XJ600 Burning Oil

[Herbalrick]

I have a 1998 XJ600 with 17000 miles on it. I started the bike as normal today, there was a little smoke as it started as per usual but this usually goes once it warms up.

I was then horrified when the car behind me started honking while I was at a set of traffic lights. I looked round and there was large amounts of smoke coming from my exhausts. I pulled over and my oil level has reduced to around 1/2 full.

Any ideas?

[el_oso]

piston rings
valve seals

mine was doing exactly the same. smoky on start up. but went away after 20-30 seconds. replaced the seals but haven't got everything back together as of yet.

have you lost compression? or does it still accelerate like normal. if it still seems normal acceleration then it is probably your valve seals. not really that hard of a job if you have a fairly decent set of tools. you will need a valve spring compressor to make life easier for yourself. that being said i did use a spark plug socket and a magnet to get the collets out which was fairly easy. getting the collets back in this was was a right pain in the arse. i needed two people to do it.
easier way of doing it would be to take the head off and take the head to a dealer. should only take half an hour to and hour with proper tools.

if you do it yourself make sure you are extremely careful not to drop anything into the crank because im having a real tough time trying to the fvcking thing out
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