[Wayne's Striple]

The dealer is 150 kms away and I didn't want to spend $800+ for the service so I did the job myself. Do not attempt this if you don't have lots of proper tools and are not mechanically inclined. Here are some hints for doing the job:

-To do a careful and methodical service the job will take 3 days unless you have done this before (there is a lot of stuff to remove to get at the shims). You cannot do this job in a rush. Not really that difficult, just time-consuming.
-You will need a Haynes or shop manual.
-Must have tools; a telescoping antenna magnet (to remove the shim buckets, spark plugs, and to hold screws in position), quality torque wrench in Nm, digital calipers (to verify shim thickness), long Phillips screwdriver to reach the throttle cable holder.
-Disconnect the battery before starting.
-Stuff the throttle bodies and spark plug tunnels to prevent junk from falling in. Pack some little bits of paper toweling around the valves in case a shim slips out of your fingers.
-Only remove and re-shim one shim bucket at a time; do not mix them up.
-You need two stout tie-wraps through each cam gear to hold the cam chain down before tightening the cams holder.
-Not enough room to remove one screw in the plate above the cam gears so it comes off with the cams holder.
-Don't forget to re-connect the radiator fan connector and Manifold absolute pressure sensor connector and tube (on back of airbox).
-You will need a short 3/8 drive 8mm socket to torque the cams holder bolts (incrementally as per the sequence in the manual).
-You need to twist back and forth and pull hard to get those spark plug coils out.
-Although the manual says not to, I could only get the valve cover loose by carefully prying with a slot screwdriver, (using a piece of wood as a pivot) at the corner of the cover.
-Make sure the o-rings and dowels are positioned correctly before installing the cams holder and valve cover.
-The middle exhaust valve clearances are most easily checked from above; the guages in mm must be bent about an inch from the end. I found that the valve lobe should be slightly past the perpendicular to get the max clearance.
-The intake valves on my bike were all ok at around 0.14 mm (ideal is 0.15) but all the exhaust valves were at the upper limit 0.33 mm (ideal is 0.30). Of course the dealers don't have the Triumph shims in .025mm increments but only .050 mm increments, and I didn't want to wait 2 wks . I managed to swap 3 of the shims and the closest ones I obtained gave clearances near the lower range of clearance(0.28-0.30), but the clearance seems to increase on the exhaust side anyway.
-Take this opportunity to properly adjust the throttle slack at the throttle bodies; I removed almost all of the play and adjusted the return cable for a slight amount of slack. The throttle now feels fantastic when revving the bike with no throttle slop.

-Basically you need to do about 20 little jobs before you get to the valves, and put it all back together again. IMO if the dealer will do it for $800 you are getting a bargain. I installed iridium plugs (the old plugs looked good with a light tan color), and cleaned and re-oiled the K&N airfilter, and carefully routed the wiring. I reconnected the battery and the bike started right up and ran beautifully. Still raining outside though so I will need to wait for a ride.

-Oh yeah, I HATE that tank fuel connector! lol - Wayne

 

[t3ckfr3ak]

I hate it too

Sent from my Desire HD using Motorcycle.com App

 

[Vallejo]

Wayne, did you manage to get any photos of your DIY service? Would be interesting to see

 

[spike_africa]

I figured it would be a job I would do over the course of a week night or two.

 

[Dave73]

The work isn't difficult or time consuming at all...waiting on shims on the other hand...

 

[Wayne's Striple]

It is best when taking apart a motorcycle model you haven't done before to take extra time and care; an extra day is a lot better than making an expensive mistake and having to tear it apart again or worse take it to a dealer. Rushing is a sure way to make an expensive mistake. The Haynes manual has all the pics for the job ($50 online). Had it out for a ride today and it runs smooth and tight. I just got a stem-mount front paddock stand so I can take the wheel into the dealer for a tire change tomorrow. I had to go to an industrial supply company to get that 17mm hex socket for the front axle! - Wayne

 

[Chris12]

Great write up!

