I hope alll of the rest of you are out riding....

This is one of the longest "quiet" periods I can remember.
I hope to be riding again tomorrow or the day after. I talked to Billy, service manager at Sun Honda late yesterday and he expected my parts to arrive today. I asked him what he meant by "parts," since he had told me that he'd just order a whole new final drive. He said that after he checked it out, he'd realized that he could save me about $600 by rebuilding my final drive. I asked him if he'd also do some thinking about why I've had two near-totaled final drives since 81,000 miles, only 33,000 miles ago. He told me he would. I think I'm going to do what someone else suggested: get my own tube of Honda Moly-60 (or whatever it is that they're calling the product now) and hand it to the tech who's gonna' be changing my tires every time from now on out. Unless, of course, I can worm my way back into Chuck Henderson's good graces and get his help in doing my own tire changes.

Phil, if you want to GUARANTEE that you will never have a final drive problem in the future, buy a good used one (eBay) and put it on the shelf. So long as you have it in reserve your running final drive will keep on keeping on.

Glad to hear you are getting your bike back and at a slightly less cost to you. Hope the tech does find a reason for the failures.

RedBird said:

Phil, if you want to GUARANTEE that you will never have a final drive problem in the future, buy a good used one (eBay) and put it on the shelf. So long as you have it in reserve your running final drive will keep on keeping on.

Click to expand...

I may do that, Ken.

Phil, I am interested to know whether you failures are actually due to lubrication issues or something else.
See if you can get the old parts (they actually belong to you anyway) and have a look at the splines.
Does the extreme wear extend the full length of the spline or only half way along?
If it is the full length of the spline it is reasonable to assume that it is either a lubrication issue or a misalignment issue.
If the damage only occurs on part of the spline it would imply that the drive hub is not fully engaging with the "diff".
Check that the spacer/shims are in place and are not worn.
Try to make sure that, when reassembled, the axle nut is tightened before the four nuts on the front of the "diff" are tightened.
This should ensure correct alignment.
I have never used the Honda Moly 60. I use CRC "Sta-Lube" Engine Assembly Lube with moly-graphite. It is a good US product with part number SL3333.
It is designed to prevent scuffing of camshafts and other parts on start-up in a new or reconditioned engine.
It is about 1/4 the price of the Honda stuff and a lot easier to get.
At 64,ooo km my splines look like new.

Macka

I don't know if handing Moly 60 to the service manager will guarantee anything in regards to it being applied to the splines. If in doubt, you can partially remove the wheel and apply grease to the splines using a long brush. I did that when my bike was new and I was planning a trip to CO.

The long mileage from modern touring tires often means the splines will go too long without fresh grease. Everything in life is a tradeoff!

I am somewhat new to the forum, and especially to this topic - but I have read the ST forum posts about using the Moly 60 whenever you do a rear tire change. (I am also an old guy and have been around mechanical stuff since shifters were mounted on the steering column).

If the drive splines are what is wearing out.....is there any possibility that the splines on the rear wheel have been worn or damaged?

[..If the drive splines are what is wearing out.....is there any possibility that the splines on the rear wheel have been worn or damaged?..]

The drive splines are an integral part of the ring gear, as in ring & pinion, in the final drive case. The driven splines are a removable part in the rear wheel and they are made of a softer material than the drive splines.

DirtFlier said:

I don't know if handing Moly 60 to the service manager will guarantee anything in regards to it being applied to the splines. If in doubt, you can partially remove the wheel and apply grease to the splines using a long brush. I did that when my bike was new and I was planning a trip to CO.

The long mileage from modern touring tires often means the splines will go too long without fresh grease. Everything in life is a tradeoff!

Click to expand...

It's actually easier to drop the wheel than most think. My friend and I dropped his a couple weeks back on a trip out west by sitting it up on a 4" curb, loosened the exhaust, loosened pinch bolt, removed caliper bolt (by pushing out on muffler just enough to get bolt out) and axle, lifted the caliper/bracket assembly off disc and moved it kinda under the pannier then dropped wheel out and turned slightly to get past rear fender. Had it off in less than 20 minutes. Went on just a easy, other than fighting with caliper for a few minutes before we realized one piston hadn't pushed back in. Once that was found, no problem. Knowing this now, I will be removing my own wheels from now on and putting the moly on myself. Believe my friend took some pictures of this procedure. I will share if I get them.

A note also, the mechanic at Rice Honda in Rapid City pulled mine rear wheel off the same way a few days later however he had it up on the lift. Only $54 labor to change rear tire.. Can be done folks.

I talked to Billy this morning and they got the parts and will have my bike done on Friday. He says they're trying to figure out why I've had two almost identical failures.

I did see the rear end and both the drive and the driven splines were in really bad shape for their full length. I'll know more when I get the old parts.

Phil,
I thought I read in a different post that your wheel bearings were damaged also. It may be possible that the wheel bearings went first which then caused abnormal wear on the splines. Just something to think about. Good luck with the fix.

Brad

Brad, one bearing was gone. I hadn't thought about it maybe having gone first.

