Wondering what my kick start is telling me?

[TimmyT]

Just put it all back together, to note another dumb electrical bug, loose ground clips under the headlamp and mystery short to ground somewhere I have yet to trace. No big deal I can fix the turn signals later... A blown fuse actually caused my brake lights to stay full on and keep the horn from working. Electric start would turn the engine over, but not get it to run. The clutch is set up proper and kick will turn the engine freely when clutch is pulled. In Neutral with no clutch there is Compression. I can hear the engine suck air in from the carbs when turned, I do have spark on both sides (and tried switching plugs). But I think the kick is letting me know something is up because on one side TDC the kick will have compression but flow through the 90 degree kick when engaged. But the other side, which I would guess as the right side seems to have a hiccup. When I try to engage is there is compression however there seems to be a small 5 to 10 degree dead spot in the middle of the compression when that side gets cranked. So the kick shaft has this little dead drop in the middle of turning it over on one side then catches again that leads me to believe I may break the shaft or worse damage something inside the engine. I hope this is just a fine tuning needed here like re adjust the valves not a rebuild. I dont think this is normal.

I have already made what I thought were proper valve and timing adjustments, rocker arms all move in succession, teeth on all the gear splines are good. Just not sure where to go from here, I will try to get a quick vid of this in action.

 

[TimmyT]

Ok so I checked and this compression gap is actually happening on both left and right sides with the kick. Bear with me cause apparently in my inspections today I tried the signal short with the flasher relay out and the signals are good and relay is bad. Neutral light was not working but I fixed that by tightening the plate screws a bit more where the wire mounts to the plastic cover under the sprocket cover. Played with my electrical some more to find a loose ground clip behind the headlight. And last but not least I caught that I was trying to fire with BPR7ES plugs!!! I went through my pile of old parts and found my original BP7ES ngk spark plugs, cleaned and gapped them up!

The "R" is added resisistors that confuse your electrical system and take your ignition coils out of range for a good spark.

I would now guess that this compression gap has something to do with improper points timing and valve gap. anyone want to back me up on pointing out I did it wrong in the first place?

 

[TimmyT]

OK so a dry compression test tells me everything I need to know. 100psi on the left cylinder and 75 on the right. So I got my balls in check and pulled the top end. I figured what the hell then I can make sure the cam and timing and all seals are good from the inside out. Huge carbon deposits on the intake and exhaust valves, pistons ect. with 20k miles I expected as much. Now Im going to start a top end rebuild forum with photos and hopefully can get a wealth of help cause other than replacing seals, gaskets and cleaning carbon deposits I am totally in new territory here. So compression is king, my fuel and spark are there now I have this bridge to cross.

 

[DARKMIDKNIGHTWARRIOR]

Good luck and set that bridge on fire! Lol

 

[TimmyT]

Ok so after opening the top end the pistons look 35 years old, cause they are. The rings are ok although there are no rubber ones left. The hones look in decent shape, but I cant get over the top of the pistons and the wear around the top before the first set of rings. The wrist collars are slightly grooved and blued. I continued this journey in the engine section clearly not a kickststart problem. Or electrical now I can set my camshaft timing tdc and points and gaps as I build it back up. Need a bigger c clamp for my valve springs so I can clean and lap valves. Never got that video up files are too big im too lazy.