Monday, October 31, 2011

Broken Engine is broken

A while back, my ZX7P8 started developing some real strange noises. It all started when I was crusing about one day when suddenly I heard a massive pop out the exhaust. I pulled over and the bike sounded like it was running on 3 cylinders:



I tried playing with the ignition coils, the ignition leads, the spark plug caps, spark plugs, carburetors and finally after trying all combinations and permutations of solutions (hotter plugs, FCRs off my RR, etc.), the bike started to sound better.



BUT when I rolled the bike out of the garage and tried to ride down the road, the dreaded 3-cylinder thumping sound comes back accompanied by stumbling power and shitty power delivery in general. It seemed like any load put on the engine results in poor performance.

I concluded that the issue must have something to do with the engine itself. So I called over some muscle and dropped the motor. Now it's just a matter of sourcing another engine and trying to cram it in the bike so I can get as much ride time as possible before the roads freeze over.


Looking pretty

Broken Engine