Honda Spree and Elite 50 Forums

Well I've been dying to go riding with my friend who owns an '87 spree. He went to replace the piston and broke the rings. So he ordered a new set from Honda. They finally came in today. He went to put them on and broke them....AGAIN! Any advice would be great help as I'm sure he doesn't want to keep dropping $30 and my Honda Pal is dying for a friend.

Lube the piston up real good, start the ring and carefully slip it on.

Make sure the the ring ends line up with the pins in piston in the ring lands first.

Greetings:

Few people know - or maybe it's just me finding out so late in life- that the whole Honda empire was built around Soichiro Honda's Better Idea for piston rings. Honda-san was a metallurgist and perfected this hard, long-wearing material that held compression and just flat worked better than anything else in its day.

Unfortunately the hardness of the alloy makes it brittle and ham-fisted installation methods lead to the breakage you described all too easily.

The Manual describes spreading the rings carefully from the gap side. I use my thumbnails. Line it up over the tiny anti-rotation pin in the ring land. Spread it open just enough to clear the ring lands' edges.

Pop the first ring's gap into the top groove, then walk the far side over the piston. Repeat to drop it into the second - bottom- groove.

Better yet, take the slug and rings to any friendly dealer or indy, watch and learn.

Don't feel bad I've broken a few myself to tell the truth.

In the last 35 years I have only broked rings taking old ones off, never putting new ones on.

Only time I have broke a ring was pulling one off a leafblower piston that was run on straight gas. The ring groove was kinda screwed up.

same here but i have broke old ones putting the jug back on before lol

In case you missed it

Pop the first ring's gap into the top groove, then walk the far side over the piston. Repeat to drop it into the second - bottom- groove.

I bet your friend is trying to get bottom ring to second groove in one shot. Thanks for the help bear!

I always install the lower ring first. Then you only have to clear the piston diameter with both rings.

i got a good question here any one got a pic to show if the rings are upside down or not?

Look at the alignment pins, they will only go over the pins one way. If I had a camera worth a s*** i would take a pic to explain.

then how come some people get them on upside down

Thats why some people break a lot, they dont pay attention to close mechanical details.

i looked at a piston and seen just what your talking about

NESticle wrote:Well I've been dying to go riding with my friend who owns an '87 spree. He went to replace the piston and broke the rings. So he ordered a new set from Honda. They finally came in today. He went to put them on and broke them....AGAIN! Any advice would be great help as I'm sure he doesn't want to keep dropping $30 and my Honda Pal is dying for a friend.

Broke them twice? At least he's buying

Here's a thought. Take the piston (or bike) to the dealer next time, and tell the service manager you've broken the last 2 sets of rings you've bought there. He may take pity on you and install them for you.