Smeegal's heart transplant...

Those of you who read my ride report around Europe this summer, will know it didn't end well...

Over 3000 miles of this:



Was sharply followed by this:



Output shaft bearing failure at 80 odd mph just north of Lyon on the way home...

Fortunately my Carole Nash insurance includes recovery and UK repatriation, and explaining that this was not something a local dealer could sort out anything like quickly or cheaply, they agreed to bring Smeegal's sorry arse back home on a truck - oh the indignity!

In the meantime I carried on to catch the ferry two-up with friends, and once home made a couple of calls to dealers to estimate the rebuild costs... With the engine now having done over 40,000 miles, it was recommended that while I had it apart I replace the big-end bearings too at the very least, and together with a new output shaft and bearing was looking at the thick end of £800... and that is before replacing anything else that might have been damaged with the wonky output shaft spinning round at 80 mph - if the gear clusters or anything else were chipped or damaged, the rebuild price could have easily doubled...

So, looking for an alternative, I checked the Bay, and what do you know? I found a low mileage, 2002 model 620ie engine in what looked to be excellent condition - for £650 or best offer... I offered £600 and the deal was done!



Now I know someone is going to say "why didn't you go for an 800/900/1000 instead?", but it's not that simple... true there were a few S2R 800 engines around for £1200-1500 (so doulbe the price of this 620 already), but then I would have to factor in changing the ECU, which would mean keys and clocks too (and quite possibly the throttle bodies too) - getting the whole lot from the same bike would be almost impossible, and scratching around waiting for the right parts to turn up would be both time consuming and expensive...

Buying another 620 engine meant a simple swap - all my electronics (including the loom) would plug straight in, and with any luck, there would be no need to do any set-up of the EFi etc either...

In fact, it all seemed so simple, I thought I'd give it a go myself - so last week I took a trip out to the shed and set to work:



Taking stuff off is easy! I did my best to lay everything out in order, and labelled up the various electrical connectors with tape - there is a lot of spaghetti on a roadbike compared to the off-road bikes I usually mess with!

After a few hours, this is what I was left with:



I elected to leave the rear wheel on the swing arm - mainly because I couldn't undo the bastard wheel nut! - but it actually helped with dropping it off and moving it around, and the subsequent repositioning and shimming to the new engine:



Some of you might be surprised to know that there are actually only two bolts that hold the front and rear ends of the bike together - or more accurately, the swingarm bolts the engine, and the engine bolts to the frame with just these two bolts!:



Getting the engine back into the frame [on my own] was going to require some lateral thinking... it might not look pretty, but it worked!



cont.