Greetings from Croatia! The bearing of the final drive has already been badly damaged, it is in the disintegration phase! You have waited too long, because now there is damage to other vital parts inside the drive housing. It's almost impossible to fix with a few common household tools. You can no longer drive at all. How many miles did you put on that engine, how was the maintenance?
Cheers. The bike has 120k km on it.
I was able to buy a replace rear hub of a used bike with about half the mileage of mine. I found this on ebay. It feels better and tighter and rotates smoother. Which was good to see as it meant I wasn't being crazy. I fitted it yesterday and it seem to be perfect (other than possibly a minor leak from the wheel speed sensor, which was due to the small torex bolt rounding off during assembly. I'll have to extract that bolt and replace it this week) The newer unit I replaced it with has some cosmetic issues with paint that peeled off and so looks a little rough, but I've no issues with that.
Here's a couple of photos. The driveshaft and hub was the old one being replaced. I had lubed the splines a few months ago, but didn't pick up on the bearing issues at that time.
(newer hub on the bottom before I switched them)
Re: maintainance. I bought the bike 3 years ago on 100k km and have taken it to 120k.
I can't know the history before me. But the dash is listed in MPH which means it was a UK import into Ireland. UK roads are salted in winter whereas Irish roads are not. So UK bikes often have a little more corrosion. I see some corrosion and paint issues on some of the metal parts on my bike.
I've had minor battery drainage issues when the bike is left idle. I put in an odyssey battery, which probably helps, but still the battery drains if left idle for about 10 days or more. I manage this issue by either plugging it in to a trickle charger or keeping a jump starter handy. Or just taking it for a spin more often than every ten days! I won't bother fixing what I think may be a battery drain as I manage it just fine now.
I've been doing oil and oil filter about each year or slightly longer. I notice some slight oil consumption and get a warning on the dash roughly every 2k and just topup when necessary.
I put a set of tyres on it when the bike was at 106km's (2 years ago) and these tyres are still looking and feeling very good (Michelin Road 6 GT).
I noticed a slight missfire off idle a handful of times and replaced the 4 spark plugs recently. The old plugs had a good bit of wear on them and needed replacement and it runs better off idle now. The rubber handgrips were worn after nearly 20 years and 120km of use, so I just replaced them. I just did the rear brake pads while I was replacing the hub yesterday too.
Both bulbs on the front needed to be replaced in the first month or two of ownership.
I've never done or even seen the air filter on it. It may be close to time to inspect that?
The slow failure of the bearing in the rear hub is acceptable after 120km. This has been an excellent bike and has been very reliable for me. I would like to upgrade to a watercooled RT with lower mileage in the next couple of years. I tested the new gs1300. It's a great bike, but on getting back on my 20 year old RT I definitely didn't think the new gs1300 was worth the 10x increase in cost! Not that I'd have 30k+ lying around!
I've had a good few bikes over the years. Among them, Honda's vfr400, vfr800 fi, pan st1100 x2 (I like the V4's), BMW 1150GSA, k1200gt x2, k75 (old). The RT fits in very well with that company and is among my favourite. I took my 1150GSA all around Europe and crossed through your country of Croatia 15 years ago. I'm looking forward to going back there on an RT in the future. A stunning motorbike country, as are your neighbouring countries of Montenegro, Albania, and Slovenia to the north!
