M
Manfred
Guest
I noticed drag on my steering soon after betting my boxer and found that cutting those fork boots off made the steering a lot more neutral and free.
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A couple Qs on my new-to-me R100RT ...
- Thread starter mneblett
- Start date
mneblett
#32806
Speedo success
Well, I decided to take a look at the speedo this afternoon. When I got it down to this stage,
I chucked the speedo drive (the part sticking out of the rear, on the left of the pic) into my drill. The drill would drive the speedo to ~62 mph. All the way up to 62, and at 62, dead steady needle.
So I started looking closer at the gears at the back of the instrument. The part the speedo cable comes into has a gear on the inside of the back instrument cover, which engages the gear at the back of the speedo drive visible in the above pic. The gears have helical teeth because they engage at about a 120 degree angle. I noticed that the gears had irregular deposits of what looked like old grease on them. I thought that these deposits might be causing "bumps" in the rotation of the gears, leading to the needle bouncing, so I cleaned every tooth over its entire length to remove the old grease, and then silicone-sprayed the gears.
Reassembled and test drove the instrument cluster with my drill driving the spare speedo cable (thanks, Greg!
) -- looked good. Then took the bike for a short test ride, and at all speeds, up to, um, "in theory" (in the land of 55) 70+ the speedo needle was solid. Looks like the old grease on the gears was it. I'll give it a longer/more through test to/from the office tomorrow.
Well, I decided to take a look at the speedo this afternoon. When I got it down to this stage,
I chucked the speedo drive (the part sticking out of the rear, on the left of the pic) into my drill. The drill would drive the speedo to ~62 mph. All the way up to 62, and at 62, dead steady needle.
So I started looking closer at the gears at the back of the instrument. The part the speedo cable comes into has a gear on the inside of the back instrument cover, which engages the gear at the back of the speedo drive visible in the above pic. The gears have helical teeth because they engage at about a 120 degree angle. I noticed that the gears had irregular deposits of what looked like old grease on them. I thought that these deposits might be causing "bumps" in the rotation of the gears, leading to the needle bouncing, so I cleaned every tooth over its entire length to remove the old grease, and then silicone-sprayed the gears.
Reassembled and test drove the instrument cluster with my drill driving the spare speedo cable (thanks, Greg!
) -- looked good. Then took the bike for a short test ride, and at all speeds, up to, um, "in theory" (in the land of 55) 70+ the speedo needle was solid. Looks like the old grease on the gears was it. I'll give it a longer/more through test to/from the office tomorrow.
Last edited:
Y
Yarddog
Guest
Thanks for following up for us on this...I'll give it a try on my speedo...gotta get in there for the third or fourth time and see if I can't get the odo gear solidly adhered to the shaft...
mneblett
#32806
Hope it works for you, too. I drove ~40 minutes into the office today, and at all speeds the needle was stable
Time to move on to addressing the steering (starting with further checking out the fork boots' influence).
Y
Yarddog
Guest
I'm not so sure that the fork boots are absolutely necessary, and in fact, probably are a debitd in the interest of good low speed control...I'm in the process of installing an RT fairing on my R100/7 now...stalled because I need time to get the body work done on it...and I'm gonna leave those off...
S
shire2000
Guest
1. The speedo should have some grease at the points where you found some. I cleaned mine thoroughly and applied a very light grease to those points and silicone spray to all other areas. Rock solid to indicated 85MPH and beyond to the pin.
2. The boots in the fairing are a personal choice. I tend to ride almost year around in any weather. I found that I was getting a lot of spray of rain and road grime up through the holes left by taking the boots off. I now run the boots all the time as it helps to keep things a bit cleaner, and less stuff coming up over the front of the tank, and up under it. Just makes cleaning a bit easier and keeps me a bit drier.
All to personal tastes and experiences.
2. The boots in the fairing are a personal choice. I tend to ride almost year around in any weather. I found that I was getting a lot of spray of rain and road grime up through the holes left by taking the boots off. I now run the boots all the time as it helps to keep things a bit cleaner, and less stuff coming up over the front of the tank, and up under it. Just makes cleaning a bit easier and keeps me a bit drier.
All to personal tastes and experiences.
Hi, MNeblett,
Nice bike! Now, for the bad news. Have you ever heard of the "missing circlip"? In 1985? 86? 87? BMW stopped machining the groove and putting a circlip to locate one of the gearbox bearings. The gearbox is fine - for a while (most passed through the warranty period fine), but eventually the bearing will move and then fail. The damage to the gearbox depends on how long the bike is ridden with the failing bearing. The fix is to send the (hopefully good) gearbox to one of the experts - Tom Cutter, Anton Largiader, Oak Okelshen, Matt Parkhouse, Bob Clement, Ted Porter - there are others, but I don't know them, and have the gearbox taken apart, the groove cut, then the gearbox reassembled and reshimmed with any bad parts replaced. This won't be cheap, but it will probably keep you from having to buy a gearbox somewhere down the road.
Nice bike! Now, for the bad news. Have you ever heard of the "missing circlip"? In 1985? 86? 87? BMW stopped machining the groove and putting a circlip to locate one of the gearbox bearings. The gearbox is fine - for a while (most passed through the warranty period fine), but eventually the bearing will move and then fail. The damage to the gearbox depends on how long the bike is ridden with the failing bearing. The fix is to send the (hopefully good) gearbox to one of the experts - Tom Cutter, Anton Largiader, Oak Okelshen, Matt Parkhouse, Bob Clement, Ted Porter - there are others, but I don't know them, and have the gearbox taken apart, the groove cut, then the gearbox reassembled and reshimmed with any bad parts replaced. This won't be cheap, but it will probably keep you from having to buy a gearbox somewhere down the road.
mneblett
#32806
Thanks very much for the heads-up! The good news is that the previous owner had Matt Parkhouse take care of it
