Yes RT325, the screw that was loose was a long case screw behind the stator plate. If you look at the picture I posted earlier look closely at the left side, and you can see it sticking out. The two short stator screws were super tight, that's why I had a problem getting them out.

You're also right that loose case screw could have been causing some of the air leak or sucking oil, but I never would have found it if I hadn't taken the case sides off. I may have had several leaks going on with this old bike.

The interesting thing is this engine only has 340 miles on it. I can't imagine how that case screw could have come loose during only 340 miles. This engine has never been worked on, so that was a factory issue.

Oh, just had a look. The screw that it is--it's probably not having any affect on the case around the rear half of the crank area. Never seen that before though on an untouched motor from new.

You're probably right, that loose screw probably didn't have any effect on the main issues, but I'm pretty sure it was causing the rattling noise I was hearing. By the way there was one other problem... the wiring harness that goes to the stator has a round rubber piece that's supposed to fit into a round recess in the case. It holds the harness securely so it won't rub against the case. It wasn't in that recess, it was inside the case, so the wires were able to touch the sharp edges of the case. Because of the low mileage on this bike, there was no damage, but I'll put it back correctly when I put this all together. 

Yesterday I cleaned up the cases, and buffed them up as well as I could by hand, and using rubbing compound and wax with a drill wheel. They were looking pretty "roached", so this is a vast Improvement. I almost don't want to buff them out too much, because I'm not going to do a full restore this bike right now. Even though it has rust on all the painted surfaces, I was planning  to keep it all original. As those cases look now, I think they'll look good with the rest of the bike. They still have some nice patina.

Gauges get swapped and many were removed from bikes for years and years...  so mileage is not always accurate.  

Hope it is though!  

This bike was stored by my parents, so the gauges are original, as is everything on it. Unfortunately it wasn't stored in a climate-controlled area, and very close to the beach, hence all of the rust. Good point though, most bikes where you don't know the provenance may have replaced gauges.

Tom P you and I are walking down the same path and we are doing the exact same bikes. It kills me to leave all the bits and pieces with their chips and scratches, but I too want to keep this one original. So I am tearing it down and cleaning it as best I can, and it will be reassembled with all the patina of a bike that appears to have led a pretty rough life doing exactly what it was made to do! Today I just replaced 8 spokes that were either broken, or badly bent and poorly straightened. I ended up buying a whole rear wheel on eBay because it was cheaper than buying individual bulk packages of right and left side, inner and outers. And now I have plenty to spare! The only change I am making is the exhaust. I have two choices of expansion chambers that fit this CT1. A Hooker and a Strader Engineering.
 

Schu, the one I rode back in the day I had a Hooker expansion chamber on. By the way, I'll bet mine's a lot more rusty than yours is, but frankly I don't think it looks that bad. As long as I can get it mechanically sound, I'm going to be good with that. Luckily all the spokes seem to be fine, just need to be cleaned up some.

By the way, I finally pulled the crankshaft seals out, and they were WAY past their due date. Interestingly, the spring side was out on both of them, but in reading previously I thought they were supposed to be pushed in with the spring inward?

 

I thought they were spring loaded both sides on that seal. Do you know its history to new as is sure does have me wondering if its been apart before. Sorry i'll go right back & read.

I looked at the seals again... actually the one from the clutch side is spring loaded on both sides, the one on the flywheel side is only spring loaded on one side, and it was placed with the spring side inward.

Looking under a magnifying glass, stretching the rubber and seeing how it has all kinds of tiny cracks, if you have a 40 or 50 year old Enduro, you want to change the seals ASAP.

Use a 77-79 IT175 seal on the ignition side...  proper dual lip seal...  much better....  crank seals need to seal both vacuum and pressure.