I installed new shims on the bike. afterwards, I double checked the valve clearance, and everything was well. I put the bike together, fire it up, and it does not start. It has spark and gas. I haven't done a compression test yet.

My question is...when I put the cams back: with the side thingy indexed at the 'T' marker, the cams should look like this right?

 

it could be a possibility that you are 360 degrees off on the crank shaft im thinking.
if manually turning it produces spark you maybe could check, and see if the intake valve opened just before or if it was the exhaust.
actually i would imagine the plugs would fire after every compression.
hell it has 4 strokes so i have no idea, i ran into the same problem and i've gotten to the conclusion of this.

 

so just turn it 360 and reset the cams? i hope i didn't bend anything..

 

The crank can't be 360 off. Do you have it all back together? You say you have fuel...are you testing pressure or injector pulse and operation?

 

service manual says make cylinder 1 is at Top Dead Center of compression...but how would i know if it's top dead center?

 

Put a screwdriver, or cut a coat hanger in the plug hole. As you roll the motor over, you will see when it gets to the top. Find the point where it stops moving up and starts moving down. Split the difference, that's true TDC.

 

cool. thanks. i'll take it a part again and see

 

sorry, just trying to help, i figured the camshaft's turn at half rpm's as the crankshaft.
so one rotation on the crankshaft is half a rotation for the camshafts. which i guess if it was the wrong placement that it would matter.
i must be looking at things way outside the box.

 

All suggestions are welcome! If you are ever wrong about a suggestion, you will learn something when you are corrected.

Your correct about cam rotation being half of the crank. The crank turns twice each cycle while the cam turns once. Every 180 crank rotation, leaves 2 pistons up. 1&4 and 2&3. The cam position determines which stroke it's on. one will be on compression while the other will be between exhaust and intake stroke. The crank doesn't know the difference. In fact, some engines will fire spark when ever the piston is up, one fires while the other just sparks.

You should see how Harleys work. It's amazing that the even stay running. 2 cylinders on the same stroke at the same time. They fire both cylinders then nothing the next revolution. In a sense, they stall every other rotation! Wacky...Thank god for big flywheels.

 

did you figure it out? please share im stuck in the same situation on my tappet valve single camshaft vulcan 500