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My New Husky AND My TERRIBLE Luck

83K views 298 replies 45 participants last post by  Op_Engineer 
#1 ·
So after all of your advice and insight I went out made my purchase of a 2008 SMR 510. I drove all the way down to Sacramento (500 miles) to get a bike that looked super clean and had semi-low miles (2,000). :bannana:

Here she is:





So I get back to my house on Sunday and I just had to take this thing out. Fire it up, let it warm up for a couple minutes, cruise through two miles of twisties and then hit a straight section….this is where I decided to open it up and see how fast it would climb through the gears compared to my Dizzer. I got it into 6th and started winding it up….80...85….90…93 BANG!!!! Rear tire locked up at 93 mph. I should have pulled in the clutch but I was white knuckled on the bars trying to control my skid. :headshake

At this point I had travelled a whopping 2.8 miles on my new ride (not counting the 5 mile test ride in California) and have just destroyed the transmission (so I thought). :damn:

I pushed the bike all the way back to my house and immediately drop the oil expecting some large shards of metal and some gear teeth. I didn’t get much of anything on the drain plug. So I ran a magnet through the oil and ended up with a good amount of fine metal particulate but nothing that says “your F’d”. Then I pulled the metal screens and they had a couple larger flakes but still nothing totally conclusive:




So then I got real excited and was hoping it was just a top end thing (crash into valves, etc…) so I pulled the spark plug and it looked perfect:rolleyes2::



As I’m staring at the plug my eyes drift to the bike which is still slowly trickling oil into a drain pan that is about it overflow. I recall these things only take about 1.5 quarts and the pan has at least 3-4 quarts and then THE SITUATION HITS ME IN THE FACE!:boxing:

I am willing to bet my connecting rod snapped off at the wrist pin and drove itself through the cylinder wall allowing all of the coolant to fill my case. I will try to pull the engine tomorrow and verify but in the meantime I NEED YOUR HELP. I have never owned a husky or a KTM or a Husaberg or anything that is not Japanese so any pointers would be fantastic. Last night I was searching the internet to find the cost of a cylinder, or top end kit, or tranny gears, or crank, or connecting rods, etc…….. I CANT FIND ANYTHING!!! Where do you guys buy parts? I was led to believe that parts for Husky’s were not too difficult to find…WTF? :headscrat

Anyway, I’m going to be asking a lot of questions and I hope that you guys can get me back on the streets as soon as possible. Thanks in advance for the support.
 
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#74 ·
Sorry, ive been crazy busy packing chit up and getting ready to move this weekend. I'll see if the tool surfaces once i get moved into my new place next week and un-packed....im sure its in a box somewhere...gotta move twice on 2 diff islands in the next 3 months....my life is very busy with what ever time i have off of work..

cant believe your motor went ka-blu-eee....sux to hear bro..
 
#75 ·
No worries Squirt. I know people are busy and mailing tools across the country (or pond) can't always be at the top of the list. I'm just going to get one turned out on a lathe. :thumbup:

I measured the major diameter at 28mm and thread pitch at 1.0mm if anyone wants to know.
 
#79 ·
good on ya for doing the work yourself! i've had a bit of fun with my huskies over the last 3 years, and at the moment am laid up with a bust ankle after the best one tossed me on a street race a week ago
my 510 dropped a valve and did basically the same as what your did - rod through barrel. so that got upgraded to 530 on the rebuild
my 450 ran the main bearing and scuffed everything when it ground to a halt. rebore and replate and i cleverly sourced all the parts from ebay/halls/somewhere else rather than the local stealership and halved the rebuild cost. it lasted 9 hours before the pin pulled out of the piston and again rod through barrel and mashed valves. it's still in bits but slowly being put back together so i can sell it for about the cost of its 2 rebuilds. my advice - no fast by ferracci/wiseco piston!
my 450rr handles like a dog. an angry one. and it bites. oh and during the first race i did it split the radiators, overheated and scuffed the barrel when the piston cracked.
don't worry though ... by the time my ankle is out of plaster they'll all be going and hopefully i'll be fit to race in mid april!
they're a bit of work, but i reckon in spite of all the failings they're almost worth it! i'd prefer not to have a broken ankle of course....
good luck with the build - hope you're out there enjoying it before i am!
 
#80 ·
Holy Smokes Mr. Willy!! You are not giving me any confidence in the Husky name. I hope you are riding the dogshit out of your bikes to get these results. If mine blows up again after 9 hours I will be picking up my AR-15, not a wrench!

You my friend have some seriously terrible luck. Good on ya for sticking with it. Best of luck to you:cheers:
 
#81 ·
Slick Willy, I've said it before and I'll say it again. I've never heard of anyone having as bad of luck as you! Your poor bikes.. maybe its somethin in the gas they're drinkin :lol:
 
#84 ·
Update!!

