That thing will likely need a complete rebuild, or at least a complete tear down and inspection. I agree with your assessment that some idiot used way too much silicone and it got loose in the case and probably blocked off the feed line to that scored cam. Look at the wear on that sucker, it hasn't seen pressurized oil in a long time. The real problem is you don't know what else was being starved of oil. The entire engine needs to come apart and be checked for wear and damage. Then you'd need to replace anything that's been cooked and clean the oil lines thoroughly. The only way to clean those oil passages is by hand, I've never seen anything I'd want to put in an engine that will dissolve RTV silicone.
So now you have a choice, is it worth it to you to tear down this motor and give it a cash transfusion to bring it back to life? At the very least you'll need a new cam and probably need to send the head out for machining if not a new head altogether (depending on how the cam journals fared). It's probably salvageable but at the cost of a lot of time and what will probably be a fair chunk of what the bike's value. If it was me I'd park it for now and scour craigslist and motorcycle junkyards for a parts bike with a mostly complete engine. Then I'd use the long block of the parts bike and replace any missing pieces with parts from your machine to make a complete engine. If luck is on your side you'll end up with a good motor for $100-$300 bucks and a month of weekends in the garage. This is a fairly involved job so if you decide to go this route make sure you know what you're getting into. Matt -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Nighthawk Motorcycle Lovers!" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/nighthawk_lovers?hl=en.
