Possible transmission problems or?

Hi all,

I'm fairly mechanically inclined, but with transmissions i'm a total noob.

I think it might be a clutch issue, but let me know what you think.

The facts.

1. What gear does it happen in? 3rd or 4th

2. Any other gears? Nope

3. Main speed? Doesn't matter just has to be under heavy acceleration.

4. What happens?

1a. Be in 3rd or 4th and a higher RPM (say around 3K)

2a. WOT

3a. Feel the power of the back take off

4a. Feel like the clutch has let go

5a. Hear a hard metal sound and the bike takes off again

It's really hard to describe, but it's reproducible every time under the above conditions.

I'll go WOT and then it's like the clutch lets go and catches. All one quick motion. Maybe half a second?

I intend on a clutch soak this weekend (hopefully not a clutch replacement).

I'm not sure how the previous owner rode.

I ride moderately aggressive, but i'm not hurting anything.

1b. Car is manual

2b. Road many bikes

Never ruined a clutch yet (except when I was first learning and burnt one out in a year).

grumpypoo said:

3a. Feel the power of the back take off

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Bike*

It's almost like I left off the throttle completely and then crank it back WOT.

I believe surging is the correct terminology here.

grumpypoo said:

2b. Road many bikes

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Rode*

Anyways another way to describe it and this may very well be the issue.

It's like 3rd and or 4th gear pops out then back in.

I did notice whenever I decelerate hard in 1st gear using the engine it will pop it to neutral.

This does not happen all the time, but it happens around 4K-5K RPMs on deceleration.

Couple of possibilities.

The worst one is that the gear dogs are worn due to a bent shift fork. That requires engine removal, splitting the cases and gear replacement as well as the shift forks that allowed it to happen. This symptom usually happens to the 2nd Gear dogs, but it could happen to any. If you search around the forum a bit you'll find several accounts of that problem and eventual repair. It isn't for the weak of heart.

If it were my bike and I could live with it as is, that;s what I would do and not run it WFO in 3rd and 4th gears. When, or if it progresses to the point that just "brisk" acceleration causes it to happen, then it would be time to dig into it.

The other possibility is that it is just some sort of an engine misfire. I would want to exhaust all possibility of that being what's happening before I declared it a gearbox issue.

Fred W said:

The worst one is that the gear dogs are worn due to a bent shift fork. That requires engine removal, splitting the cases and gear replacement as well as the shift forks that allowed it to happen. This symptom usually happens to the 2nd Gear dogs, but it could happen to any. If you search around the forum a bit you'll find several accounts of that problem and eventual repair. It isn't for the weak of heart.

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Yea I was afraid of this.

Fred W said:

The other possibility is that it is just some sort of an engine misfire. I would want to exhaust all possibility of that being what's happening before I declared it a gearbox issue.

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I'm not going to completely rule this out. Might be time to hook the scanner up and watch the cylinders fire.

A bad TPS will always misfire in a fairly narrow rpm band. The TPS is commonly temperature sensitive and only causes misfiring when hot, yet passes a diAG test. No matter what gear, a bad TPS will misfire in the same rpm range(s).

A slipping clutch will start to slip and not recover. Put 'er in 5th gear, ride highway speed and pop the throttle wide open. If it's the clutch it'll clearly slip.

Losing traction?

When this 'slip' feel happens, what happens to the tach, does it jump up then back down or does it drop down and jump back up?

Usually it's second gear that has the pop-out with 4th gear in second place for occurrence.

Popping out of gear into neutral on decel? Wowzer. My first thought is operator failure

Surging: Riding along at a steady road speed the engine RPM will slightly vary up and down. This force is strong with my FJR without a Power Commander, especially around 30 mph. Usually worse at low speed, low gear, low RPM.

Unfortunately, it sounds like it is worn gear dogs/bent shift forks, holding out for it to be something simple like the TPS.

ionbeam said:

Popping out of gear into neutral on decel? Wowzer. My first thought is operator failure

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Maybe it is

ionbeam said:

Usually it's second gear that has the pop-out with 4th gear in second place for occurrence.

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Might be 2nd let me test today on my way home from work.

I really hope it isn't the damn gear dogs/shift forks. I've seen mixed results with the YES warranty and reluctant to have the dealer even split the cases if Yamaha wont even warranty it.

Worse case scenario I will have to do everything myself. In which case while i'm there give the engine a good overhaul.

Lets pray it isn't 2nd gear gentlemen and if it is lets pray Yamaha will be nice since I haven't even had the bike for 4 months yet.

On a 2005, I'm pretty sure that YES is way past possible. Good luck wit' dat.

I think YES ran out on my '05 back in '010.

Fred W said:

On a 2005, I'm pretty sure that YES is way past possible. Good luck wit' dat.

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Well hopefully they will honor that expensive ass contract I bought. If not i'll just get my refund and call it a day.

The good news is if I do have to split the cases i'll write a nice how to since I can't seem to find one.

What contract was that? The best I have ever heard of a YES contract was the one I had on my '05 , and have now on my '14. It covers 4 years after the initial 1 year. That is 5 years total. I have heard there is an additional 2 years that can be added at a premium on top of that, but that is still only 7 years total. You are still 5 years past that.

