98 FE501 replaced rockers/rollers tappets: kick sticks and..

I recently grenaded a roller in my top-end and had to do a rebuild. I bought a 2001 assembly from another 'berger and pulled the internals out to put in my 98. Seems to have worked like a charm. I JB welded the hole in the top of the 98 cover and haven't seen any leakage.

Problem 1: On kick-starting, the lever has a funny pattern. Lets start at the full kick. It goes like this:

full kick 'cycle'
jammed - (it binds and i rotate it all the way forward and then back to kick position)
jammed - (it binds and i rotate it all the way forward and then back to kick position)
full kick 'cycle'

So that means i get a good kick, and then when i rotate the lever forward and get it ready to kick again, it's jammed. I have to push on it, then do that again, and on the next try it gives me a full kick.

Problem 2:

The bike starts and runs, in fact it kicked over on almost the first try after months of being in pieces...love my 'berg! While idling it makes a bit of a harsh tapping sound, you could call it pinging, but it's lower pitched than a ping in my opinion. It sounds similar to how it did when the roller grenaded the first time, so it's got me paralyzed with fear, i haven't even rode it around the block yet for a victory lap.

Could both problems be caused by the auto-decomp lever? My theory is that the decomp tension is too high/too low and is interrupting the exhaust rocker making the kick starter stick on that part of the cycle. Also causing the pinging sound if the rocker is hitting the decomp shaft. Does this make sense?

At first i thought the kick starter was sticking, but when the rocker cover is off, the kick starter rotates through the cycle flawlessly, no binding.

What do you guys think?

[EDIT] I forgot to mention i adjusted valve tappets via the 1/6 turn method, but i'll double check tolerances this weekend with a feeler guage.

BOSS said:

Goblox, 98 501 rockers look very much the same i just compared the exhaust
& without doing more comparing can't say what is the exact problem.
your rocker # is 200-147-01 in. & 200-148-01 ex. they are good part #'s.
you have insalled 200-281-01 in. & 200-283-01 ex. If your old rocker is ok
we have the roller complete to rebuild your old one # 200-019-01. 32.90 ea.

Click to expand...

I could be wrong, but I mic'd both rockers and rollers to ensure the proper sizes/spacing and they are identical. The only thing that was odd was I had to back the tappets nearly all the way out to get proper clearance. That said, the old tappets were mushroomed pretty good, and the ones i put in were in pristine condition, so i think that accounts for the height difference.

[UPDATE]

It was the decomp lever. I tightened the adjustment screw and it kicked flawlessly every time.

Now however the re-assembled motor blew up on me this morning on the way to work, same results as before! WTF is going on!? Gotta get it off the side of the highway at lunch and get it home to tear it apart again.

very discouraging

Well bad to worse, the bike got towed by DOT before I got to it. So I had to go drop $125 to get it out of impound and now it's at the office. I am going to tear it apart this weekend to see exactly what happened this time. Perhaps husabutt, I made a mistake putting the 2001 rockers in there.

There is a 98 fe400 parted out in the classifieds i can order the internals from, I'm betting they are identical to mine. That is of course dependant on how much damage was done to the inside of the motor.

Good info

Thanks Husabutt,

To further the discussion about rocker year/models, I noticed while doing the replacement that the 01 rocker pivot/shaft is much lighter weight (thinner wall) than my 98. I used the complete 01 assembly rather than mixing and matching pivot/shaft and rockers of different years, seemed like the best course of action.

I just got the bike into the office ( i design moto accessories so i've got more tools at my job than at home) and just tried rotating the cylinder, and all seems well. I think I may tear into it tonight to clean out any bits and pieces and attempt to nail down what's happened.

I think as far as upgrading rockers, I will likely just get the fe400 rockers/cover from the classifieds, I'm afraid to put anything other than stock in there at this point. This is two sets of rockers/rollers i've grenaded. Something is amiss. Could my cams be off somehow? Maybe the bearing is worn and is wobbling or something? What could cause this?

BTW here is how the motor sounded last night before I rode it this morning. This is basically freshly reassembled, and fresh oil change/coolant change.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOossRt_H4k

Sorry guys, i need to slow down here, I'm a noob remmeber? ;-)

Husabutt, are you saying that the 03 rockers are ideal for my 98 501? And that they need to be 501 rockers?
Are you also saying that i'll need bearings to make up for the diff size roll-pin?

Money is an issue in all of this, I don't have really any spare cash, I need to fix this on the cheap. new rockers from my dealer are 169/pc...that's too much for me.

I'm going to check the parts catalogue from the berg site PDF and double check the rocker pn. I thought it was the same from 400-500.

Thanks guys for trying to help with this. OH and I'll pull the motor apart tonight and see what's what in there.

[EDIT] Husabutt you were right. Diff PN for the 360-400s on the rockers.
[EDIT] BAH!! I made a terrible mistake. No wonder they failed! I put 2001 rockers in my 501 from a 400, not a 501! How in the hell did i do that. I totally mis-read the parts fiche. Missed the displacement designations, god that was dumb. I guess it's learning, but here's hoping I didn't do any serious damage. Found a guy trying to unload a 'basket case' 96 with some extra 97 parts, even in the same neighborhood as me, hoping to get lucky.
[UPDATE]

Ok so took me under an hour to tear it down to get inside this time, where it took me at least 5 the first time. Progress is a good feeling. Anyway I got lucky, or blessed or whatever you want to call it. A tappet locknut worked loose and bounced around in the top before finding the EXACT same hole that the roller made previously. I've RE-JBwelded the top up, and i took a locknut from my old rockers and am re-assembling it tonight. I can't start it till tomorrow as the RTV needs time to cure. I think i'm in the clear though, can't believe how lucky I got! I'm relatively sure the very hand of god protected my motor, can't wait to get on it!