Quotes on the combo reamer I have gotten to date are relatively large $$ numbers like $280 plus shipping (six required to place an order).  So you can see why I am stalled on that path since until you DO it with the reamer you can never be sure if it will work out or not.

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It is possible using the blackening and scraping techniques covered here to hand fit the bearing journals.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJd8Zwd9L1k

http://www.smokstak.com/articles/babbitt.html

This requires very little money except for the plastigage kits you use to prove to yourself you really have gotten it right.  

It does require endless time and endless patience ....

.... endless  

.... endless  


I'll tell you about it when I finally get done.

Yes, if the teeth are tall enough to grind down far enough and still have some tooth there to do the 20mm cutting.  Six flute reamers might not have enough height, a deep cut 4 flute is what has been quoted before.

I will "prototype" the functionality of the general idea by hand dressing (scraping) the journals.  This will allow fit and function testing on reassembly for valve adjustment, clearance, tappet clearance etc.

If it all works OK, then maybe somebody will front a reamer to be passed around as needed.

Yep, add flute filling heavy grease to your thought and you have it.  The grease provides new cutting lubricant each time you nudge the bolts down a tiny bit and give it yet another twist.

You could never 'feed it in end wise " accurately enough, wobble would kill you as the sharp reamer would remove the wobble material as it occurred.  

You will have enough fun being light handed enough with the bolts to be able to take the very light shavings you need to take to keep everything under control when simply rotating the reamer in place.

PROVIDED YOU HAVE A REPEATABLE REASONABLY ACCURATE SET OF HOLLOW LOCATOR DOWELS, YOU SHOULD BE ABLE TO RE-MATCH A SET OF MISMATCHED HEADS AND COVERS USING THE COMBO REAMER TRICK.

Factory max air gap spec is two and a half thou so you should be able to dress in that much mismatch and not even exceed factory specs.  I suspect many of us run twice that much air gap due to simple wear on our older bike's well worn journals and don't even notice it.

Here is a trick or point to consider.  The wear on the 3 bottom head journal portions is all in line with each other -- it might look nasty but it is tight to the mating cam journals and it is in line with each other.  Just clean it up carefully with 320 grit wet or dry on your finger tip to remove all the debris and wear oxides.  

Then just lower the cover's half moon journals by selectively flat sanding the entire face of the cover and keeping careful track of the air gap using plastigage.   This allows a careful "scraping hand" to refit the cover to the head to the cam shaft journals without an expensive reamer.

The reamer would make it a whole lot quicker though, fer shure.