Gentlemen,
Last wednesday @ 4pm I had to order a bunch (nine) parts from Dan over at Motoxotica due to some wear found while doing some routine maintenance after my Phx ride a few weeks prior. I was a little disappointed that I would miss a Glamis trip on friday due to the state of the bike :cry: . Well good news, actually amazing news, is that the parts arrived on my doorstep at 12 noon on friday, less than 48hrs later... this was normal ground shipping. I immediately proceed to the garage to start fitting my bits and pieces and was able to get the bike back together and started by 6pm that evening. Two hours later I am packed up and hitting the road for the four hour ride to Glamis,CA. I arrived at midnight and found my group of buddies that had left earlier that morning. after settling in for some sleep I awake at 7:30 the next morning for the grueling task of swapping my paddle tire over before everyone else is ready to ride. After about two hours of tugging and twisting the tire is on and holding air... no pinches :wink: . I take the bike out for a quick spin and everything is running like a champ! I take the bike back to camp after a 5 min putt-putt around to see how she runs and shut her down. I come back after a few minutes to notice that the water pump weep hole is dripping a bit of coolant. At this point it is important to note that while installing the parts the day earlier, two being the water pump bearing and seal, I installed the water pump seal a bit too far into the grooved fitting than it was supposed to be. Now, with this being said I am in a sort of dilemma... do I ride it as is and risk loosing all my coolant far into the dunes?, Or do I cut my trip short and head home with my tail between my legs to fix this issue? or do I improvise and fix the problem right there???? Well I chose the later of the three options. I decided that going home was not an option... and that removing the transmission cover to knock the seal back out would take too long and risk getting sand into the guts which I did not like the thought at all. So here is what I did... I pulled the water pump cover, impeller (new), and the water pump pin. I placed the largest socket into the seal recess that would fit and pushed it in as far as it would go until it butted up against the bearing behind it and then fitted the old water pump seal I had removed the day earlier in front of the new seal. To my amazement both seals fit into the recessed area without interfering with the movement of the impeller 8O . 10 minutes later I have everything back together with some quick setting gasket maker sealant and allow the gasket maker to set up for about a half an hour. I then topped off the coolant with engine ice and started her up. The bike dripped for about 10 seconds, which im assuming was left over coolant in the weep hole and then I had no more drips or leaks. I rode the bike carefully shortly after that for about three hours taking time to stop and check for leaks and if I had coolant leaking into my oil. I had no cross contamination of coolant in the oil at all. I did notice that the sand was sticking to the outside of the transmission cover around the weep hole but not more than usual. I was able to ride for 9 hrs in all over 2 days without any engine trouble at all. I seem to have fixed all my major leaks with exception of the weep hole at the water pump. I checked my coolant level many times and did not loose coolant at all, lever was consistent with normal operating conditions. What do you guys think? Does this raise any concerns to you gents? Everything seems to be fine and I am wondering if failure will happen anytime based on anyone elses experience with this? Comments or suggestions would be appreciated.
Regards,
Sandskipper
ps. By the way, the weather in Glamis was beautiful and the dunes were nice to see again after almost a year of absence. No injuries to report :wink: !
Last wednesday @ 4pm I had to order a bunch (nine) parts from Dan over at Motoxotica due to some wear found while doing some routine maintenance after my Phx ride a few weeks prior. I was a little disappointed that I would miss a Glamis trip on friday due to the state of the bike :cry: . Well good news, actually amazing news, is that the parts arrived on my doorstep at 12 noon on friday, less than 48hrs later... this was normal ground shipping. I immediately proceed to the garage to start fitting my bits and pieces and was able to get the bike back together and started by 6pm that evening. Two hours later I am packed up and hitting the road for the four hour ride to Glamis,CA. I arrived at midnight and found my group of buddies that had left earlier that morning. after settling in for some sleep I awake at 7:30 the next morning for the grueling task of swapping my paddle tire over before everyone else is ready to ride. After about two hours of tugging and twisting the tire is on and holding air... no pinches :wink: . I take the bike out for a quick spin and everything is running like a champ! I take the bike back to camp after a 5 min putt-putt around to see how she runs and shut her down. I come back after a few minutes to notice that the water pump weep hole is dripping a bit of coolant. At this point it is important to note that while installing the parts the day earlier, two being the water pump bearing and seal, I installed the water pump seal a bit too far into the grooved fitting than it was supposed to be. Now, with this being said I am in a sort of dilemma... do I ride it as is and risk loosing all my coolant far into the dunes?, Or do I cut my trip short and head home with my tail between my legs to fix this issue? or do I improvise and fix the problem right there???? Well I chose the later of the three options. I decided that going home was not an option... and that removing the transmission cover to knock the seal back out would take too long and risk getting sand into the guts which I did not like the thought at all. So here is what I did... I pulled the water pump cover, impeller (new), and the water pump pin. I placed the largest socket into the seal recess that would fit and pushed it in as far as it would go until it butted up against the bearing behind it and then fitted the old water pump seal I had removed the day earlier in front of the new seal. To my amazement both seals fit into the recessed area without interfering with the movement of the impeller 8O . 10 minutes later I have everything back together with some quick setting gasket maker sealant and allow the gasket maker to set up for about a half an hour. I then topped off the coolant with engine ice and started her up. The bike dripped for about 10 seconds, which im assuming was left over coolant in the weep hole and then I had no more drips or leaks. I rode the bike carefully shortly after that for about three hours taking time to stop and check for leaks and if I had coolant leaking into my oil. I had no cross contamination of coolant in the oil at all. I did notice that the sand was sticking to the outside of the transmission cover around the weep hole but not more than usual. I was able to ride for 9 hrs in all over 2 days without any engine trouble at all. I seem to have fixed all my major leaks with exception of the weep hole at the water pump. I checked my coolant level many times and did not loose coolant at all, lever was consistent with normal operating conditions. What do you guys think? Does this raise any concerns to you gents? Everything seems to be fine and I am wondering if failure will happen anytime based on anyone elses experience with this? Comments or suggestions would be appreciated.
Regards,
Sandskipper
ps. By the way, the weather in Glamis was beautiful and the dunes were nice to see again after almost a year of absence. No injuries to report :wink: !
