Terry

It has been touched on above, but external adjusters are not the whole answer if other parts of the suspension (e.g. spring weight, preload and the shim stacks/valve bodies) are not correct. If the shims are too stiff or the valve body is too restrictive (Honda HMAS I'm looking at you) the adjuster won't make much difference. Personally I find it best to leave the adjuster alone and work on getting the shim stacks correct. The shim stack (e.g. from Racetech) will normally consist of x quantity of 17 x 0.15mm shims backed up by a "pyramid" of smaller/reducing diameter shims. Changing the 17mm shims (e.g. adding or subtracting one) makes a big difference, bigger than winding the adjuster in or out. Only takes about an hour to pull the forks out/apart/change shims/refill and refit with some practice... To summarise what has been discussed above, get all of the stock parts working well, and change out the shims/springs/valves inside. I did this in steps (revalved standard, then added VTR rebound adjusters, the VTR fork lowers/F4i delinked brakes, and finally F4i forks in 6G triples). Each step is an improvement but the biggest one came from the first step. Aside from the springs, you can re-use the valve bodies and shims in all of the above; the cartridges are basically the same in 5G, 6G, F4i and VTR but with adjusters added in the VTR (rebound) and F4i (rebound/compression).

Love it! actually if one knows the screw pitch for any screw-adjusted tappet, I guess you could work out how many degrees of rotation from zero clearance would get the required clearance.

You can buy this one in Japan...

The diaphragms lift the slide and the needle up out of the emulsion tube, so less flexbility = less lift; I doubt that would cause low end richness. What does cause low-end richness is any wear on the needle or the emulsion tube that it fits into. My RF900 suffered wear in the emulsion tube and that caused poor fuel economy and occasionally fouled the spark plugs. You can viually inspect the emulsion tubes by removing the diaphragms and slides and looking straigth down to the emulsion tube in the floor of the throat. It should look perfectly circular, but on my RF the holes wore oval due to movement of the slides allowing the neede to vibrate against the tube.

That would be a Delkevic tri-oval; I had the low-slung version on my VFR.

The topic of "can I replace my weedy incandescent bulbs with more manly LED's?" seems to come up on every forum. There's always a keyboard warrior that leaps into type with "you can't do that, the pattern of the LED is different/the reflectors are designed for filaments/you'll blind everybody". To which I respond, shop carefully and buy LED's that position their emitters in the same location as the filaments of that old incandescent, and the reflector won't care where the light is coming from. Below are some comparison pics of low beam on my ST1300, first with the halogens, then with some no-name brand LED's from China. I like 'em. Sorry I didn't tidy up my bench before snapping the pics...

Absolutely agree that a rattle gun/impact wrench is the right approach, and in my experience a lot gentler on the fasteners as well (lots of little rapid taps versus one almighty slow twist with a long breaker bar). Heat is also very useful but would be difficult to do without affecting the wheel paint.

If you are referring to sealand applied to the "half moon" section of the cam cover gasket, that is manufacturer recommended whenever refitting these gaskets. I tried going without this and ended up with a fine oil weep.

Doesn't look like it; the mounting bolt diameter is larger on the 6th gen 10mm vs 8mm on the 5th gen.

Thanks Mohawk, my VO2max is peaking right now and I'm seeing some interesting colours! Not to be unnecessarily picky but aren't all engines that use a primary chain to drive the clutch spinning "backwards"? I'm thinking of CB750/900/1100Fs and of course Z1s, GS1000s etc, before the move to direct gear drive of the clutch basket. Probably even Harleys? To get the same with "modern" engines a jackshaft is usually employed e.g. the MV 800F3. I never owned the 550 but did have a CBX400F back in the day, I never had camchain issues on that one but it used to have quite the appetite for sparkplugs and got quite sulky at low revs until they were swapped.

It's not a 550? (actualy 572cc). Also the crank spins backwards due to the chain primary drive.

I'm pretty happy with my front and rear stand combination, the rear just lifts the swingarm using rubber pads on metal angles that can be adusted for width. And the front lifts directly on the steering head via a pin inserted into the stem. It's a fantastic combination until you want to remove the swingarm/shock or the steering head.

Good luck with your restoration; I owned a couple of these back in the 80's from new, great little bikes that punched well above their weight. Managed a couple of 900km days on one but then I was young and stupid. I managed to wind my first one out to 210km/hr down a long hill much to the surprise of my friend alongside on his GPz900. The brakes are a bit complicated but once you figure out the right disassembly sequence they're not too bad to work with, but you can overheat them easily when playing hard.

If all is well in the caliper (moving freely on the slide pins and the pistons are free) then I think you do indeed need to be looking at the SMC. In order for the rear centre pressure to release, the compensation ports in the SMC need to be clear and allowing fluid to flow back from the caliper. There are two ports, one in the casting as per normal, but there is a second one in the plastic one-way valve that is just under the banjo fitting, you'll know it when you see it. I'd be popping that out and flushing it well and then making sure the whole SMC is clean and the piston is moving freely. There are also some critical dimensions for the clevis to screw onto the shaft, if there is not enough movement the piston can't retract far enough to uncover the compensation port, so measure that before you disassemble it (actually the manual says not to disassmble the clevis from the piston, just to replace as a unit).

I can tell you with confidence that my two bikes with voltmeters fitted show a lower voltage (the battery voltage) at idle (low 13s) and then hit a steady higher voltage (usually around 14.2V) once the revs rise, and then don't change at all with any higher revs. Are you sure you're getting the right info and that the numbers have not been switched around?