I’ve bought all the necessary parts (except for the shims) and I’m going to give it a go within the next few weeks.

 

[MotoRen]

Thanks for this.

 

[Baldrick61]

-The intake valves on my bike were all ok at around 0.14 mm (ideal is 0.15) but all the exhaust valves were at the upper limit 0.33 mm (ideal is 0.30).

From this I assume you have an engine number in the "up to #452999" range, even so its interesting that the exhausts were at the loose end of the range. I'm familiar with seeing exhausts on other bikes close up over time as the valve seat and valve face wear in use and to be honest I would have left the exhausts untouched @ .33mm. It would be interesting to hear of others measurements at 20,000km mark as this is the first valve check interval. Are others seeing figures like this? Starting to think of this service as I'm at the 16,000km mark with 2014 675.

 

[sparechange]

I have an '18 765 and mine were within spec at that service, although I don't know what the numbers were as I had the dealership do it. The mechanic told me that most street triples don't need an adjustment till the next time around.

 

[mtofique]

Off topic slightly. My first service is coming up on a 19 R and I want to tackle it myself. Do we void warranty if we do it ourselves? Am pretty mechanically inclined and know what the first service entails.

 

[Baldrick61]

Off topic slightly. My first service is coming up on a 19 R and I want to tackle it myself. Do we void warranty if we do it ourselves? Am pretty mechanically inclined and know what the first service entails.

That in completely in the hands of the consumer laws of the country and/or state you live in. In my part of the world as long as you can prove you have done all service items yourself with receipts or even better iPhone photos with metadata of the work you did then all is just dandy.

 

[JfromMN]

I’m curious what people that have done this job think of the actual process itself. I’m struggling a little bit With a ‘13 Street Triple non-r. Getting to the valves/ removing the valve cover is the easy part.

1st off my manual states to select a high gear and rotate the rear tire until one “pair” of cam lobes are facing away from the valves. Check these clearances and repeat for the next pair, etc. Ive rotated and rotated the tire quite a bit and never have seen any “pair” facing away from the valves at the same time. I seem to be able to get a pair to come off the buckets at the same time but not face upward at the same time. Am i just hanging too much on the verbiage? What ive done so far is just rotate the tire until the one cam lobe I’m going to check clearance on is facing up regardless of where the others are. Doing this one at a time, 12 times. No idea what stroke the engine is on. Is this right?

2nd is the exhaust valve clearance. UGH. How to even get to them? The intakes are all fine to get to. The exhaust are not and i have to use my feeler gauges that are at 45 degreee angles but thats not enough. I have to further bend them and nearly a 90 degree angle and of course broke one doing this. The trouble here is due to so little room to work with and doing this all by mirror, I’m not really confident about getting the feeler gauges in or not. What i mean is when i get one size in, and then move on to the next larger size that i cannon get in, I’m not so sure the clearance is the one feeler gauge smaller or that i just couldn’t get the next larger one in due to how difficult the space and angle is to do so. It really makes me unconfident of my readings... That and when i do get the feeler gauges in, especially the thicker ones that would reflect its actual gap, I almost cant get them back out!

Is this all pretty normal? I sure hope i don’t damage (by scratches) any buckets or cam lobes doing this job.

 

[CafRacer]

It means a pair of inlet or exhaust cam lobes for each cylinder, They will be facing away at the same time.
I'm pretty sure you can do inlets on one cylinder at the same time as exhaust on another as they'll both be facing upwards at the same time, although somebody may correct me on that.
Can't really help much with the exhaust gaps, they are tricky, I think I may unbolted the top radiator mounts on my Daytona to give a bit more clearance, and some of them you can get at from the inlet side.
Its also easier removing the crank cover to rotate the engine as you get a better view of the cams, but at the price of a gasket.

 

[sparechange]

Just did this myself and had the same issues. I actually had to shim mine again this weekend cause I did it wrong for the same reasons you mentioned.

