Bonneville America Forums Forums Technical Forums General Tech Shim Kits available?

Does anyone know if the shims are available in kits? My bike will be ready for valve lash checking in 4000 miles, so I'm starting to get stuff together for that. The price that the dealer quoted me is $6.40 a shim, which will add up really fast, and I'd much prefer to have a good selection already on hand, vice having to order shims once the bike's down.

A shim is a machined coin. Not a shard of brass. To have a kit you would need at least one of each shim. That would be 49. They start at thicknesses of 2.000mm and increment by .025mm to 3.200mm. Ferget about it. Buy what you need. BTW $6.40 per shim is a steal. If'n your dealer is really cool, he would swap shims with you.

Yeah, I read through the service manual last night after I'd talked to the dealer. And I also recall someone mentioning $8 a shim. I'd seen shim kits in some of the mags, although I'd assumed they were for Big 4 bikes, no biggie.

My dealer does an exchange deal.. costs about 1/4 of the price of a new shim to get an used exchange one (assuming he has the sizes you need) - it's worth asking about.

Matt

shims are 25mm.
Kawasaki and I believe Yammer use the same size. Check with other dealers.

RoundSlide,
I went to my Triumph Dealer and was told they'd do the 2 hour job for $57/hr and swap out the shims for free. If I do the job, I'd have to order the shims at around $7 each plus $15 shipping and another $10 if I wanted them mailed to the house. So I went to the local HondaYamaKawaZuki dealer with the 2 shims I couldn't use and swapped them for FREE for the ones I needed. I took my digital caliper with me to show dude the thickness was what I had marked on my used ones. Thanks Pat (Dinqua) for the "Shim-o-lator".
Don't forget to try swapping with yourself first - I had 5 valves that needed adjustment, but after moving them around, I only had to acquire 2 new ones. To hold my backlash springs, I cut two 1" pieces off an old allen wrench that measured .57mm at its widest point, chucked it up in a drill and ground about 1/3 of it down to .315mm on a bench grinder. it held very well until I was installing the intake cam. It became slightly offset and I had to use a screwdriver to pry the gear in line to get it to drop in.
It was a bit scary thinking the small tip of my holder might break, and I'd lose the tension. Anyway, it ain't hard if you're patient.
Is the torque on the T30 torx bolts really 12nm?
The rain is turning to ice here now. Supposed to do that all day, with more ice and snow tonight. RideSafe!

$6.40 is a pretty good price. My dealer, Motoprimo in Minneapolis, charged me $10 each, and that was on an exchange! It seems to me that we are at the mercy of the dealers on this. I have heard that the dealer in Belle Plaine is easier to deal with, but they are about 40 miles south of the city, which works out to be 50-60 miles for me. How far do I want to drive to save 10 or 15 dollars? If I am buying a new bike, then that's a different story.

The next time I check my valves, I'll buy a very good quality digital caliper. Some of my shims had no markings, and I was again at the mercy of the dealer service guy to measure them and make the correct pick. When I reinstalled them, they weren't perfect, but probably close enough.

Wow, I just had a strong Deja Vu feeling. Sort of like I've been through all this before. It was kind of like a Triumph/Mad Max vibe. Weird...

Cody

I also paid $6.40/shim locally. They had them in two days.

Thanks for all the input guys, starting to get all the stuff ready for this one. Just bought metric feeler gauges, and have got my eye on a $40 6 inch digital vernier caliper, with metric accuracy to .001mm. I'd just like to minimize how long my ride is going to be down while having to check and adjust the lash.

Roundy,
I got my digital caliper on ebay for $21, including shipping. The buy it now price was $29, but I submitted $20 in the last 20 seconds and got it for starting bid price. Every known thickness I've checked with it has been true. It measures in mm and inches.

Thanks for the idea, Dennis, I'll be sure and poke around ebay before I hit the "ok" on that $40 caliper set. I've got a 12" dial caliper that reads in inches, the metric indicator is not nearly as precise as I'd like it to be, so that's why I want to buy another, more accurate, caliper set.