LA Sleeve, oh boy.

[Billy Golightly]

Well I received my newly sleeved cylinder from LA Sleeve this afternoon. Extremely disappointed would be an understatement. The last time I had called them they informed me that they would have to charge an additional $175 to match the new sleeve to my existing porting. After a few questions I was told that original port matching was included in the cost of sleeving it. I did very very little work to the transfer outlets, most of the time was spent on the exhaust, intake, and transfer tunnels. So I had decided I could match those areas up again as they were for the most part pretty east to reach and get to with the tools I had.

I received the cylinder today and found the intake almost completely blocked off, the transfer outlets on the sleeve are about 1/4 inch higher then the casting so now they are pointed upwards at an angle instead of straight across like they are suppose to be. The exhaust for the most part they did pretty decently, I'll have to re-grind the sleeve to match what I had but its the least worse out of whats there. The Transfer tunnel opening from the bottom is almost COMPLETELY closed off because of the bottom shape of the sleeve, its absolutely ridiculous. I had tons, an tons, and tons of hours into this cylinder before hand and I've easily got twice that from the looks of it to get this thing where its even usable. I don't have an effin clue how I'm going to reach around in the transfers and fix them unless I just end up raising the height of all of the ports to match it which is going to lessen my blow down time (Generally not a good thing for a high rpm-power engine).

Looks like I might be at TF for the 3rd year in a row on a stock cylinder...I'll try and get some pictures of it posted this evening. Man :cry: :cry: :cry:

[SYKO]

MAN! that sucks, I went the other day to my cycle shop here in Valdosta about resleeving the big bore cyl and I said what about la sleeve and he said "yea if you want it F'ed up! and I was ok... he said he sends his to be resleeved to suncoast in tampa? and they do a great job and reasonable, he showed me a cyl that had been resleeved and it was impressive to say the least. sorry that yours went to the chitter!

[oscarmayer]

how come you don;t cotnact them and complain? You paid them to do a certain job and they did NOT do it. Not even close. then they charged you extra. I would be hopping pissed off totally and demanding a refund or they fix it.

Good luck with it. I knwo I owuld NOT take it as easy as you are.

[kb200x]

Looks like I might be at TF for the 3rd year in a row on a stock cylinder...I'll try and get some pictures of it posted this evening. Man :cry: :cry: :cry:


Is this for the 500r? If so I wouldn't sweat running the stock cylinder at Trikefest. No one came close to the 500r last year ;)

well maybe that sick T3 :eek:

Feel free to talk trash about how you have no competition and are just going to run the stock cylinder. It may make you feel better....:cool:

[Tri-Z 250]

Does L.A. sleeve have any idea of the amount of poeple you can touch through the 3ww's website Billy? With your web skills you could crush any and all sales from this site. How about a bonfire flame post, setup for mfg. mistakes like this one?....That is if L.A. won't fix their obivious oversite. You can post pics....send the BOSS, plant foreman, and the head of marketing a pic of what you have....I would think this is one that slipped through the cracks. Along with your pics attach the POST site here thats about to catch on fire if the results aren't exceptable. I've never delt with them and was under the impression they handel their work. Sorry to hear this happening to ya. I think by now, I and the owner of LA would be on a frist name, driect line phone convo...Best of luck!

[Mr. Sandman]

Contact them and give them the chance to correct their shoddy work. If they fail to comply dispute the charges with your credit card co. and fight it that way (assuming you paid with a credit card).

[Billy Golightly]

Well I've already started grinding on it. I'll fix it as best I can and if it ends up sucking or I'm slow at least I'll have a good excuse for losing the drag races this year. I got like 6 pics before I started working on it and then the batteries in the camera died. I'll try and scrounge some up and post them.

[Billy Golightly]

OK these pictures came out really terrible, I swear I gotta get a new camera sometime. Compare these, with what I had posted in here: http://3wheelerworldforums.com/showpost.php?p=466965&postcount=160

See that big chunk sticking up in the boyesen ports on the intake? That huge piece in the opening for the transfer tunnels? Ugh.

[SYKO]

HOLY F*CK! man! did a vietemese child sweatshop worker do that!?

[Mosh]

I will put them on the list along with CT racing.My brother in law had a real bad experience with them and their sleeve work.Sent a stock lt250r cylinder out to them,They said the sleeve was busted,Which was B..S.They must have dropped it off the bench or something.Anyhow it took 4 months and 775 bucks to get his jug back,and not to mention,Their so called porting was nothing great to speak of:banned:

[Louis Mielke]

Holy cow I could have gotten those ports closer with a tooth brush. I will NEVER send anything to LA sleeve.

[SpeedBump]

That thing outta RIP! LOL! Sorry...had to Billy. Lots of threats should be heading their way.
I know you got a pile of $$$ into it already, but how about this for a suggestion...can you take it to a local engine shop and have them match up the ports for you. The time involved for you may be worth a few more bones. Good luck.

[Bryan Raffa]

is that how much you hogged it out in the exhaust port.. gotta remember those are stock ports on that sleeve.. but still they could have done it nicer:wondering better do something I GOT the EDGE!:naughty:

[Jason Hall]

Wow thats a hard lesson learned. Never port (Drag port especially) If you plan on sleeving the cylinder. That really stinks, you have lots of grinding to do.

[icp4life162005]

The only way to get anywhere is to complain. maybe you can get it redone for free and a partial refund.

[BigGreenMachine]

Holy sh it dude..the pics aren't the best but you can see the wrist work out that your in for.

