1985 Vmax 2nd gear repair - Looking for advice from seasoned techs

[barber1303]

I've put about 2000 miles on this bike since I bought it used from a dealer. Its performed very well until recently it started "ratcheting" in 2nd gear under heavy acceleration (near peak power). I'm familiar with the issue from reading these forums and was prepared for it when it started occurring. I finished out the season taking it easy in second, but it did "ratchet" a few more times before I parked it and began tearing it down.

Upon tear down I was expecting to find significantly rounded off gear dogs, worn slots, and thinned thrust washers. This would be my indicators of what needed to be replaced to get it back to factory fresh. Unfortunately it doesn't look like its going to be that easy. I'm not convinced...yet...that I'm positive I know what was really happening. I'd like to get some better eyes looking at the parts to ensure I replace/fix the right things before this beast goes back together.

Here is a look at the dogs and slots:

Split Washer

Thrust Washer

Main Shaft Slot

None of these parts looked overly worn to me, so I reassembled the transmission and shifted through the gears to see if 2nd gear was fully engaging. To me, everything looks great...the next picture is 2nd gear engagement with its mating gear. The dogs seem to be very well engaged with the slots... I'm at a bit of a loss for why this thing was ratcheting in 2nd gear...thoughts from the forum? What should I check next?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Chris

 

[barber1303]

Forgot to mention, but this bike has about 32000 miles on it.

 

[gentsvmax]

Pack'em up, send them to Sean and he'll get them done. Undercut with an overdrive is the way to go.

 

[Radioguylogs]

I had this problem profusely with first gear on an XS1100 I purchased with 15,000 miles on it.

As in your case, the gears didn't look that bad, but they were bad.

Here is what the gears looked like:

 

[one2dmax]

The first picture of the gear dogs shows they are needing to be repaired. The other dogs aren't too bad but do show a little wear. The slots also look bad and would need repaired. We can help you out and have an overdrive option should you chose to go that way.

 

[jedi-]

As Sean said those dog teeth and its mate are mashed, my friend. Replace those and anything else that looks remotely suspect, you don't want to pull it down again

 

[barber1303]

Thanks for the feedback guys. Looks like I'm in the market for some new gears, a good condition used tranny, or I'll just bite the bullet and get them undercut.

 

[one2dmax]

I'll let you know that in all of the transmissions we've removed (from engines that did not necessarily exhibit trans problems) I have felt comfortable reused a total of 3 of them. And we've done a lot.