52 bux a piece for APE's
 

Is that a good price?:confused: They look like something that could be fabbed up in a matter of minutes with 50 cents in supplies. I guess a $10 liferaft is priceless when your boats about to go down.

Same intriguing discussion going on in UK Firestorm forum

http://www.vtr1000.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=12826

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3013/...7e430ae9ff.jpg

These are cheaper....

http://www.overstockpartsgalore.com/index.html

Nice, I was about to get out the drill and find some bolts. Still tempting. But think I'll spend the 80 bux,

When I decided to order ccts last month I found the website MuHerdFan linked.

When I hit the "buy" button I found out they don't accept credit cards or anything but PayPal, and there was a notice from PayPal saying they'd had trouble with the retailer and weren't processing transactions.

Seems PayPal is working on that website again, but just so you know.

I went ahead and ordered directly from A.P.E. and had my ccts in less than 48 hrs.

EDIT I spoke too soon. just checked and PayPal is still not processing orders from that website.

how do you determine the preload nessicary to keep the timing chain at proper tension?

I'm waitin for a stator to get my bike up and running. if my tensioners fail before I get the APE's I'm gonna freak out.

RK1, nice catch. I'm in the process of attempting to sell my bike, so I never bought the CCT's.

Version I):While you have the valve covers off, notice the tension of the cam chain between the two cams. Just install the new ones to that tension.

Version II): An "A" tech told me to get as close to the proper tension as possible, then fire it up. Move the tensioner out until it rattles just a little bit. Then tighten it until it quiets down, then lock it down.

Too tight and you can cause premature wear.

how do they know where to send them? the paypal page just says, "PAY", no method of payment or shipping address verification...

I paid $49 apiece for mine from Schnitzer Racing. They're arriving today. I took off of work tomorrow to reassemble my engine. New valves, gaskets etc. to recover from my catastrophic failure. With any luck I'll have the thing running before I store it for the winter.

Yeah, kind of a thread jack, but for anyone keeping track the grand total for me ended up being $925. Had the shop replace and lap valves on the bad head, lapped and cleaned up the good head, bench set the valve clearance for me, all for about $575, New APEs $100, new top end gasket set $150, various oil, coolant, plugs, etc. $100.

Moral of the story...spend the $100 for APEs now and save $825 and numerous hours of labor.

Thanks Wicky! After reading the thread on the Firestorm forum, it seems easy enough to DIY. I'm gonna try to make some on my own this winter. Just need to find some decent carriage bolts with metric threads now. I fookin hate that I can never locally find good metric fasteners in this country. Building supply and hardware stores never stock em.

You might wanna try McMaster for metric stuff.... yeah you have to plan ahead, but they have almost everything you can think of... and if you live in the NY area... they ship from New Jersey, which I found is $4 (ground shipping) and delivered next day since it's so close (I've ordered over 10 times for work, always next day). You spend more than that on gas driving to 4 different hardware stores and ending up with nothing!!!

J.

You might want to check out http://www.totallystainless.com/totally.html See page 68 of their downloaded catalog.

im gonna make my own. Ill use allen head bolts with a locking nut.