shims... what a friggin' pain!

[1KPerDay]

Grrrrr.... I was up until midnight trying to get the right shims
swapped on the SheePz... suckers are a royal PITA to get back in,
particularly in the outside valves on cyls 1 and 4. I've tried gluing
them to my finger with grease to help, but it seems 98% of the time I
can sort of get them in the general location with my finger but they
never slip right into the cup... the tolerances are so close that it
has to be EXACTLY parallel and I end up having to tap on it with a
screwdriver for 5 minutes (and pick it up with a magnetic tool 5
times) before I get it back in.

Then when I DO get it back in, I re-check and the clearance is out of
spec range@!#!@#!@#$!@#$!#$!@!!@! RRRRGGAASGASDGAGGG!!!

I've done this twice before and I don't remember it being that
difficult. Have I lost my touch?

Of course the first couple of times I only had to swap 3 shims or
so... this time about 10 were tight and one was loose.

I expected this as the last check a bunch were on the tight side of
spec, but still... very frustrating. I finally had to just give up and
go to bed because I was pissed off and covered with grease (and not in
a good way).

Any sure-fire tips to getting the shims back in? I was thinking of
trying grease on a tongue depressor or something.


And I have to do this for the ZZR soon also... which is more
inaccessible and the cyl head is tilted forward...

Maybe I should get a Harley again. LOL No valve checks, no chain
maintenance. (.....waiting for it..... :D )

-- 
Utah Jeff
'96 SheePz1100