Cold Seize? engine rebuild?

[FNG]

Doing pre season maintinance on a new-to-me 06 800 Adrenalin 151 (has RKT head and probubly overbore kit). Sled has 3100 miles and change on the clock. I pulled the carbs for servicing and while I was that close I pulled the Reed Valves to check them and to look at the pistons, this is what I found...

PTO side:

[/IMG]

MAG side:

[/IMG]


Cold Compression is 139 PTO and 146 MAG so pretty good, sled runs fine. I think this was just a cold seize from the previous owner ??? and I should be ok to button it back up and ride. I was planning to do a top and bottum rebuild next summer anyway...but ... maybe now?

The real question here is about my crank bearings and a sound I hear when I rotate the primary clutch by hand. With the RAVE(s) and Reed valves off I can pretty much look into the lower crank and when I rotate the crank I hear a little "click-click", sounds just like 2 ball bearings falling way down in the crank case. The sound is a bit louder on the PTO side and happens when the PTO piston is near the top and bottum of it's stroke. Is this a normal sound??? or am I hosed and should be thinking of doing that rebuild now instead of next summer

The "click click" is not my primary clutch arms falling btw.

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[tukernater]

that's not good comp;way low pto side has deep damage to piston,change both piston's,clicking could be bottom end or a ring that has started to turn because locater pins pushed in.keep us updated on what you fined?

 

[onlyrotax]

I had a motor that lost the plastic ball cage in one of the main crank bearings, as you turned the clutch by hand you could hear the balls in that bearing roll from one side to the other, clink, clink, clink.

 

[FNG]

Ya, it's not a ring as it is definitly coming from the lower case. My neighbor has one of those stethescope thingies with a listening wand on the end and I can localize it to the bottum end but can't for certain decide if it's more from the PTO side or more from the MAG side. it's already on the trailer so I'll probubly drag it on down to the dealer this afternoon for a more experienced set of eyes and ears to look at it.

 

[gus bohne]

WOW, that looks horrible !
Get those cylinders off. the pistons have collapsed and that is the noise you hear. Piston slap. it mostly heard at bdc and tdc as the thrust load changes sides and rocks the piston in the bore before changing direction.
get thos piss poor ports chamfered so as to not shear lube from the skirts.

Remove the deto prone head if the ring pins are loose, just because you bought a us. patent doesn't mean you have a better or even as good a mousetrap. as witnessed by the lack of oem or race shops winning anything with that unproven design.
Install all new pistons and see how it feels then.
those piss poor ports drilled in have no chamfer on the cylnder side..fix those rightaway

Gus
sorry for your bad luck.
The more I look at that crap porting job and the sharp jackhammer johnnie edges it just makes me cringe.
The shop should hang their heads in shame

 

[nor-cal]

Are you sure the clicking you hear is not the arms in the clutch falling against the clutch housing. You should be able to roll the motor with the clutch on and hear 3 clinks per rev.
n/c

 

[FNG]

Well, I'm sure it's not in the clutch but tomorrow I will be pulling the primary just to rule out all non core parts that could be gennerating this sound. I really havn't had any time to look into this farther since discovering it but tomorrow I'll know more.

Thanks for the input.

 

[H20SKE]

WOW, that looks horrible !
Get those cylinders off. the pistons have collapsed and that is the noise you hear. Piston slap. it mostly heard at bdc and tdc as the thrust load changes sides and rocks the piston in the bore before changing direction.
get thos piss poor ports chamfered so as to not shear lube from the skirts.

The more I look at that crap porting job and the sharp jackhammer johnnie edges it just makes me cringe.
The shop should hang their heads in shame

I am with ya!!

Those look terrible--I would tear it down and get it handled before season. It does not take that long to take the whole engine out and take her down. You can do it now or do it after towing it home!!
I have seen this before--even on my sleds in the past.

Sorry for your bad luck--but with 3100 miles it is time--probabley past time for the pistons and rings--where did that metal go?? Out the exhaust port--if lucky--if not it went down into the crankcase--not good.

Just our .02

H20SKE...

