Does anyone do this? I figure to get the exact clearance I can sand it and use calipers to verify it's correct. Plus you don't have to buy new shims.

It's pretty common in the Duc world.  a piece of glass to place the shim on, some 400grit for taking material off and 600grit to smooth it down.

Let us know how it works -- I've always heard they were hardened.  Sanding might take a while...

Kerry tried it, he said he spent of lot of time to get nowhere.

Pony up the 5 bucks at order them up at cycle-re-cycle

Considering I'm so busy now between school and work it looks like gasp! I may have to drop her off at a mechanic. Good thing I know of a reputable one near me that charges a reasonable amount. $150 which is less than half what the dealer wanted.

No sanding ... run it loose if you have to and adjust a few 1000 later.
Cool.
Buddha.

The dealer here will trade shims if I'm doing the servicing myself. The bad news is their mechanic is a bit of a prick and makes me wait hours to do the swap. Last time he didn't have the size I needed and waited until the end of the day to tell me. Fortunately, another shop in town who used to sell Suzuki had one, but they charged me $17 with the swap. So ask around various shops and see if they'll swap shims. Just be sure to get the same size/shape. GS500's are 29 mm, but some that size have rounded egdes and I've  been cautioned by a Suzuki mechanic not to use the round edged ones or they could pop out of the bucket and that would be a disaster.

They are hardened, so sanding could take some time - if it works at all - and I'd only sand one side. The challenge will be keeping the sanding even so the thickness is not uneven. I think that would cause extra wear on the cams. Overall, I wouildn't recommend it.

I think the $150 charge is reasonable if you trust him, and if he's a good guy and has a shim kit, maybe he'll swap you if you want to do the work yourself. Bribing with beer works with most mechanics . . . 

Quote from: bval on April 11, 2008, 10:40:37 AM
The dealer here will trade shims if I'm doing the servicing myself. The bad news is their mechanic is a bit of a prick and makes me wait hours to do the swap. Last time he didn't have the size I needed and waited until the end of the day to tell me. Fortunately, another shop in town who used to sell Suzuki had one, but they charged me $17 with the swap. So ask around various shops and see if they'll swap shims. Just be sure to get the same size/shape. GS500's are 29 mm, but some that size have rounded egdes and I've  been cautioned by a Suzuki mechanic not to use the round edged ones or they could pop out of the bucket and that would be a disaster.

They are hardened, so sanding could take some time - if it works at all - and I'd only sand one side. The challenge will be keeping the sanding even so the thickness is not uneven. I think that would cause extra wear on the cams. Overall, I wouildn't recommend it.

I think the $150 charge is reasonable if you trust him, and if he's a good guy and has a shim kit, maybe he'll swap you if you want to do the work yourself. Bribing with beer works with most mechanics . . . 

Its 29.5 mm and bevelled edges aren't bad, shim cant fly out unless you float the valves.
Cool.
Buddha.

forget sanding, either get it to a machine shop with a little surface grinder or just buy/swap the shims.

surface grinder (with a competent operator) = 25-30 seconds to dress, touch off, grind, and finish off, clean up.

if you're a nice guy, and they're nice guys they might even grind 5-10 shims out of hardened scrap a-2 or 0-1, if they're generous they'll even let you have some D-2 (pricey!).

it's easiest to just swap out shims with someone though, provided they aren't a prick

Oops . . . Budda's right about the 29.5mm . . . I don't have my service manual in front of me, but I remembered them being 29mm anyway. You should always use a caliper to match them in width and double-check the thickness regardless . . . never assume!

Not sure the mechanic was talking about "bevelled" edges - I think he was referring to ones that are more obviously rounded the way he described it. But I haven't seen anything other than square or slightly bevelled to date, The bevel I'm talking about is so slight you'd have to look closely to see it's not a sharp edge. I think it's to help get the tweezers underneath it to lift it out. I'd go with either of those but avoid anything the same size with obviously rounded edges. I have used slightly bevelled ones myself and prefer those for the above reason.

I lucked out that a guy four houses down, (who's a bit of a local mechanical legend), happens to have a full factory Suzuki shim kit with valve depressor, tweezers, the whole shebang. He had a mix of square and bevelled edge shims and I'd agree with Budda, the bevelled ones are fine.