Believe i found my popping noise

[Dankathy]

Like many others, i have a popping noise coming from the rear "somewhere". Have looked for it repeatedly but failed to isolate it. I have quite a bit of experience with the sand cars, and identifying a bad cv is not unknown to me but no success here. I have been continuing to run it with the let it develop approach and i do think its getting worse. Fast forward to today (about 5000 miles since I first heard it) i decided to pull the shocks off to reseal them again. About 15000 total miles on the machine, 8000 or so since the last time the shocks were resealed. With the shocks off and the machine blocked up at ride height so that there is no pressure on anything i went through all of the joints, pivots etc. With a pry bar and found what i had come to expect- lots of joints with a small amount of movement but none really bad. I believe that whats going on is in a tight corner on hard surfaces everything binds up and then relaxes with a pop when the tires slip. Going to the 32's made this noise worse- lots of side wall flex. The worst joints i found were the front uppers. Not real suprising in that they are subjected to a lot of axial thrust. Was going to replace them and found that honda does not service these joints separately and i am not ready to do a wholesale replacement of all of the rear suspension arms. Hope the aftermarket addresses this before i have to start changing parts. Lots of money involved here real quick at $300 or so per arm. I am back to the let it develop thing. Wheel bearings show about 1/16in movement at the wheel, i am going to continue to run them. Just my findings, as always your milage may vary.

 

[TripleB]

Like many others, i have a popping noise coming from the rear "somewhere". Have looked for it repeatedly but failed to isolate it. I have quite a bit of experience with the sand cars, and identifying a bad cv is not unknown to me but no success here. I have been continuing to run it with the let it develop approach and i do think its getting worse. Fast forward to today (about 5000 miles since I first heard it) i decided to pull the shocks off to reseal them again. About 15000 total miles on the machine, 8000 or so since the last time the shocks were resealed. With the shocks off and the machine blocked up at ride height so that there is no pressure on anything i went through all of the joints, pivots etc. With a pry bar and found what i had come to expect- lots of joints with a small amount of movement but none really bad. I believe that whats going on is in a tight corner on hard surfaces everything binds up and then relaxes with a pop when the tires slip. Going to the 32's made this noise worse- lots of side wall flex. The worst joints i found were the front uppers. Not real suprising in that they are subjected to a lot of axial thrust. Was going to replace them and found that honda does not service these joints separately and i am not ready to do a wholesale replacement of all of the rear suspension arms. Hope the aftermarket addresses this before i have to start changing parts. Lots of money involved here real quick at $300 or so per arm. I am back to the let it develop thing. Wheel bearings show about 1/16in movement at the wheel, i am going to continue to run them. Just my findings, as always your milage may vary.

15,000 miles. Thats awesome!

 

[JenElio]

U have 15K miles on a Talon!!??

 

[Ragnar406]

@my99svt

 

[Dankathy]

U have 15K miles on a Talon!!??

Pretty darn close. Next couple of rides will do it.

 

[Adam_20_Adam]

View attachment 239365
Pretty darn close. Next couple of rides will do it.

I am so jealous. You must get to ride a few times a week. Or at least every weekend. I can barley scratch enough time once a month to go enjoy my Talon. Green with envy.

 

[fartsalot]

View attachment 239365
Pretty darn close. Next couple of rides will do it.

Please tell us about your maintenance schedule and what fluids you used? What have you repaired if anything. Your history could be helpful to us all who may someday put on a lot of miles.

 

[Dankathy]

Please tell us about your maintenance schedule and what fluids you used? What have you repaired if anything. Your history could be helpful to us all who may someday put on a lot of miles.

Honda oil in the motor, honda high moly oil in the sub trans, napa gl5 in the finals, honda filters. Replace the motor oil and filter at 1200 miles, then motor oil and filter, trans filter, sub trans and finals oil at 2400. Put a filterminder on the air box a long time ago and will replace the air filter as needed. Currently have a Donaldson precleaner in place so air filters last pretty good. Combination of unis and the Donaldson, this air filter is at about 8000 miles. May change it just because. Problems to date were all new machine warranty stuff, nothing but oil changes and reseal the shocks other than that. It may be worth noting that we are not hard riders. We dont have to be the fastest at anything, we just go out to look around and explore. 120 to 140 miles a day is a normal ride, two or three days a week is not unheard of. (Have to have time for jeep days )Personally, i believe that manufacturers in this industry have done a very good job at conditioning their consumers to the belief that its normal for these $20000 machines to fall apart at 4000- 5000 miles and we have to buy a new one. I have been given to understand that the africa twin guys routinely do 100000 miles on their motorcycles and i dont really see why we cannot expect 50000 out of our machines- depending on how they are used and maintained of course. I honestly don't see 9000 a year as unreasonable. Its good to be retired.