When I bought the bike (used 3 months ago) I signed a contract for YES.

I'll have to pull out my papers and take a look, but it was definitely through Yamaha.

Hmmm... never heard of YES on used bikes, but you may be in luck.

:thumbsup:

Fred W said:

Hmmm... never heard of YES on used bikes, but you may be in luck.

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Nope you're right. Right after you said it was unlikely I had one I called Mommy Yamaha up and confirmed that they thought I was crazy for thinking I had one.

The next question is wtf did I sign. :|

grumpypoo said:

The next question is wtf did I sign. :|

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I will have to wait until tomorrow to find out, because my Yamaha dealer is closed on Mondays for whatever reason.

It's much cheaper to buy a new set of clutch plates and pressure plate. I had clutch slippage in first and second. Put in a new clutch and plate . TA DA no more slippage.

Rob

So to answer your other question ionbeam the tach sits still it happens very quickly less than a second, but here is the kicker.

I'm coming home from work and had a nice patch of road with no traffic around me. Went ahead and dropped into 2nd at about 4k rpms. I twisted that throttle like it stole money from me and the front wheel came up pretty high (much higher than I thought for a 2nd gear wheelie but no where near balance point). I never had a 2nd gear wheelie on this bike so it scared me and made me poop a little.

Each try yelded the same results.

Move into third and didn't do it either. Unfortunately 4th gear at that rpm is entirely to fast for the road I was on.

I will keep trying but it did happen this morning.

If I bought a bike from a dealer and had an issue that hints at a bad transmission and I had the option to get a refund, I'd get the refund and look for another FJR.

That popping out if first gear on heavy deceleration makes me think your trannie is toast. If you bought some kind of dealer warranty, make them honor it. IF it is the transmission, they will make out better returning your money and selling the bike for parts. I hope it's just a TPS or clutch issue.

HotRodZilla said:

That popping out if first gear on heavy deceleration makes me think your trannie is toast. If you bought some kind of dealer warranty, make them honor it. IF it is the transmission, they will make out better returning your money and selling the bike for parts. I hope it's just a TPS or clutch issue.

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I hope it's something easy.

It does have a warranty I know that much, but now i'm not sure what kind of warranty it has I thought it was a YES warranty, because it had the yamaha logo on it, but we will find out today.

I'm about to order a shim kit and do the valve check. Also going to run a compression test and leak down test to get an idea how bad off the engine itself is. I told them about the transmission, but their tech said all my issues were normal and he is the Yamaha certified tech here

All jokes aside I will be doing a lot to the bike this weekend.

List of problems so far...

1. Cylinder 3 spark plug when first changed had oil on it

2. Rough idle - Partially fixed this with TBS + spark plugs + air filter (still a little rough, but probably just me being anal)

3. The damn horn (All the wonderful members of this forum has given me great advice and will be doing all the recommended test

4. Possible transmission problems (I will check the clutch first since it's easiest)

Hopefully not to come

5. Bad compression

6. Intake or Exhaust valves leaking

7. Head gasket leaking (Doubt it because no coolant in oil)

We shall see the fate of this FJR

Geezer said:

If I bought a bike from a dealer and had an issue that hints at a bad transmission and I had the option to get a refund, I'd get the refund and look for another FJR.

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I probably wont get a refund, but I will have a warranty I could flex around. The down side of course is putting the bikes heart in fate of a tech that quite honestly could care less about my bike.

I will say however the list of issues isn't bad until you get to the transmission. Overall it's a great bike and if this one has to be laid to rest i'll be looking into another FJR.

Fact: If it's the transmission the engine comes out of the frame and the lower case gets split open. Parts aren't that expensive but accessing them and then getting the engine closed up and back in the frame will be 90% of the cost.

IMO: Before bothering with compression testing run Yamaha Ring Free or some other name brand ring and carbon treatment through the engine for at least a couple of tanks, it's the heat, soak, cool cycle that does the work.

The clutch work is fairly low effort, low cost and somewhat low risk and unlikely to address your symptoms barring broken parts (and dropping hardware down into the engine, stuff rags into the openings).

You can call any Yamaha dealer and have the service department look up your FJR's VIN and tell you if any recall or TSB work has been done. If the TPS hasn't been changed it could be responsible for rough idle and rough running at specific rpm bands. It will require troubleshooting with a DMM. The TPS often only fails when hot, how does your FJR run cold?

Don't worry about the #3 plug until all the other things are done. If #3 continues to be oily take a long metal rod, long screwdriver or mechanics stethoscope and listen to the exhaust headers, right where they exit the engine. You are listening to see if #3 has a rattling noise the other cylinders don't. There is a very outside chance that you will hear the valve stem rattling in the valve guide. More on that only if you hear the rattle, 99.99999% chance you won't but it's a fairly easy check.

If the bike has an almost unheard of cylinder head gasket problem you will hear faint to moderate puff, puff, puff in the oil fill hole. A radiator sniff kit will let you determine of there is a head leak into a coolant passage. Or best, do a cylinder leak-down test which will tell you everything, but do the Ring Free first.