When I did it this weekend I noticed that the casing around the bucket is just a bit proud and thats what threw me off with the feeler guage. Really have to make sure you got the Guage at the right angle which is tough.

 

[JfromMN]

It means a pair of inlet or exhaust cam lobes for each cylinder, They will be facing away at the same time.

Duh, it’s all about interpretation I suppose. And I didn’t interpret it that way. Thanks for that, makes sense now.

I think I may unbolted the top radiator mounts on my Daytona to give a bit more clearance

That’s a great suggestion, I’ll definitely do that next time. Also before next time I’ll need to get new angled feeler gauges as I ended up breaking 3 of them. Geesh.

 

[JfromMN]

Just did this myself and had the same issues. I actually had to shim mine again this weekend cause I did it wrong for the same reasons you mentioned.

When I did it this weekend I noticed that the casing around the bucket is just a bit proud and thats what threw me off with the feeler guage. Really have to make sure you got the Guage at the right angle which is tough.

I didn’t notice that until reading your post. Your right and it caused me to go back in tonight and re check a few of my “off” ones. Sure enough they changed.

 

[JfromMN]

Well after a few rounds of checking mostly the exhaust (and that one right in front of the damn throttle cable mount!), here are the numbers I come up with-

Spec- intake .10 to .20mm, exhaust .325 to .375mm

Intake-
.152
.127
.127
.127
.102
.127

(the .102 might be .127 but I had a hell of a time getting the feeler in due to the throttle cable mount being directly in the way)

Exhaust-
.356
.381
.356
.356
.381
.381

The bike has 5k miles on it. I think I’ve decided not to make any changes. From what I remember the exhaust should naturally tighten on their own. The intakes I’m not sure. With that low of mileage I think they could loosen a little yet. What do you think, is it a mistake to leave them alone? I’d hate to start messing with factory assembled parts unless I absolutely have to.

 

[CafRacer]

From experience with both my bikes and plenty of others on here I don't follow the long standing assumption that they'll always tighten, also if that was the case then your original Exhaust gaps must have been set well over tolerance from the factory.
That said I wouldn't worry too much about leaving them as they are if you don't feel confident removing cams and changing shims etc.
Considering the low mileage and the fact you haven't got any actually under tolerance and the one intake on bottom limit you admit may be a misread its probably safe to re-check again in another 10K, at least now you have some measurements and you can track any changes and see which way they are actually going and how fast.
I'm sure others will disagree and insist they are set back to spec, I just don't think its a desperate priority at this stage and if you're not confident messing with the cams the risks may outweigh any benefits.

 

[JfromMN]

Thanks for you opinion and reply and i tend to agree. Now that I’m more familiar with the process (and that i would remove the top rad bolts next time!) I think I’m comfortable checking again next winter and compare to the readings i have now to see if they move and where they go. The only problem is I’m not sure if ill even get a couple K’s on it over the period of a summer due to splitting seat time with other bikes. Might not be worth it, maybe wait til 2 winters from now depending on mileage. I think i would be comfortable pulling cams if absolutely necessary to change shims. while i don't have a lot of experience with multi-cylinder street bikes Ive done several single cylinder off-road bikes. Its mostly the thought of un-doing factory torqued bolts. Even though i would torque them back to spec upon re-assembly (assuming my torque wrench is calibrated), its never as good as the factory on the 1st time with clean threads, virgin bolts etc.

My overall thoughts on an engines life from new is- when new, everything’s tight before it get broken in and usually quiet- thus smaller clearances from bearings, valves clearances etc. After full break in everything loosens up to what should be the factory’s spec range and gets a little noisier, thus valve clearances loosening a little bit. Then as an engine ages and wears, bearing clearances likely gain in tolerance while valves likely reduce clearance from pounding on the seats. If I’m even close to right, and the reason for checking these clearances in the 1st place is because i though the engine was louder than my comparable Daytona 675’s engine (except it only has 2800 miles), then i should be right in the middle of the 2 stage. Or I’m pipe dreaming...