Alright, some of you experienced Kawi guys on here, maybe you can shed some light on a 30+ year old question. I bought a great condition 79 440 Invader in the fall of 1981 and still own it. It has never run better and we finally got SNOW this year in Indiana...60 inches and counting at Lafayette, In. I know that's just a dusting to some of you fortunate folks that live in the "Great White North", but it's more that we have had in a long time. I had the good sense to get a factory service manual right after I bought the sled, and it has been invaluable over the years. Sometime, maybe the 2nd or 3rd summer I owned it, I went through the Invader from top to bottom. I noticed both cylinders had "340" cast near the bottom of the cylinder. I about croaked. But the tunnel tag clearly showed a 440. I'm at work, so I can't recall the exact #s as they appear. I think the serial # is 012240. The engine tag near the recoil clearly shows TC440-2A (or something close to that). I layed a metric rule on the cylinder bore and it is definitely 68 mm, not 60. Cylinders appeared stock with no polishing or port work. Didn't worry about until 2010, the most recent year I tore everything down for a complete inspection, including new crank seals. With the info on this site, I will pull the gear off the crank myself in the future, but then I took it to a nearby motorcycle shop (knew the guy) and had him pull the gear and install new seal on that end. I didn't want to ruin an expensive crank. In a weak moment he talked me into buying 1 of his buddies Invaders that had been sitting in a barn for years. I agreed for 50 bucks. Couple days later I went back to pick up crank, and there sat an Invader....no hood, no seat, skis looked like they had run high speed through a rock quarry for a 1000 miles. Only 1700 miles on the clock. Actually got LOTS of good parts from this sled..well worth 50 bucks. One cylinder in particular was virtually perfect, chrome bore looked brand new. Couldn't help but notice that both of these cylinders had "440" in the casting at the bottom. I cannot see any difference between these and the original ones in my sled. I have since sold the tunnel, but the serial # was a few hundred higher than mine. The 1 cylinder from the parts sled is now on my motor on the PTO end. I had seized the PTO piston a couple times many years ago (both entirely my fault) and the original PTO end cylinder had some minor scratching, hence the switch to the 1 from the parts sled. So now mag cylinder says "340" and PTO cylinder says "440". That should make for an interesting topic when I open the hood at a pit stop. I'll just tell them that was the only way I could ever get it to run smoothly....340 on 1 side and 440 on the other!! But,seriously, I suppose Kawasaki had thousands of cylinder castings and maybe some that were marked "340" were machined to 440 spec. Any of you have any other ideas? I'm not worried about it because the dang Invader has run just perfectly all winter (knock on wood)...with 440 pistons on both sides! Just curious.
Topic: 79 Invader cylinders---340? 440? (Read 9680 times)