Well here it is all the details from the final chapter of Project X-tra Power you've been waiting for, careful its an epic!
I changed plans & ideas several time throughout the process but here is what I landed on.
I dropped the high compression piston route in exchange for an OEM piston with stock compression. Why you might ask? I decided I wanted the motor to make more power without working any harder. With everything else in the bike still being 20+ years olds I felt more comfortable sticking with factory specs. The reason I love the 350X so much is that it's so reliable and the motor is d**n near bullet proof.
So I had the cylinder bored one over and in went a 1st over piston for the 350X from Honda.
I then focused all my attention on the head, heres what was done.
1. Brand new oem springs
2. Brand new valve seats and guides
3. A 3 angle valve job to clean everything up
4. Some significant porting and semi-polishing of the exhaust & intake ports.
5. I also put a new oem cam chain in just to be safe.
I went back and forth on a cam and what size but I couldnt make up my mind. PLus with all the porting I had done with a cam I was probably looking at needing a bigger carb and I felt like I was being carried away in the moment and delusions of more and more power swept in. I started to lose focus on my original intentions. To make her run just like she used to with a little extra kick (no pun intended)
So I stayed with a stock cam, If I wanted a race bike I'd buy a quad and build it up.
While apart I had everything sandblasted down and repainted. I even took both side case covers off and had them repainted so she's got that showroom shiny motor (for now).
I also sprung for a new chain since little Sahara had put the final nail in the coffin of my old chain. And of course I sprung for the X-ring chain cuz.. well you know
And of course new gaskets, seals and o-rings were replaced all around and every bolt, nut, and screw was torqued to factory specs straight from my Honda repair manual. The valves were adjusted to spec and she was timed to the T (pun intended)
A couple complications that took the wind from my sails was of course the aforementioned cir-clip issue. But one that really got me worried was when we had the motor in the bike bolted in hooked up and ready to start, you could grab the kicker and push it down with your hand over and over again with little to no resistance. After removing the side case we discovered a gear on a shaft that made contact with the kicker and crank had been put in backwards and was making contact with nothing. No worries nothing was damaged because of this, so we fliped the gear and shaft around and but the case cover back on wala problem solved.
Another issue we ran into was before we fired her up for the first time we took the carburator apart and cleaned it out real good and checked all the jets. A stray part fell out that we did not notice and you can imagine how it ran without a correctly asslembled carb. The part was discovered the carb was reassembled and one kick later she fired right off ;D. I've started her four times since and every time she fires on the first kick with no leaks and a very healthy sound.
;D Project Complete!! ;D
Check the pictures out below for the final process.
We had to remove the clutch basket, oil pump line, and oil pump to get the old cam chain off and the new one on. You can see the kicker gear on backwards I talked about earlier in the northwest corner of the motor by the removed oil line. See the shaft it's on, its not connected to anything it just slides into the case, and the gear is offset on it. When this slid out during disassembly we of course put it back in backwards only to come back and haunt us later.
Heres the old and new cam chain Honda must have revised the chain if you notice the new one has an extra link in it.
I'm not sure what Nates doing here, It looks as though sabotage,
(this was his idea of a Honda joke)
And the new piston & bored cylinder
Here's the new piston installed AFTER I got some cir-clips
A top view of the head with the new springs & such
An underside view
Here are some before and after pics to give an idea of the porting done. The stock head pictured is an extra piece I've had the cam journals are chewed up other wise I'd have used this as a replacement.
BEFORE
AFTER
BEFORE
AFTER
BEFORE
AFTER, you can also see the fixed crack on my exaust stud looks pretty good huh?
This is a large portion of the aluminum removed from the head from porting, I asked for it to go, for its coolness value.
The whole head & cam installed and getting ready to put on the rocker cover.
Look I worked on it too
adjusting the valves
HEre she is with the motor set back in the frame
And all bolted in
My new exaust the finally gets to stay on!
The X-man intalling his new X-ring chain
And she's done... d**n that's sexy!
BONUS PICS!!
As if rebuilding the motor isnt fun enough, I had to stop to take time for a little side fun. I found a great use for my old cam chain. ;D
X-man iz in da Hiz-ouse
And so Operation X-tra Power comes to a close, thanks for comeing along for the ride and I'll see everyone on the trails!! ;D ;D ;D
The project is currently on stand-by while I wait for 2 freakin cir-clips to come in. On the bright side if that is the worst that happens I'll be sittin pretty.