So I finally got my flywheel puller and got the cases apart. The puller is officially 28mm x 1mm pitch. The puller was actually being sold for the DRZ 110 and/or the CRF 450X (not sure what years). Anyone looking for the puller just hit me up and I'll help you out (way cheaper than the Husqvarna puller).

Transmission gears look good:thumbup:


The counter balancer shaft is totally bent. I actually can't even get it out of it's bearing (you can not access this bearing from the other side of the case so it is not possible to press out). I had to use a bearing puller to remove the sprocket on the counterbalancer that engages with the sprocket on the crank shaft in order to get the crank out.



Something that I noticed during this disassembly was that the counterbalancer lobe impacted the rod during the failure. I believe that some of the piston bits got between the teeth of the sprockets (on crank and balancer) allowing them to skip teeth and become misaligned / out-of-time.

Also, all bearings in the case are intact and seem fine (I am replacing but they were not the mode of failure). The bearing on the big end of the rod seems fine. No extra play or anything. I also found both circlips in the case in one piece (problem not caused by circlip breaking).
 
#87 ·
The timing gear on the crank was fine. Still held in place by the woodruff key. As far as the cam gear on the cam shaft I'm not sure. I didn't pay any attention to it but will look this week. I am pretty sure that the piston hit the valves AFTER the rod broke away from the piston because the contact marks in the piston top are to the side of the valve recesses. Meaning the piston rotated in the cylinder prior to whacking the valves.

What do y'all think about the crank? Any quick easy and cheap wat to find out if it is salvageable?:hmmm:
 
#88 ·
Cam gear possible rotation

So here is one of the cams. It appears that the sprocket may have possibly slipped 5-8 degrees. I don't know if these marks are from the factory or what. Is the sprocket pressed onto the shaft? Just a tapered press fit? There doesn't appear to be any key in it. Also, since I am replacing all of the bearings how am I supposed to get the sprocket off the shaft? And then the bigger question is how do I press it back on in the right location? Any help here would be great.:headscrat

 
#89 ·
Just looked through the manual and removing the cam sprockets are never covered.

I will agree that by looking at those marks on the sprocket it does look like it rotated.

The only way to get it back to normal would be for someone else to measure their cam timing and you adjust yours back till it matches. (sounds like a pain in the ass to me.)
 
#90 ·
Thanks for the input. This is what I was afraid of......it just keeps getting better and better. If you ever want to replace the bearings on the cams then you have to take off the sprockets. Because of this I have to believe that there is a way to remove them and press them back on correctly. I really don't want to just replace the cams because at that point the bike really isn't worth fixing. I hope someone chimes in with options, ideas, or just some leads for me to pursue.

Is it possible to just buy a new complete engine?:damn:
 
#92 ·
Have a talk with your machine shop when they look at the head and crank for you and see what it will cost to put the new bearings on. Doesn't matter that the sprocket spun a bit because they have to take it off anyway. My concern is the amount of force it takes to spin a sprocket if it damaged or weakened the cam. Maybe turn to ebay there are couple options on there. BTW msrp is 258. for each cam. Good luck this thing sure has been a nightmare for you... You know it would be a shame if you put the thing together in its current condition and left it outside where some not so honest people could see it. Its not insurance fraud if it really gets stolen!!!!!
 
#93 · (Edited)
I appreciate your words of wisdom Juicehall. :lol:

You had mentioned going with a 530rr intake cam if I do go with the 530 kit so maybe this is just telling me something......

Here is the exhaust cam. The sprocket and shaft still appear to be aligned.


It makes NO sense seing that the intake valves were only slightly and the exhaust valves looked like this:

 
#95 · (Edited)
WOW!!! I feel like a dumbass! Thank you for pointing out the obvious:thumbup: Was it the high heat discoloration that gave it away?:lol: I think a just jumped to a logical explanation without really paying attention:anim_peep:

Upon further inspection.....the intake valves are ALSO bent. No markings on the valves themselves but they do not seat properly. About a 1mm gap between valve and seat when reinserted into the head.

I'm not sure what this means for the exhaust cam....it's probably fucked too given the circumstances....sigh
 
#96 ·
haha yea the color gave it away. and this is just another guess, i think that when it blew at a high rpm (said you were going 93) the piston some how held up the intake valves (probably on the intake stroke which explains why the exhaust cam gear didn't get spun out of time) causing them not to move but since the cranks rotating mass couldn't stop so fast it kept going and spun the cam gear on the cam because the valves were held up. this is just an educated guess :hmmm:
 
#97 ·
Possibly Useful Information

Okay guys… I just wanted to give an update of what has been going on. I have been doing a lot of behind the scenes information gathering and wanted to share with you all. A lot of this information/suggestions have come from Juicehall, J.R., and 06-530rr (formerly known as Alohar something or other) so I want to give them a big THANKS!

