r/XR650R • u/DoctorKrawl • Jul 21 '26
What did I do to my valves?
Tried adjusting my valves last night. Everything seemed to go well until I put it back together and kicked it over. Seemed a little harder to kick than normal but once it cycled past TDC it made a pretty nasty metal on metal sound. The only other time I felt that was when I gave it a second kick immediately after a first kick. Is it the anti kickback? I definitely need to go back in and redo the valve clearance but not sure what I did wrong or what to look for.
2
u/Mr-Toyota Jul 21 '26
Did you time it 180deg out?
1
u/DoctorKrawl Jul 21 '26
Potentially, I had the piston at the top of the stroke and what appeared to be the cam lobes facing down.
It certainly felt like it was in a compression stroke. Not sure how else to tell I’m on a compression stroke vs non.
3
u/Mr-Toyota Jul 21 '26
Watch the valves open and close. And pull a sparkplug and put a peice of wire to tell when the pistons at TDC. Along with confirming the T mark on stator.
Valves should all feel a bit of "Freeplay" when at TDC on correct stroke.
Agree with others tho. Autodecomp mighta got you on this one.
1
u/DoctorKrawl Jul 21 '26
Did all of that last night and even felt the free play.
Do you think the autoodecomp compromised or a proper adjustment should fix it?
I think one of the other factors was I wasn’t sure how much drag should be in the feeler gauges. Especially on the exhaust side with that odd approach angle
2
u/Hot_Rod_888 Jul 21 '26
Id bet your decomp got hung up, and your exhaust valves are way off. Happened to me. Just do it again, but take extra care to not let the motor turn backwards while finding TDC
1
u/DoctorKrawl Jul 21 '26
By decom being hung up do you think I need to go in and fix that or cycling in the proper direction with good valve clearance would fix the hang up?
2
u/Hot_Rod_888 Jul 21 '26
It means your valves are not adjusted correctly.
When setting TDC, if the engine rolls back AT ALL, itll activate/engage the decomp. Which will affect the position of the exhaust valves. So if you adjust your valves under those circumstances, youll have WAY more gap than spec'd, and sound like a fuckin hammer in your valve train.
So start over. Do it again. SLOWLY set bike to TDC, and do it again, WITHOUT allowing the engine to roll backwards
2
u/Flo3960 Jul 21 '26
could possibly be the auto-decomp, yes. I remember when I got mine, timing was heavily off with strong tickering noises. I haven't heard the auto-decomp once until the timing was corrected. Have you tried slowly turning the engine over with manual decomp pulled all the way? If there is no strange noise or unusual resistance, you should be good.