'05 with less than 16M...tick tick

I finally took a short ride last week without my ear plugs in & guess what….my ’05 with just under 16M had the dreaded “tick”. Not very loud, but noticeable. So I armed myself with a little knowledge & took it down to my dealer, the Hitching Post in South St. Paul, for my scheduled 16000 mile service. I first grabbed my sales guy and asked him to come out & take a listen to my bike. I told him I was quite concerned that my bike was developing a major problem & that I possibly needed him to be my advocate in talking to the service manager. He definitely could hear the ticking but admitted that he had no idea what was causing it. I told him what I thought it was & explained to him about the valve guide problem with some FJR’s. Like so many other threads have mentioned with this problem….nobody at the dealership level seems to have ever heard of this type of failure before, and this held true in my case. We next went to talk to the service manager, same thing “I’ve never heard of that happening before”. So I went ahead & scheduled my service & kindly asked him if he would have the mechanic(s) listen to my bike & see if they could determine what was causing it. Through this whole face to face with my dealership I never got angry with them for not having any knowledge about the exhaust valve guide failure, or tried to come off that I knew more than they did.

Well they’ve had my bike for 2 days now & I’m supposed to pick it up tonight. The phone rings…it’s the service manager. He explains that they had called in the Yamaha rep to get a ruling & after the mechanics explain the problem to him, he agreed that it was indeed the exhaust valve guide that was the problem. He gave them to the ok to replace them all and rebuild the heads all work covered & paid for by Yamaha. They wanted to perform the work now rather than later which I reluctantly agreed to….it will be down for the next 3 weeks. But it will be ready to go a couple of weeks before my trip in July, plenty of time to get the bugs worked out.

I guess in my situation it paid to go in not demanding anything from them (my dealership) but I did offer what little information I had on the subject. Maybe these guys are a little better than most, who knows, they took care of me & that’s all that counts.

Btw, I do not have Yamahas extended warranty. I'll give an update if things go sour.

I have a repaired 05 ticker and 25k later it is running silently and STRONG..

When they do the repair, please be sure to inform the service mgr. to get new head bolts as more than one repair has been held up at the last minute because they thought they could re-use the old head bolts, which are of the "stretch once and throw away" kind.

They nearly did this on mine - until I reminded them to get new ones.

Good luck - it took three weeks to get mine repaired at no charge.

Good to hear that there taking care of yours!

Mine started a loud ticking at startup recently, and is still audible when it warms up and you can hear at most rpm's.

When restarting with a warm motor, it really ticks loud.

I was really concerned going on my trip to south Utah from Seattle, but after reaching Bryce Canyon, my immediate worries

that the bike would beak down went away.

Mine '05 now has 10,900 after putting 2,900 miles on it in the last 8 days.

Before I left, I put in new Iridium plugs and synched the throttle bodies, installed a fork-brace, throttle lock and 1lb bar end weights.

Good thing as my bike still has a good case of vibes through the bars.

Keep us updated and let us know if the bike runs smoother.

Bryce

Gramps said:

I guess in my situation it paid to go in not demanding anything from them (my dealership) but I did offer what little information I had on the subject.

Click to expand...

Hi Gramps,

I've found it almost always pays to start off calmly and treating others with respect. Ya catch more flies with sugar than honey. And you can always ratchet up the assertiveness if necessary. Hope it goes well for you.

FJRMGM said:

I have a repaired 05 ticker and 25k later it is running silently and STRONG..

Click to expand...

FJRMGM-- did they replace the guides with the same sort as the previous? -- the reason I ask is because Warchild replaced his own with new custom jobbies.

Also-- was there any headwork done in addition to the replacement (face resurfacing-- etc.)

thanks!!

It never ceases to amaze me what Yamaha DOESN'T tell their dealers - everything from new features on new bikes not fully explained, to known maintenance issues not disseminated. Why in the hell would Yamaha think keeping their dealers in the dark benefit anyone, include Yamaha?

Dick Frederick

Kiki, the guides and seals had a new part number when they replaced them. They replaced all the exhaust valves but not the intake. The problem was not the guides - it was the too tight oil seals that did not allow enough lubrication to the hotter running exhaust valves.

They were only going to replace the exhaust valve guides/seals but I asked them to replace the intake with the new numbers at the same time for peace of mind. I had to pay $75 for the parts but the labor was free since the other was under warranty.

No headwork done other than cleaning off the carbon buildup.

I actually got to see/hold the old #2 cylinder exhaust valve and guide that was loose - I could make it "click" in my hands so it was really loose.

At 44k miles my FJR now runs like it always should have but didn't - STRONG...

kindofblue said:

Gramps said:

I guess in my situation it paid to go in not demanding anything from them (my dealership) but I did offer what little information I had on the subject.

Click to expand...

Hi Gramps,

I've found it almost always pays to start off calmly and treating others with respect. Ya catch more flies with sugar than honey. And you can always ratchet up the assertiveness if necessary. Hope it goes well for you.

Click to expand...

Uhhhhh,

more flies with sugar (or honey) than vinegar........................

Right you are!

Shane

nice to here it there were zero problems . my 05 is also ticking but i am going to wait it out .