 

[FNG]

Ok (H2OSKE and gus bonne) I am not a professional mechanic by any means, nor do I have a shop full of specialty tools to work with, but I do have a reasonably healthy roll around tool chest full of yer socket sets, Allen wrenches, a couple of torque wrenches, benches, vices, drill press, compresser, ect... the power equipment that I have is set up around wood working (I build the occasional acoustic guitar) but I am not afraid to tear into a full engine rebuild if that is truly what is acalled for.

After your comments I am leaning much more strongly toward tearing this thing apart and doing a rebuild as I would hate to have this thing grenade on me out in the boonies. If I decide to do a full rebuild how does someone who is fairly capable but has never done this sort of thing before go about correcting the apparent mistakes made by others, i.e., polishing the turd that I appear to have? How does one (for instance) chamfer the edges of the ports? I am sure that when pulling the heads greater access will be available to the inside of the cylinders but is there a special tool to chamfer these edges? I can imagine some kind of ball ended grinder tool is available for this work, even a Dremel tool, but does anybody have a picture of either the proper tool to use for this, or a good picture of this job completed correctly? And how polished should the final surface be? as when I first pulled the Reed Valves and looked in there I thought (not knowing much) that the grinding work was pretty coarse and I would have expected to see more precisely done and more highly polished and finished work???

The bottom end I can deal with, maybe I'm simple minded but it seams like just like pulling the motor, pulling the heads and doing the upper end work including probably replacing the pistons, then, cracking the case, replacing all the bearings and seals, taking the crank to a good shop to have it checked, packing as much expensive as*d IsoFlex in there as it will hold, and bolting the case back together... a bunch of work but no one part is really all that hard, just a bit daunting and a big PITA and reall time consming when you put it all together, yes???

So I guess the questions would be (if I decide to do this now):
1) How does one chamfer the inside edges of the porting?
2) How polished should that chamfering surface be, mirror like? or is “course ground” (like in the pictures) ok.
3) How big should the chamfer surfaces be, just a tad" 1/16", bigger?
4) Sources for parts? such as lower end bearings and seals? (my dealer wants a tad over $400.00 for a bottom end bearing and seal kit.
5) Are there better sources than Doo parts?
6) Is there a better manual then the digital (06 Doo) one that I downloaded last week?

Sorry to sound like such a newb… but that’s what I am… an FNG to all of this.

Thanks again for your input and suggestions.

 

[munchkin]

Check your carb boots and make sure they are not cracked(leaking air)>My engine looked just like that and found the cracked boot when i put it back together.In fact rode it like that for another 800 miles while i waited for parts. Wouldnt suggest it though! As far as fixing it, I think the sound is piston slap as gus pointed out If you wanna be sure take the cylinders off and have someone hold the pistons and rotate the crank and see if the noise goes away.With instructions that bottom end is easy to take apart and put back together after you do it once.That 06 manual should show you everything you need.I bought a reman crank from skidoo for 500.00 and it was ready to run except packing the outer bearings.As far as isoflex gease call stock america,inc at 1-262-375-4100 You can get a grease gun size tube for 100.00 or so. its the exact same lube.Call kelsey at rkt for pistons and some info on that motor if you think it is his.He'll get ya goin.Another thing is check your pto seal also.Itll cause that also. Hopefully some of this will help..That really doesnt look like rkt work ,look under the piston and see what brand or what is on them thatll tell what it is.

 

[FNG]

Thanks Y-all.

Carb boots are good, not a crack or delam spot on em anywhere, When pulling the air box however there were two holes I could put my thumb through, one directly in line behind each carb, it really looked like there had been some kind of mounting bracket in that spot at some point as there was also a slight depression pressed into the plastic surrounding each hole. Each hole was covered with some kind of metal foil tape but one had pulled loose so unfiltered air was getting to the carbs.... dang! I'll prolly be fixing those with a plastic weld and fiberglass fabric patch.

Oh well, I'm yanking the engine and pulling the whole thing apart this weekend so I'll update and be lookin for input/information/knowledge from the group mind here as things devellope.

