Working on a 2016 Yamaha Wolverine - Charging system

[ehart814]

There's one thing about it now that You have went through what You have been through with that machine at least now You know that machine, Congratulations👍👍

Yeah, I know far more about it than I ever wanted to! But it's my cousin's machine and he has learned A LOT about it, and more importantly how to maintain it so that these types of things don't happen again. Unfortunately it was an expensive lesson.

 

[Admin]

 

[ehart814]

Last night we were doing some reassembly of the plastic body parts and bed that needed to be removed....well he was, I was mostly drinking beer and supervising.
To take the stator cover off without removing the engine, I had to cut a metal brace that connected the lower frame to upper frame. Easy to remove, and weld back up. So he removed the fuel tank again before welding. I told him to hold the fuel line far away while I welded. Well, when he pulled the line off he wrapped the end with a shop towel. I did not realize that quite a bit of gas squirts out when you pull that off, and he didn't think about it. So I start welding and after a few seconds I hear the old "whomp" sound that we all know..... So I throw the helmet off and the mig gun and grabbed the rag (it was sitting right where the fuel tank goes) and threw it away from the machine. Somehow I didn't get burned at all, and I didn't even have gloves on! So we got pretty lucky!!! LOL.... I was pretty mad for a minute but no real harm done. Too bad that didn't happen when we started with this project... probably would have just turned around and let it go!!! hahaha

 

[ehart814]

Update

Looks like the Yamaha is getting pushed into the weeds. He rode it with me on Saturday and Sunday a little bit, just cruising roads and easy riding. Everything fine. Then Sunday night, he went for a ride to a friends house about 5 miles away. Keep in mind, he literally drives like a grandpa - as if there's a wood block under the gas pedal. After going a few miles down the road, the temp light came on. He sat there with the engine off and the fan running for a half hour before the light went out. Started it and drove 100 yards and the light came back on. I rode over to where he was and towed him back to the garage. We tried burping it, but it would immediately overheat and the coolant in the radiator is cold. Water pump is working. Removed thermostat. It had popped itself too far open, (i guess they do that when they get too hot). Cut the middle out of the thermostat so it's wide open. Reinstalled it. Opened bleeders till just coolant comes out. topped off and started it while trying to add coolant as needed. After about a minute of run time from cold, the temp light comes on again and radiator is still cold.

I think it may have blown the head gasket from getting hot. It seems air locked but coolant is circulating. Seems like it is either getting combustion causing an air pocket in the head due to bad head gasket or crack somewhere. Either way, at this point it's beyond us. We cant do anything with it and there's no sense in us starting over again throwing money and time at this thing. I don't know what to do.

So the moral of the story is DON'T OVERHEAT YOUR MACHINES.

 

[ehart814]

Reminder: DON'T ABUSE YOUR MACHINE. If you repeatedly overheat, youre going to have bad problems.

Still haven't gotten it up and running. He took it to a dealer for diagnosis. They told him the water pump is not circulating coolant. We pulled the case cover again. There is a sprocket that bolts to the balance shaft which is driven by the crank. That sprocket is not indexed to the balance shaft. It is held by a nut and washer. The sprocket drives another sprocket which is connected to the oil pump and water pump. I removed the nut (it was loose, allowing the shaft to spin inside the sprocket). So the water pump and oil pump were not turning. Cleaned, red loctite, and torqued to spec. Felt good finding that nut was loose. So we think we finally have it figured out.... Fired it up and idled for about a minute or two and the fan kicked on. Radiator still cold.... few seconds later, temp light back on.

He pulled the cover off the water pump. The impeller would not turn by hand, verified that it is spinning when the engine is running. So now the only thing we can think of is there is an obstruction somewhere in the cooling system. How? I have no idea. But it definitely is not circulating the coolant...... Now we will start removing the lines and blowing them out with air.

 

[Mudder]

An interesting read in this thread all.

 

[ehart814]

An interesting read in this thread all.

Last night we disconnected the coolant lines and flushed them out one at a time to make sure there were no obstructions. All hoses are clear, and we flushed up through the water jacket out through the thermostat housing - all good. Checked the new thermostat in a pot of water on the stove. Going to use the garden hose to make sure the radiator isn't plugged up somehow (even though we have drained all the coolant at least 5 times now)

 

[ehart814]

Update: Since flushing the lines out, the Wolverine has been running great and not overheating!!! When I put the water hose on one of the long lines going to the front, I thought I may have noticed a little bit of resistance before the water flushed through. I don't know if that line was obstructed, but it seems that was what was causing the problem. We ran it for a while with the cap off and a lot of tiny black flakes were circulating around. I think the extreme overheating deteriorated one or more of the rubber hoses. After the riding season, will probably drop the coolant and flush it out just for good measure.

He has at least 20 miles on it since we finally figured this out, and so far so good. He did say it might be down a bit on power, but he doesn't care. I don't understand how it could be down on power. I think maybe it's belt wear or something. Oh well. If anything happens, I'll report back. But for now, we will be riding.