CT screwed me as well, year long wait and poor work.

[Billy Golightly]

Yeah raffa, I had the exhaust port wide no doubt and I'm not really complaining about it. The main thing is how screwed up the intake is, and the transfers-both the inlet tunnel and the outlet ports. I've got the one exhaust side and one transfer tunnel already roughly cut into shape. Lots and lots of touch up time with the dremel and file to be correct. I guess I'll just chalk this one up to experience....

[Bryan Raffa]

I guess I'll just chalk this one up to experience....

Thats what it takes to be GOOD! Just dont drop this one!:(

[TRITecate350]

The crappy things is, they probably had the sleeve sticking out the top about 1/4", which made the sleeve 1/4" higher than your transfers(big problem at hand). Then they just machined the top of the sleeve flush with the cylinder.... And all they had to do is machine the seat of the sleeve 1/4" deeper and it would have lined up fine. I could fix that for you by the way :)

[Billy Golightly]

You can fix the transfer height issue Corey? I'm thinking on just doing like I had mentioned above and zero angling it the full height of where it is now. It will make the transfer timing longer which I was trying to avoid but it beats trashing the cylinder I suppose. What do you suggest?

[TRITecate350]

You should be able to heat the cylinder and pull that sleeve out and buy another sleeve from LA Sleeve. Then lower the seat the sleeve sits in by 1/4 and your transfers should line up perfectly and then you could port match the sleeve and rebore your cylinder etc. This is what I would do. I also pmed you.

[Air-cooled-R]

I'm just not a cylinder wiz, but Ive torn into enough motors to know that is about a piss poor job, especially for a company as big as LA. Sucks you gotta deal with this crap man...

[Billy Golightly]

I just learned via a 3rd party that the 89+ sleeves are thicker then the 85-88 ones. Know what this means? My cylinder will not fit down in my center cases unless they are bored, or I lathe down the outside OD of the sleeve which is going to be very difficult to do correctly because of the port opening window. I am about seriously effed for the drag races this year.

[Louis Mielke]

BILLY! You got time! Split that bad boy down!!!! have the cases bored and ported why your at it. common! you can do it!

[Tecate250]

I have thrown away 6000$ almost away on my tecate 3 and 4. From crappy dealers. I sent my cylinder away to get bored and they bored it to the maximum on a brand new sleeve. And they charged me to match my ports and 90% was good and the other 10% was bad. I had to do it my self. I am sick of paying out good money for crap work. It sucks when parts have to be sent away. And billy beleve me the damage is done. So just wait till this post is about 50 pages long and everyone saying boycot La Sleve. Ill bet if wiseco did it, it would be a better product.

[Billy Golightly]

So let me get this straight. L.A. Sleeve resleeved his 500cc jug with a sleeve that needs machining to fit into the case. Made the deck height where the the transfer ports in the sleeve are higher then the ports in the cylinder. Left the intake and exhaust ports in the sleeve blocking off the cylinder ports?

Also Billy, in this pic below I noticed the auxiliary ports I think you call it on the bottom left and right in the intake port are higher then the ones on my 250r cylinder. Is this because its a different jug or is that custom work?

http://3wheelerworldforums.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=42257&d=1172634712


Pretty much.


Those bottom little ports are called Boyesen ports. Originally, they were in a whole separate chamber from the transfer tunnels. Normally, the way those are made is they flow into the bottom of the crankcase, and also connect to the transfer tunnels. The stock 500 had a good set up, keeping them separated because normally when they are connected you have adverse flow conditions. Think about it, the boyesens are flowing downwards, and the transfer tunnels are flowing upwards. They are working against themselves. The problem with how mine was originally, is that the boyesen ports were so small, they were about useless. I enlarged the outlet, and DID make it connect to where the transfer tunnels open. What I did do though, is you see in the intake at the top of where those ports start, its ramped down in such a way where the flow is not so much as going into the transfer tunnels cross wise, but going downwards, parallel next to it and not necessarily flowing directly into it. Know what I mean?

[Billy Golightly]

Your 250R cylinder is made a little different. If you look closely at where the rear studs come up through the cylinder, you'll notice the inside corners of the casting is kind of flatened out for a lack of a better term. The the way the boyesen ports are shaped on the Rs is, they kind of go towards the outside of the cylinder, and then back down pointing towards the crankcase. The 500 cylinder does not have that much material casted into it, to allow that kind of path.

In my last post I was referring to what you have marked in the second picture. On yours you can smooth out the bottom of the boyesen ports where it transitions in sort of a small ramp down and not such an abrupt drop off. You can work the tops of them where it angles down a little better. You could also I think, shape the bottoms of them into a little bit more of an L shape, similar to how mine are. Just be careful that you don't take out to much that you weaken the integrity of the cylinder....I really took to much out of my 500 cylinder and I'm worried about it cracking. Either way enlarging the boyesen ports is gonna help some but it won't be a night and day different with that alone.

[NOS_350X]

I have been getting HUGE power gains from just opening up the boysens and cleaning up the transfers. The bikes loose bottom end power, But for the most part the power delivery is simular to stock just alot more power there.

But porting i dont recomend on any 2 stroke unless you can see one thats done or you know exactly what your doing. There are water jackets in there and you hit one of those your buying a new jug. Its also very easy to really screw up 2 stroke motor by trying to port it and not know what your doing.

[carmen cafro]

I have a CR500 cylinder and head ported by Duncan. Pulls like a S.O.B. on top if you or anyone is interested (for cheap).