Talon wheel chatter/hop

[Tthomas525]

Hello I’m new to the group just looking for help/opinions..... I have a talon r and went riding this weekend in about 6-8” of sloppy snow and I can’t believe the amount of wheel hop/chatter this thing has. Adjusted the shocks to 1 and put tires around 10-11 psi. Just seeing what everyone is doing for a fix. Three of us with the R model went and one broke a drive shaft.

 

[PaulF]

I would start by backing off the crossover rings, especially in the rear. If I remember correctly, you can go as far as 25 turns in the rear and the tender springs won't bind. Start with 10 turns and go from there. Just put a couple small wire ties on the tender coils in a couple places and make sure they don't get smashed or cut. If they do, you are binding the spring and will need to screw them back a bit.

I have seen a couple others with U-Joint issues. The cups just come loose and fall out (they are not clipped in like a car). I'm pretty sure Honda has replaced them under warranty.

 

[Tthomas525]

Thank you. I’ll have to try that is the morning. It’s feels like most of the chatter is coming from the front end. Seems like uphill is even worse, almost like the transition from the left and right is what I’m thinking causes it

 

[PaulF]

Hop/Chatter on the talon happens at the transition between grip and slip. The stock suspension setting loads and unloads at that the worse time (right at that transition) so the tires go from a grip to slip then back and forth (grip/slip/grip/slip, etc) causing the hop. Backing off the crossover rings tunes this out of the suspension for the most part.

Mine had horrible wheel hop in the sand, felt like the machine was going to shake itself apart. I ended up backing off all 4 just to the point of coil bind and it helped a LOT.

I have since installed the Shock Therapy spring set and the hop is all but gone. Once in a while (like not very often), it will hop/chatter a little and when it does, I just back off the throttle a bit to stop the chatter and then back on and it goes away. Or if I'm climbing and don't want to back off and lose momentum, I give it a little more gas so it spins and stops the chatter then back off a little to get my grip back. After 2000 miles, you get so in tune with the machine, you start to anticipate these things.

Basically, you can get rid of most of the hop by adjusting the crossovers and then learn to drive out the minor occurrences when they start to happen.

 

[HondaTech]

I'd be interested in what caused the driveshaft issue. I've never seen a Honda SXS break the actual shaft.

 

[PaulF]

I'd be interested in what caused the driveshaft issue. I've never seen a Honda SXS break the actual shaft.

I don't think it broke. That looks like the rear yoke separated form the driveline. The cups don't have clips so they come lose then work their way out and the yokes beat themselves to death like that until finally the joint just comes apart and the 2 yokes separate.

Here is another with the exact same problem (although the joint is still together) that the guy shows some pretty good detail...

 

[SLOWPOKE693]

I saw that same video on YouTube a couple days ago. Putting a Tig or Mig weld tack on each u joint cap will ensure that this never happens. I plan to do it to my joints when I tear the Talon apart to start my build. We do this to front axle joint caps in the rock crawling world to keep them from twisting and spitting the retainers out. I've also done it to brand new Honda CRV center driveshafts after having to replace entire units due to the same crappy design as the ones in the Talon.

 

[Tthomas525]

I don't think it broke. That looks like the rear yoke separated form the driveline. The cups don't have clips so they come lose then work their way out and the yokes beat themselves to death like that until finally the joint just comes apart and the 2 yokes separate.

Here is another with the exact same problem (although the joint is still together) that the guy shows some pretty good detail...

The driveshaft does have clips

 

[PaulF]

View attachment 189510
The driveshaft does have clips

My misunderstanding. Just goes to show, you can always believe what you read, the guy that posted that video states in his comments that there are no clips...

 

[SLOWPOKE693]

Tack weld all 8 caps on the new driveshaft...... Poblem solved.

All Honda is going to do under warranty (if they cant figure out a way to blame it on you) is replace it with another crappy driveshaft that is going to fail again. Who the hell wants to deal with that problem over and over???

On a side note...... Sombody needs to come up with either a lightweight aluminum or aluminum/carbon fiber driveshaft to replace the stock one. Less rotating mass = more faster. Those of us who want to race our Talons need all the advantages we can get.