Suzuki SV650 Riders Forum banner

Front Sprocket Cover

2K views 16 replies 11 participants last post by  SlvrDragon50 
#1 ·
Am I the only one who has huge issues getting this piece of plastic back on? Doing my first ever work on the SV changing the chain and sprockets. I made it through everything but I can't get this stupid cover back on. Am I missing something obvious here?
 
#12 ·
Scraping sludge off the sprocket cover always reminds me of this passage from ZatAoMM.

The welder is in, an old man in his sixties or seventies, and he looks at me disdainfully...a complete reversal from the waitress. I explain about the chain guard and after a while he says, "I’m not taking it off for you. You’ll have to take it off."

I do this and show it to him, and he says, "It’s full of grease."

I find a stick out in back under the spreading chestnut tree and scrape all the grease into a trash barrel. From a distance he says,

"There’s some solvent in that pan over there." I see the flat pan and get out the remaining grease with some leaves and the solvent.

When I show it to him he nods and slowly goes over and sets the regulators for his gas torch. Then he looks at the tip and selects another one. Absolutely no hurry. He picks up a steel filler rod and I wonder if he’s actually going to try to weld that thin metal. Sheet
metal I don’t weld. I braze it with a brass rod. When I try to weld it I punch holes in it and then have to patch them up with huge blobs of filler rod. "Aren’t you going to braze it?" I ask.

"No," he says. Talkative fellow.

He sparks the torch, and sets a tiny little blue flame and then, it’s hard to describe, actually dances the torch and the rod in separate little rhythms over the thin sheet metal, the whole spot a uniform luminous orange-yellow, dropping the torch and filler rod down at the exact right moment and then removing them. No holes. You can hardly see the weld. "That’s beautiful," I say.

"One dollar," he says, without smiling. Then I catch a funny quizzical look within his glance. Does he wonder if he’s overcharged? No, something else—lonely, same as the waitress. Probably he thinks I’m bull****ting him. Who appreciates work like this anymore?
 
#13 ·
That is a great post, Keith. A greasy sprocket cover is the sign of a dutiful chain-luber.

In remembrance to a remembrance, and another old codger, the terse "No" from your post reminds me of the recently departed Levon Helm from The Band. I always loved the lyric in the song "The Weight":

"Hey, mister, can you tell me where a man might find a bed?"
He just grinned and shook my hand, "No", was all he said.
 
#14 ·
A greasy sprocket cover is the sign of a dutiful chain-luber.
Yes, and usually one who doesn't use Dupont Chain Saver. (shameless plug) I've been using the stuff for 7100 miles now (from new) and the chain is STILL flinging off the black tar-like crud that Suzuki used to lube the chain. It is much reduced now, but amazing amounts came out of the cover the first two times I had it off.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top