Checking back in my records, I found this:

2/6/15 -- 96,213 miles Sun Honda
Repair of final drive after Interstate Honda's tire change. Covered by warranty, parts replaced included Collar, Flange Set, and Thrust Washer.
Replacement of rear wheel bearings; $63.07

Sure shouldn't have been a rear bearing going first. We'll see.

Just got a call from Sun Honda's service manager. Good news: he figured out what's been going on. My rear wheel was damaged, probably from the first time this happened and it was wobbling around. The clearances should have been allowing the drive spline/driven spline to float, but they weren't able to do that. That was stressing the bearing, etc. So, I need a new rear wheel. The other good news is that Sun will be able to keep the price of the repairs in the same (outrageous) range they had estimated nearly two weeks ago.

The bad news is that they had to order a wheel and I won't have a bike for another week.

Oh, well.

Phil Tarman said:

My rear wheel was damaged, probably from the first time this happened and it was wobbling around.

Click to expand...

That makes a lot more sense than it being a lube only issue....

Phil, this might be a contributor to the rear wheel mess. My rear rim had the thrust washer removing aluminum from the rim hub. it wore down about 1/8. You can see the hub should be flush with bearing, but width of thrust washer wore / chewed it out causing my straight splines on hub on wheel and splines on final drive to wear too. I got a new rim ($254), hub spline, thrust washer, thrust collar, spacer, and those drive alum pcs and rubbers that the straight pins fit into. Its hidden unless the hub is withdrawn from wheel / rim.
This was about 96,000 miles and Jan 2015
I could have taken out bearing and have tig welded, but a lot of matching machining to be done to bring back to spec. didn't know for sure what height hub was at, even with bearing or slightly up or down.
here is a pic....if Phil actually looked at his rim or will see it next week...........



see where thrust washer was and recessed out alum hub??

And to further add.....missing or forgetting to lube splines on wheel hub and exterior of final drive only cause those meshing splines to wear more. Other factors such as this pic could cause undo stress on internal final drive issues. The internal helical gears could be fine in Phil's final drive, only thing needing replaced would be that gear that has the straight splines to wheel.

That fits Billy's description of what he had found, Dale.

This is the note I made after Sun worked on the wheel the last time:

2/6/15 -- 96,213 miles Sun Honda?
Repair of final drive after Interstate Honda's tire change. Covered by warranty, parts replaced included Collar, Flange Set, and Thrust Washer.
Replacement of rear wheel bearings; $63.07

The note before that one had said this:

1/26/15 -- 95,629 miles
Replaced rear tire with PR4 from Revzilla @ Interstate Honda. Tire had gone 11,569 miles. Interstate says splines were dry again. They show wear and Interstate is calling Honda to see about repair.

My guess right now is that when Sun rebuilt the final drive after Chuck and I found the problem the first time that the wheel had already been chewed up. I'm going to suggest that someone mic the new wheel and keep that as a reference number to check any wheel before rebuilding a final drive.

[...The internal helical gears could be fine in Phil's final drive, only thing needing replaced would be that gear that has the straight splines to wheel...]

It's difficult for me to tell because of the extreme closeup of your photo but when you disassembled it, did you find lots of alum bits?

There are only two gears in the final drive case: the pinion gear and ring gear. I'm not sure what they're called in the Honda parts catalog but in American parlance they are "the ring & pinion." I was a drag racer as a kid so am very familiar with those parts but unlike in a car, the ring gear has female splines cut on its backside: the drive splines. Those mesh with the removable driven splines on the star shaped piece that fits into the wheel hub.

The ring & pinion are always sold as a matched set so it's not possible to replace just the ring gear.

ps. I had to plug my NT's rear tire on a recent trip to VT and the plug held but that Avon tire has +10k miles on it so it's going to be replaced with a new Pilot Road 3 that is ready to go. It'll be a few weeks before I make the swap but I'll take a close look at the area in question. Having a "2nd bike" is nice!

yes the alum hub rim had flakes of alum all around. yes ring and pinion would be replaced at same time

Phil,

I like the idea MENTIONED about keeping a spare on the shelfe!!, or as some IBA guys di when on long serious rides in their baggage on the bike. I know thatin my 50,000 + nt miles I never had any final frive eorries or concerns, not to say that in the next 50 I might not have.

If in this second life should I ever see ny way clear to do so I would consider picking up USED nt , EVEN non ABS version for adding a side car to it. Will I ride again?? well with the right pilot I would play at being a monkey!!

eldon

It only took three weeks, but I got it back today. Sun Honda did right by me, IMNSHO. The bill came to $1621.26. The charged me only the price they charge to mount tires on the bike and rebuilt the final drive for no labor. They also replaced front and rear brake pads and charged me the normal labor for that work. They gave me a $260 discount on parts. The bike did fine (which you'd kind of expect after spending $1600). So, now I'm going to be out there riding a tad more. The How the West Was Won Rally is four weeks away and the 3-Flags Classic is less than two weeks after that.

I have to confess that I'd be OK if it cooled off about 10 degrees, but I don't have anything to complain about.