97 gsx rebuild project started today

[bigler]

Bought a clapped out 97 gsx for a project For $500. It had good compression and I got it to start right away, I figured I would take it apart and go through everything though because The seller said the engine was shot. After pulling the engine out of the ski, I find the case is missing a lot of case haha. How do you think this happened? Pistons were a little scored but otherwise this appears to be the main problem. Going to do a full teardown and rebuild, I already bought a new case for it.

 

[JC-SUPERJET]

Air-cooled Counter Balance Shaft...

 

[burtshaver2021]

Just following along

 

[Charlie_gtx]

the countershaft bearing failed. It has a reservoir for oil, maybe it was empty?

 

[mikidymac]

the countershaft bearing failed. It has a reservoir for oil, maybe it was empty?

No, that is the front one that is sealed, only the rear one is oil fed.
But yes, it failed and was just a time related thing.

 

[bigler]

Waiting on my flywheel puller to arrive then ill open the rest up and see what's salvageable. Hoping I can rebuild the counter balance shaft to save some bucks.

 

[bigler]

I might need to clean up the bilge a bit also

 

[mikidymac]

I would pull the pump, that should have been done before removing the engine and will have to be done to align it.

 

[bigler]

My pump is pulled, I'm going to have to align the engine somehow when I'm all done with the engine, anyone local in twin cities mn have the alignment tool and want to borrow it out? A case of beer might be in your future if so!

 

[bigler]

Here's the majority of the engine I've found in the hull so far, you can see the bearing that failed on the counter balance Shaft causing the badass failure. The ball bearings also shot into the flywheel housing and shrapneled the stator and pickup which explains why I lost spark

 

[bigler]

is anyone here familiar with the flywheels on these? I think my PN is 290966442 according to the parts manual. it looks like there are two types of flywheels for these that are different but everything im seeing says both types work. mine has a 2nd set of teeth on the cog that point to the front of the ski along with the teeth that go on the starter. im finding more flywheels with just the one set of teeth for the starter. are those safe to slap in here?