The head cover is definatly RKT, so I have been assuming all along thet the pistons were there too, and but I'll sure know more by Saterday afternoon

Glad I got a pretty good price on the sled and it's upgrades (suspension, clutching, boss seat, coated pipe, can), as if I can get this done for $8 - $900.00 I'll still have around $4600.00 into it and have a newly rebuilt motor to boot ... and know a piss-load more about snowmobiles

 

[triple7]

Get the thing pulled down and verify that it is indeed a big bore. Get a good set of pistons coming for it.

From there you need to re-grind the cylinder. All the champhering can be done first with a dremel and sanding cone, and then finish it with a set of needle files. Ive got a set that I have bent in different shapes for touching up and putting the final touches on the ports. Any stock engine can benefit from just a good clean up or 'blueprint'. Yours isnt stock but needs it worse than a stocker.

As for the finish on the work. The ground finish will work better than a polish job. No need to polish it. There are some other finishes that would be a bit better than the ground job, but that should work just fine for your purposes.

JMO and others can probably tell you better. But this is what i would do.

Let us know how it goes and keep us updated.

Jake

 

[FNG]

Thanks again, this place is great!

Um... does anyone have a photo they could post in here showing how it "should" look?.

Picture says a thousand words and all that.

 

[munchkin]

Well what did ya find? pics or anything...

 

[FNG]

Weelllll, the rabbit hole gets deeper....

Pulled the engine, pulled the heads, cracked the case (what a PITA getting that engine out solo, next time I’ll bring a friend). I found the inner seal of the inner most bearing on the PTO side was nowhere to be found... went up in little bits through the cylinder and got spit out the exhaust I'm sure. I guess I'm kind of lucky that I actually decided to do a thorough pre season as I never would have found the bad bearings until it grenaded on me real soon if I hadn's pulled the carbs and reed valves to check em and clean em. As it is, the seal popped and ground itself up and the bearing race had just come loose and not disintegrated yet, all the bearings were intact. There was some small scoring to the cylinder walls on both cylinders and I have them off to a local guy who has nikaseal (? sp) specific hones, they are done and still in spec and he says they came out great but I haven’t picked them up yet.

I have the two PTO side bearings on order and seals, ECT... just plan on replacing the two PTO side bearings as the others all seem fine and money is tight. I really hope this is not false economy but the guy I took the heads and crank to to have the bearings pulled said the rest of the bearings looked really good so grease and go.

New pistons should be in the mail from RKT (maker of the heads), I was gonna go with Wisecos but the folks at RKT told me they won't work with his domes???, anyway ordered a set from RKT and hopefully I should be getting my parts by about the 10th as the bearings are back ordered from Ski-doo.

Oh, the porting had been chamfered and the work inside the cylinders actually looked really clean.

I'll post some pics when I get the heads and crank back

 

[gus bohne]

Man, good deal.. well done going through the whole thing..
You'll have a great season now..


Gus

 

[chumbilly1]

Told ya so

Fng, just kidding but I did tell you that was a main bearing going out when I talked to you about eric happy's lower end. The holes in the airbox are where the NOS was mounted and that could have overreved the motor and caused some of your problems. Was it overbored? Did they reprogram the mpem? that sled will rip but is going to require you to pay more attention than a stocker. I would replace all the main bearings if I was you, otherwise you will be replacing more parts when those things cut loose and take out your cases and cylinder on that side! You got a great deal on that sled, it just needs a motor rebuild is all. Be thankful you did this teardown, you could have ended up with asled that you would have to part out. my 2 cents TRAVIS

 

[Macattack]

I'm a little late reading your post ...

Those are RKT's drop in pistons, but you know that now. RKT mills down watercraft pistons to fit within the stock bore. The chatter marks you see on the skirts of the piston are over heating marks (break down of oil) and they appear to look like seizure marks due to the milling process.

I've been running RKT's setup for 4 years and came across the same scenerio on the pistons my first year. I was running too lean and was overheating on the longer pulls. This was my own fault and learning how to read the plugs and piston wash with the RKT head. The piston wash is a little different with the custom domes.

But anyways, sounds like you're on your way back to a running sled. But before you start your sled and run it, check out the main jet and needle position. You should be fatter on the mid range from stock and just a little leaner on the main jet from stock. Once you find out what you have, I'd call up Kelsey and get his opinion.

oh, and one last thing. Check out those pistons for signs of deto.

Good luck.