which both are also like new and oil holes are clean. the Exhaust rocker looks like new as does the 4 shims.

what i want to know is how does the oil get to the top of the valve to lubricate this face?

Click to expand...

I don't have my manual in front of me to trace the oil path/galleries ... but I believe there is an external spray jet located on the inside face of the left-hand cam tower. If nothing else, it is spraying the top of the cam lobes as they rotate.