1000 Valve Clearance Maintenance

[johnny2tents]

Hi All,

Was talking to a now retired proprieter of a MZ dealership recently.
When checking/adjusting 1000 model valve clearances, it is necessary to turn the engine over 4 complete revolutions before checking valve (tappet) clearances.
Apparantly at least one outfit who did not send a particular mechanic on the MZ technician training course had one engine with the valves apparantly tied in knots as a consequence of not following this practice.
Certainly wouldn't do any harm to do it as per suggestion.
Boilermaker has done the biggest mileage of the entries I've read, perhaps he could comment on required valve clearance adjustment over time. Cheers J2T

[mzsrus]

hi andy again,

whats the mileage so far of us all,

I only done 5600 miles and when do you boys service, every yr? or every ?000 miles?

bfn

fastest mz in Beacons

[tomtom]

Has anybody had to fit or swap buckets round?, Usually buckets once settled in tend to need far less adjusting than screw and locknut adjustment systems.
I think it was andy at border bikes who said that even their race bike had never had any need for bucket adjustment.
Out of interest when a bucket needs swapped is it up a size or down a size for the new one?
How many of you have taken a note or covered the original valve clearances written in the toolbox compartment so that they don't rub away.

[boilermaker]

J2T
I think my 06 MZ 1000st machine has done around 18,000m and is not yet in need of valve clearence adjustment. I used to hear alot of nonsense talked about Ducati valve gaps years ago, (and still do) from dealers trying to tell my wife that I can't possibly be servicing her 600 monster correctly as I am not changing valve shims as frequently as they do (at £30 or more per hour). the fact is I was shimming dukes before most of the cardboard cut-outs were born and with modern synthetic oils the frequency has been reduced even further. I did however shim my Yamaha TRX 850 recently (5 valve head) as my No 2 son mentioned that the engine was mechanically quiet. The shims barely needed doing but at 40,000 miles I thought I should do something! The writing of the factory clearences in the MZ toolbox was a very useful thing as it provides a much needed datum and is typically german. These bullshit peddlers should try their hand at fixing an old Bristol Centaurus Radial aero engine. Well thats the old codgers rant over for this week!

[LWS66]

I'm at about 29,500 miles and at last check (around 25,000 miles) every valve was well within spec. And there was insignificant change between 1st and 2nd service, most were the same clearance. One or two valves were on the tight side of the acceptable range at 1st service, and now they are actually equal to the others......still we're talking insignificant changes. No worries there

[IlPrincipeBrutto]

How many of you have taken a note or covered the original valve clearances written in the toolbox compartment so that they don't rub away.

I did, but I don't know whether to gloat or to be ashamed of this. I mean, what kind of sad person would take the trouble of copying said data into a safe place ? Surely only someone anal enough to actually read the owner's manual would think about that...

My 1000s is at 15000 miles, and so far I haven't had the clearances checked.
On one of my previous bikes, a Yamaha Thunderace, I had the valves checked at 24K and 40K miles, in both cases without any problem found. Same goes for my current Yamaha, an Fz6, which has just had the 24K valve check, and passed with flying colors. For what is my limited experience, altered tolerances seem to be a fairly rare occourence.

Ride Safe,