Hopefully by the end of this build this thread will not just contain updates but some useful information to others.

Anyway….I have recently been debating the 530 kit as well as making the engine partially a 530rr (by adding the rr intake cam, valves, springs, etc…). Also looking at aftermarket rods as the stock ones seem to have a few issues and since I will be adding 30 more CC I thought it might be a good idea. Also looked at going to stainless valves….

Carrillo – These guys make high performance rods, pistons, and such. You are looking at $250 for a rod that has a bushing pressed into the small end and that is it. It is then up to you to source the crank pin and bearing (I do not believe you can order these by themselves from Husqvarna but I could be wrong).

Falicon – Primary product is Rods. These guys offer the rod for the SMR 450. They couldn’t verify for me that it would fit a 510 but I think that it would. I would think that the 510 uses the same rod but with the pin location slightly further away from crank shaft centerline (adding stroke). However, I will let someone else confirm this one. You can pick up the Falicon for about $200 plus a pin for $70 plus a bearing for $45. This total price is very close to the stock Husky rod kit. Some other interesting information that was shared is that the SMR 450 rod is a very slightly modified version of the RMZ 450 rod. Now, I don’t know what that means or what the modifications were but apparently the base forging is the same.

Jeff @ Hall’s – The ’08 bikes have all titanium valves. The ’09 and ’10 have titanium intake valves and stainless exhaust valves. Jeff told me that the valves are compatible but does not recommend it. Price difference between SS and Ti is negligible (says Jeff…I don’t actually know). Sounded like you could make the swap if you wanted to by no reason to do so. He said that for my kind of riding (which is mostly street with minimal track) the 530 would be a good buy. He said the RR intake cam, valves, springs, etc… would be a “nice” performance upgrade but probably not worth the money if you’re not racing. For all of the valve stuff and camshaft I would be looking at $700-800. Therefore, I am not doing this mod. I can always do it later and it is an easy swap.

If you have read through this page then you know that my sprocket slipped on the intake cam. I asked Jeff about getting this fixed and he is going to give me a ring back to let me know if his shop will do it. They have the equipment and personnel to do it but wants to check with the shop guy first?? Maybe a liability thing, not sure. He said that on there race bikes they will only press the sprocket on and off to replace the bearings only 1-2 times and then they will Tig weld the sprocket in place because they start to get loose (the RR camshafts have TIG’d sprockets).

As far as Rods are concerned Jeff said that he hasn’t seen too many broken rods come through his shop. He said that the common failure is the Pin that holds the crank lobes together and the rod onto the crank. The pin doesn’t necessarily break but it wears funny and then the Bearing goes out and then BAD THINGS HAPPEN!!! So, based on this information I don’t think that I will be buying aftermarket Rod. I’ve also sent my crank out to Paul @ GP cycles in San Diego so I don’t want to fuck around with getting him aftermarket stuff.

Anyway, that’s all I’ve got for now.
 
#99 ·
I've decided not to do the SS valves for the simple reason of keeping it "factory". Jeff really couldn't give me a reason as to why husky switched it up. My guess is that stainless are cheaper to produce and performance wise the TI simply isn't necessary (on the exhaust side) for this particular engine (again, this is just my assessment). I just don't see any reason to switch but I also don't see any downside either.

I was not told to stay away from Falicon. In fact, if my crank was being rebuilt locally I would probably buy one cuz I could just deliver parts and crank at the same time. It looks like they build a great product and the staff was very helpful and informative. I would without a doubt be buying from them if I heard broken rods were super common on husky's but I haven't and Jeff did not make it sound like a common occurrence. However I would be interested to hear how the falicon pin differs from the stock one as these seams to be a problematic area.

Hope this clarifies things
 
#102 ·
falcon does superb work, has done a ton of modified rotax cart cranks for me and friends, superb work. You will have a lot more vibs w that 530 kit. You ought to have everything rebalanced if you go that route.. IMHO
I really haven't heard anyone say anything about excessive vibes. Not that your wrong or anything but do you speak from experience on this....I'm sure it increases a little simply because it is more reciprocating mass but since I haven't heard anyone complain I didn't think much of it.

When you say "everything rebalanced" are you just talking about the crank or are there other things? Are they not well balanced from the factory?

I wonder if the counterbalancer from a 530RR is different than the one in the 510? I may have a new topic to investigate.:hmmm:

Thanks for the input
 
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