P500 Clunking noise when hard braking

[JayPo]

When going fairly fast (> 25 mph) and then press hard to medium hard on the brake, there is a loud clunking sound. If I let off of the brake it stops and it also stops once the speed gets pretty slow. It sounds like it is the clutch. I have done the clutch adjustment and the noise does appear to increase and decrease as I adjust it, but even at the best adjustment, it is still pretty bad. I attached a mp4 file where you can hear the sound. Is this a normal noise of the P500? My machine is still under warranty so I want to take it to the dealership if this is not one of the many normal P500 noises.

 

[trigger]

It's gear chatter, they all do it.

 

[J80]

Change the gear oil to mobile 1 synthetic 75w-140 or comparable gear oil and if u haven’t changed the engine oil yet that will help to I used mobile 1 synthetic racing 4T 10w-40 it helped with shifting but after I did my oil change I had to adjust the clutch again but now everything shifts good and noise is minimal but there’s always gonna be some noise but as you break it in it will get better. these things are little tanks slam that b**** in gear and go and have fun

 

[Peter_72]

Mine started doing that just before it made 200 miles.

 

[JayPo]

Thanks for the replies. It sounds like this is a normal P500 noise. I have over 900 miles on my P500 and am well familiar with all of the various differential and clutch/transmission noises but this one seems kind of excessive. I changed the differential oil to full synthetic 75W-140 at the 100 mile maintenance. I am not really sure when this clunking noise when braking started. I think I noticed it at about 300 miles but who knows, maybe its always been there. I think I will replace the gear oil again and see if it improves.

 

[nctrailboss]

The very reason I did away with the auto downshift feature in my 17 model.It is trying to downshift as fast as you are slowing.I hated that.Sounds terrible and can't be good for it.A person with a 15 or 16 model can't relate as their machines don't auto downshift.It happens when,as you said,slowing quickly from a decent speed,on the brakes.I fixed it by putting a 16 model ecm,speedometer pod,and a SpeedoDr on mine.It thinks its a 16 model now with no auto up or down shifting.Much better now.

 

[JayPo]

The very reason I did away with the auto downshift feature in my 17 model.It is trying to downshift as fast as you are slowing.I hated that.Sounds terrible and can't be good for it.A person with a 15 or 16 model can't relate as their machines don't auto downshift.It happens when,as you said,slowing quickly from a decent speed,on the brakes.I fixed it by putting a 16 model ecm,speedometer pod,and a SpeedoDr on mine.It thinks its a 16 model now with no auto up or down shifting.Much better now.

It definately sounds like it is trying to downshift more so than the normal P500 gear noise from the differential. It's kind of like the computer gets a bit confused and can't downshift fast enought to keep up with the braking. Not sure if I want to go that much effort to eliminate it but it's good to know there are options.