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So the idler grear for the kips has a flat on it, is there a reason for this?
Ie; could, say, a full gear of the same dimensions without a flat be put in its place?

Cheers,
Michael.

I suppose so, yep. You got something in mind in the way of a repair/mod?

I sure do. Ill post up details when its under way, don't wanna jynx it, and associated parts sourcing at the moment.....

Cool :)

Good luck with it!

Ok, so i got pretty sick of busting left had valves, and decided to pull my finger out, i dont know how long it will last but we shall see.
not sure if the images will work, (im not super tech savvy)

There are a few problems i see when i look at the kips system, apart from the obvious 20 odd years, wear on parts....

From the top, left hand valve,
-The spacers wear and allow the two gears (valve and rack) to move apart and reduce tooth contact patch.
- The soft aluminium wears on the hard steel rack.
- The rack sits slightly low on the valve gear (not a full contact patch)
- Clearance on the valve to cylinder increases over time and allows the valve to rock and bind in the hole.

The right hand valve,

It doesnt seem to suffer as bad, mainly because it is driven by the idler gear which has a full contact patch on the valve gear and are similar materials (steel to ali is going to wear one out alot faster)

The idler gear suffers similar fate to the left hand valve, again the small contact patch doesnt help this, a new steel/brass gear is in the pipeline after my 500/1000km top end check.


Basically i got a gear machined up to match the valve as per this pic below (again it should work....)



Then parted off, drill and reemed to size.




And this is how it turned out.



Oh and its pressed on as an interference fit and loctited in place.

Comments and opinions welcome,

Cheers,
Michael.

OH and forget to mention i machined up new collars for the top of the valves and idler gear.

I like it! That was what I was thinking about a while back when we were talking about solving the problems with the E series KIPS. Do you plan on making and selling them?

As for the collars, are they show they are still available from Kawasaki and they're cheap. Curious as to why you made them?

I dont think it would be economical for me to make them, it wasnt really cheap.
For just the gear cutting (which was done out of house) it was equal to the cost of 2 new valves from kawasaki. Plus the machining, which i did and im not a machinist /fitter and turner, so not super quick....Im a boilermaker with access to some machining equpment.

The collars i made pretty much 'snugged' everything up, i think i made 2 a slight bit taller, longer if you will, and increased the O/D by approx 0.10mm (~0.0040'' 4 thou?)

I'm a little unclear on exactly what you changed with regards to the gear--did you machine off the original gear and press on a longer gear to get more complete overlap with the rack? Is the new gear aluminum or steel or ?

Well, even if it was double the cost plus some I think it would be a good deal to have sub-valves that actually last.

Anyways, if you spec them out I would love to have a copy of all the dimensions so that I could have some made.

Very nice work. And agree. Just need the gear pitch and I think i could source getting some gears made.

dfeckel wrote:I'm a little unclear on exactly what you changed with regards to the gear--did you machine off the original gear and press on a longer gear to get more complete overlap with the rack? Is the new gear aluminum or steel or ?

Yes, machined off the old gear to suit the reemed hole in the new gear. I should have posted up the machined valve/gear.

And also yes, the new gear is longer by 2mm from memory, although doesnt sound much it is a decent percent of extra contact. Im sure it could be longer, with a bit of trial and error to make sure the rack still slipped in wouldnt be too hard.

The new gear was originally going to be brass but after talking to the gear cutter he said just go the whole hog and we ended up going with 4140 chromoly. Bit of overkill yeah probly

SS109- ill go back through my chicken scratching (read calculations) and post up some sizes.

JULIEND- Dont quote me, but there was talk of it being a 'module 1 spur gear' but the gear cutter took care of all that mumbo jumbo.


This is still in the experimental stage as far as i know and what people are suggesting (im hoping not), something else will break now, but im willing to see how it holds up.

i would take a set of those plans if you have time to draw up a set. my dads a machinest so i could have him make a set for my kdx220 im hoping to get next week.

So any update on the outcome of this experiment? How does it hold up?

I'm still interested as well.

bigerestblazer wrote:i would take a set of those plans if you have time to draw up a set. my dads a machinest so i could have him make a set for my kdx220 im hoping to get next week.

These wouldn't work for your 220. Which is fine, since it doesn't suffer the same KIPS valve weakness as the E series 200's do.

I am very interested, too.