We had a bright sunny day in the Midlands and Alena told me to b*gger off on the bike for a few hours
I think she's got fed up with having me around the house since breaking up for Christmas so of course I did as I was bid
The last time I had chance to use the GS was when I used it to go to the NEC bike show so a good few weeks ago. The first thing I noticed was the salt encrusted on it so I made a mental note to give it a wash when I returned. I set off and hit a problem when I couldn't shift from 2nd to 3rd. I pulled in and after a few minutes of revving, clutching and levering I managed to get it to select all of the gears. At first I thought the problem might be down to the gearbox oil being very thick due to the recent cold spell but as I continued I realised that I couldn't drop down the box - it was as if the gear lever was not returning back to the "home" position after being pressed down.
I took it home and after an inspection I could see that the lever upward return action was very "lazy" and indeed it was not returning to the normal position; I suspected that the problem was in the area where the lever pivots on the footpeg hanger. I disconnected the top ball socket linkage and sure enough the pivot was very stiff. I decided to remove the lever and grease/lube up the pivot. The first problem is that you have to access the pivot hex head bolt from the back of the footrest hanger. I managed to get a hex bit into it and went to the other side of the bike and managed to fit a socket and extension bar onto the hex bit and get my ratchet onto it. Would it shift? would it b*ggery, so I put an extension bar onto the ratchet to give me more leverage and after jamming the gear lever I managed to get the bolt to move about an eighth or quarter turn. Fortunately this was enough to loosen the gear lever up as it should be. I squirted some lubricating oil into the pivot, greased up the ball sockets and it all seems ok now.
I am concerned with a couple of things though -
1. What caused the tightening up in the first place, is it just a case of the pivot becoming "dry" through use or is it something else?
2. Should the pivot retaining bolt be as tight as it is? The hex bit slipped out a couple of times and has "chewed" up the hex bolt hole a little. It took a lot of effort to get it to move a little and when it did move and freed up the lever I abandoned my idea of removing the pivot completely as I was worried that I might chew the bolt up completely or shear it?
Anybody else had this problem or know of it?
The bike is an 01 1150 with 25k on the clock.
I think she's got fed up with having me around the house since breaking up for Christmas so of course I did as I was bidThe last time I had chance to use the GS was when I used it to go to the NEC bike show so a good few weeks ago. The first thing I noticed was the salt encrusted on it so I made a mental note to give it a wash when I returned. I set off and hit a problem when I couldn't shift from 2nd to 3rd. I pulled in and after a few minutes of revving, clutching and levering I managed to get it to select all of the gears. At first I thought the problem might be down to the gearbox oil being very thick due to the recent cold spell but as I continued I realised that I couldn't drop down the box - it was as if the gear lever was not returning back to the "home" position after being pressed down.
I took it home and after an inspection I could see that the lever upward return action was very "lazy" and indeed it was not returning to the normal position; I suspected that the problem was in the area where the lever pivots on the footpeg hanger. I disconnected the top ball socket linkage and sure enough the pivot was very stiff. I decided to remove the lever and grease/lube up the pivot. The first problem is that you have to access the pivot hex head bolt from the back of the footrest hanger. I managed to get a hex bit into it and went to the other side of the bike and managed to fit a socket and extension bar onto the hex bit and get my ratchet onto it. Would it shift? would it b*ggery, so I put an extension bar onto the ratchet to give me more leverage and after jamming the gear lever I managed to get the bolt to move about an eighth or quarter turn. Fortunately this was enough to loosen the gear lever up as it should be. I squirted some lubricating oil into the pivot, greased up the ball sockets and it all seems ok now.
I am concerned with a couple of things though -
1. What caused the tightening up in the first place, is it just a case of the pivot becoming "dry" through use or is it something else?
2. Should the pivot retaining bolt be as tight as it is? The hex bit slipped out a couple of times and has "chewed" up the hex bolt hole a little. It took a lot of effort to get it to move a little and when it did move and freed up the lever I abandoned my idea of removing the pivot completely as I was worried that I might chew the bolt up completely or shear it?
Anybody else had this problem or know of it?
The bike is an 01 1150 with 25k on the clock.
