Bent Shift Fork

I took my bike into the dealer for what I thought may be the 2nd gear engagement dogs. They did a test ride and think based on how it is behaving that it is only the shift forks and not the engagement dogs....yet. They said the engagement dogs are sure to go soon, and may be well on their way already.

Anyhow, my bike is out of warranty and he said Yamaha said they "may" consider assistance with parts, but in order for me to know whether or not they will help, I have to commit to $2000+ in repair bills. I don't have $2000+ to repair a two year old bike that has less than 12,000 miles on it. I am none too pleased either at the prospect of having to do so. I came from a Suzuki Bandit that cost just over half of what my FJR did. In four years, no issues, and I rode the piss out of it. I get an FJR, ride it respectably, and am now faced with the potential of having to sell it.

As far as NAFO is concerned, I have over $800 invested in it, and it too may be a waste since I may not have a bike at that point.

I'm pissed. I'm depressed. I'm angry. I'm frustrated. And I'm at a complete loss of what to do.

Wow, dude....how can you be 800 clams invested into it? By my count the rally fee and hotel expenses combine to about 455. Sucks about the shifter forks, too......on an 06? Sheesh.

edit:.....if you want to beat something up I can send you one of my blow up dolls.......just clean it up when yer done with it, eh?

Second Opinion????? I have an 06 with 35000 miles, not all of which have been respectful. No Problems at all.

Trailer it to smitty or radman? :dntknw:

Shitty mang, hope you figure out a plan...

odot said:

Wow, dude....how can you be 800 clams invested into it? By my count the rally fee and hotel expenses combine to about 455. Sucks about the shifter forks, too......on an 06? Sheesh.

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Two rally fees (wife and I), hotel at location, hotels along the way, airfare for my wife to get there, rental car for her to get from airport to hotel, etc, etc, etc. In fact, in looking at total costs, I'm actually $950 invested and that doesn't include intended post NAFO ride or gas.

Someone up in the Great North Wet surely has the mechanical skills to help you out, Scott. I would think that with all of your community contributions here that your good karma is due a payback...

Anyone? Bueller? Someone step up and help a brudda out...

What's all this BS about selling the bike? You know there is a problem with it. Selling it broken isn't going to get you top dollar, and trying to sell it w/o the new owner discovering the problem until after the sale isn't kosher.

NAFO is in July. Stop screwing around and start taking it apart. If you don't have a manual, get one. If you don't have tools, buy some. If you don't have skills, bulls***, it's just nuts, bolts and time.

I get that you're pissed and frustrated. Now take the next step. It starts with the allen wrenches.

Speaking of someone in the area with the proper skills...

ponyfool said:

<snip>....it is only the shift forks and not the engagement dogs....yet. They said the engagement dogs are sure to go soon, and may be well on their way already.

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True -- slipping, jumping out of gear rounds the dogs (both male & female). And, it's such an involved process to get there -- replacing anything that's worn seems self-evident.

....Yamaha said they "may" consider assistance with parts, but in order for me to know whether or not they will help, I have to commit to $2000+ in repair bills.

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I have seen this work -- dealer comes to your aid and says it looks like faulty components, etc. No-one really knows what's wrong 'till they get in there.

Whatever, I'm with 'OCfjr' on this -- one way or another, it's gotta be done. I'd recco talking with your dealer/serv.mgr. a little more to try to get a sense of the probability of some warranty (good-will, or otherwise). Your level of commitment says alot.

I can tell you that motorcycles jumping out of second gear has been around for a long time and that manufacturers, generally, contribute that to abuse (they know how things work). But.... your dealer can be a strong ally, here -- talk it over, work with them.

twowheelnut said:

Speaking of someone in the area with the proper skills...

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PM sent and one received.

OCfjr said:

twowheelnut said:

Speaking of someone in the area with the proper skills...

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PM sent and one received.

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Sweet! :good:

Does the service manual go into great detail on this procedure?

ponyfool said:

Does the service manual go into great detail on this procedure?

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Ping my your addy. I'll send you mine to borrow.

Edit - scratch that. Model year conflict unless the procedure/specs are the same.

Just a thought, but you might be able to work something out with the dealer so that you can remove the tupperware and do a great deal of the disassembly yourself. I have not looked at the service manual to see exactly what's involved in the tranny work, but I'm betting there's a lot of "overhead" labor that could be done with limited mechanical skills, saving the actual transmission work for the dealer and keeping it's outcome his responsibility.

If you were anywhere near my side of the rock, I would help you! Hang in there. It's just parts!

I have a Gen II Service manual I'll loan if it will help.

Git-r-dun and take lots of pics in the process.

ponyfool said:

Does the service manual go into great detail on this procedure?

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It goes into great detail on everything. Seriously though, pull the seats, tank, T-bar, cans, 02 sensor, header, side panels, drain the coolant, pull the radiator, air filter box, throttle bodies, drain the oil, pull the side stand assy, misc. hoses, wires, cables, (probably the rear wheel and drive shaft), drop the engine and then it gets fun.

It's not a simple job. Once you have the engine out, separate the crank case and you might be able to remove the long shift fork guide bar and the shift forks w/o further disassembly. Not positive, haven't been there before.

The Yamaha manual is one of those that covers the area in detail and refers to other areas of the manual for the things you need to do to get to the area you're working on or for more intimate details of that area.

I.E.

Removing the transmission, shift drum assembly, and shift forks

Crankcase ----- Separate,

------------------ Refer to "CRANKCASE"

1 Drive axle assy

2 Bearing

3 Washer

4 Shift drum retainer

5 Long shift fork guide bar } Refer to "INSTALLING THE TRANSMISSION"

6 Shift fork "L"

7 Shift fork "R"

8 Short shift fork guide bar

9 Spring

It continues on. Then there are pages detailing how to check the parts and allowable run out. They specifically detail checking the shift forks & guide bars for wear, damage and bends as well as the gear dogs and have pictures showing what to look for in wear & damage.

Sorry to hear the bad news Pony. Regrettably, I have some idea how you feel. Most of the expense and most of the work is in getting to the problem area. Short of doing the whole job yourself the least expensive way out is to deliver the engine to the dealer on a pallet. The most expensive way out is to drop the whole motorcycle at the dealer. Unfortunately the engine case has to be split to access the transmission. Once inside the engine the labor and parts will be fairly inexpensive.

The dealer may be able to help you. Right now the Yamaha rep is telling me that, “It would be unfair to all the people that purchased YES if they were to cover my grenaded engine, even if my problem is not a normal failure.”

(Does the fellow you loaned your bike to feel up to contributing to the project?)

It is a tough call to make -- repair, sell, burn stall on the railroad tracks with a train coming...

Based upon the amount of disassembly and resulting reassembly required for this repair and the general dealer quality repair feedback that we see.

I'd put your chances of getting the work done to your satisfaction at less than 10%.

That being the case; I'd seriously consider doing this myself or at the very least stripping the bike down as far as I could and delivering the bare machine to the dealer.

I am pretty good with a wrench in that I know what's what, and know my way around the terminology, etc. But mostly I call myself good because I know when I don't know what I'm doing and seek advice when I'm at that point. I've taken out, and completely rebuilt a Chevy 350 engine before including crank, pistons, rods, cams, valves, etc, so I have some experience, just not on a bike.

I appreciate the offers of a service manual. I took Hal up on his since I saw his PM before I read the posts. I figure I'll try to do the work myself, and if all else fails, I'll simply deliver the engine on a pallet to a qualified mechanic (note, I did not say dealer).