Cover Me, I'm Going In.....

[Tom Herold]

The ticking in the upper area of the head/cams has reached a point where I feel I have to do something about it. It's far too noisey at speed and a riding buddy of mine made a comment about how loud it is when he's riding close to me.

I can hear the distinct metallic tick coming from the head and when I'm behind the bike listenting to the exhaust = not good at all.

I'm going to start off with stripping the bike down and conducting compression and leak down tests on the cylinders.  If it passes those tests, I'll crack the cam cover and recheck the shim clearances again, for the second time in less than a thousand miles....

If the clearances pass, I'm guessing I'll need to start chasing down the oil passages to make sure it's getting the lubrication it needs to the components. A little compressed air might be in order to blow them out anyway.

I'll throw it back together and if it's still ticking after all that, I'm dropping the engine and pulling the head to have it either rebuilt or replaced.

The thing is, there's no smoke on start-up or while running, the spark plugs aren't fouling with oil or fuel, and the bike seems to run just as strong now as it did before the tick started.

I've had other fellow riders make the comment it's only a $5k bike, why put so much into it and not get a return on investment, rather than replace it?  My answer is pretty simple; I like this bike. A lot. I've owned several bikes and feel it complements my Trophy 1200 nicely. I consider it the best all-round bike I've owned in my last 20 years of riding street bikes.  So I'm going to repair/fix it, ride it and keep enjoying it. Hell, I'm even selling off my Harley because the two Triumphs get more road time than it does and I just can't see letting it set any longer.

If anyone has any other ideas before I start this adventure, feel free to chime in. Otherwise, I'll keep you all updated.

[iansoady]

Don't remember any previous posts on this, but you have checked it's not blowing slightly from the exhaust headers? These can make an awful racket.

[Tom Herold]

I did check the headers and found them nice and snug.  I used a mechanic's stethescope to pinpoint as best as possible. It's definately an exhaust valve, and I'm believing it's on the #1 cylinder.

[Stretch]

I remember Sasquatch saying he had a ticking sound, and it turned out to be a burr on one tooth on the exhaust cam gear.  He filed down the burr, and all was well.

http://tigertriple.com/forum/index.php/topic,4725 (http://tigertriple.com/forum/index.php/topic,4725)

[Tom Herold]

Thanks Stretch, I'll look into that too if the bike passes the compression and leak down tests....

[Medic09]

I've got a tick on the right side head at 36,000+ miles.  Had it at the dealer and the mechanic (a friend who trust) said he honestly wouldn't bother doing anything for it.  It doesn't seem to bother performance any.  I've left it for now.  My older bikes all have something that makes their character; I guess the Girly does, too.   :roll:

[Tom Herold]

Okay, it's been a while since I started this thread, and here's what became of things.....

After making sure my Trophy 1200's healthy and the interval maintenance was conducted, I tore into the Tiger intent on finding the issues.....

The compression came back with all 3 cylinders within 3% of each other, so good to go.  Then the leak down, and again, all valves/cylinders were within 3% of each other, so luckily those weren't the issue. With only 36k miles on it, they shouldn't be in bad shape anyway!

I rechecked my valve clearances and found them on the tight side on a few, especially the noisiest one on the exhaust side of #1. I scratched my head wondering WTF happened from the last time I did them less than 1500 miles ago. So I opened a few of them up to the wider clearance, and buttoned everything back up after fishing a wayward shim out of the bottom of the timing chain area.....  :roll:

All the valves are nice an noisey now, and the louder, single cylinder, ticking is almost gone. Though there's still a tick in there, it's nowhere near as loud and hardly distinguishable if you don't know what to listen for. At higher RPM's its almost gone, or at least not a lot louder than the others......

Still no smoke on start-up or while running, the idle's smooth (for a 955i) and the power's back.

I'm going to ride it and see what happens.

[Mustang]

when my alternator bolt gets loose and starts to rattle in the middle of a cross country road trip .........I just shove the earplugs in a little deeper or turn the Ipod up  

sometimes ignorance is bliss and what you can't hear isn't broke