Down from the mountains

Salam fellows,
A lot is happening in these intense days but eventually we're forced to have a break and slow down a bit.
Grinding the shims down manually turns out to be ridiculous as we removed not even the thickness of a joint paper so we went to a grinding shop where in the end we are handed a fistful of shims from 2.1 to 2.4 mm. With 'em we adjusted a quite conservative/big valve clearance and run around the workshop spreading high fives to the workers as we fire Kismet up. We then get on the bikes and braaap off and we make it to the outskirts of Almaty as - on a very busy road, of course - Kismet again suffers of low pressure and faints. F*CK. Well, what did we expect? With these shims we might have adjusted the clearance somehow, but not solved the cause of its disappearance.

We decide to call Adlet, a chap we just had met 20 mins before leaving Freeriders workshop and exchanged contacts *destiny*. He tells us to get to his private, small yet very well prepared workshop, with even a decent hotel just around the corner. Same evening, with a good soundtrack and chai we do the decapitation and with cylinder and head in hands we go to Adlet's friends Roman and Maxim (ROMAX, Almaty) the next day. They quickly find out the exhaust valve seats are lose, just in place out of convenience, which explains both variable valve clearance as well as lack of compression especially when hot. BAM, explanation found!

Some very clever ex-owner apparently installed a high compression "tuning" piston, creating higher pressure and temperatures in the anyway quite hot running XT 350 combustion chamber. Different thermal expansion of the aluminium head and steel seats over time might have shaken them off their place.
Apart from that, valves, head, piston rings and cylinder seem to be fine.

They then offer us to:
1. Hone the barrel just because they can
2. Install some new valve seats
3. Take 0.5 mm off the piston to decrease the compression (remember: high power is something for your home trail; if you want to get home in the heat with bad juice keep your head and piston relaxed...)

This might take max 3 days they tell us, and although it's an unexpected start of our journey weirdly we are always grateful for the things that happen to us.
We went to the industrial side of Almaty. We met very helpful people, cheers Denis (Ricambi motor) , thanks Adlet (the most badass engineer in Almaty), peace Olzhas, rakhmet to the guys who know somebody, call someone, drive around for us, drive us around, etc. We get to wrench on old bikes in good company, a lovely thing to do. Also, we are forced to keep the revs low for a bit and breathe, didn't really have a break since before we left home.
We're breathing... Breathing the smoggy Almaty air, and IronChris' tissues are blood red when he cleans his nose.
We're fine, life is good, the dust, the wind, they are waiting for us out there!

Kick it always,
RidingKismet and IronChrisMeer informatie