cranking the engine by hand

[WAP]

How exactly does one go about doing this? I'm assuming you take off the right hand side crank case, and turn the rotor by hand? Right?

[JohnNS]

You can do it by setting the bike on the centrestand, putting it in gear (the higher the easier...meaning it's a lot easier to do it in 6th gear as opposed to 1st) and turning the rear wheel by hand. Just make sure you've got the kill switch on to avoid any accidental freak of nature start ups.  

[tkm433]

How exactly does one go about doing this? I'm assuming you take off the right hand side crank case, and turn the rotor by hand? Right?

My first question would be why do you want to crank it by hand?

If you are wanting to turn the crank so that it will move the camsso that you can adjust the valves then you can do so by removing the spark plugs which will allow for you to turn the crank without compression.

Put the bike on its center stand and put it in gear and you will be able turn the motor by moving the back wheel.  This will only work with ease if the plugs are out.

[KevinC]

Or you can use a 19 mm wrench on the ignition rotor behind the round cover on the right. Do not turn the engine with the 10 mm bolt that hold the rotor on.

You should only turn the engine forwards (clockwise on the 19 mm hex). I can't remmebr why right now, but there is a good reason. A little backwards doesn't hurt, but for cam timing you have to always approach in the forward direction so the slack is on the right side of the cam chain.