markjenn
Well-known member
Hi, I've got a 2005 FJR with 22K miles. I arrived home yesterday from a short two-day tour in near freezing temps to find quite a bit of oil on my rear wheel, final drive and swingarm - a real mess. This is not a minor leak as everything in the rear wheel area of the bike has some oil flung around including the wheel, final drive pumpkin, brakes, tire, etc.
My first thought was final drive seal failure (ala BMW's typical failure mode), but the wheel hub where the splines engage the whee is dry, the drive shaft cavity is dry, the final drive oil level is right up to the fill hole, and the aft end of the driveshaft where it engages the pumpkin has only a tiny bit of seepage and no sign that even that tiny bit of seepage is moving forward to the weep hole at the bottom of the swingarm just forward of the acorn nuts. The back of the engine is completely dry and there is no oil in the airbox. And the biggest concentration of oil is forward of the final drive pumpkin.
I do have oil all the way forward towards the bottom of the shock which is a Penske. I thought this oil had just been blown forward by turbulence, but I'm now suspecting I've got a blown seal in the shock, perhaps aggravated by riding in very cold weather. The upper part of the shock with the connections to the remote reservoir is dry, but it is pretty oily down near the bottom. But this seems like a lot of oil to be coming from the shock. Any other theories I should consider?
- Mark
My first thought was final drive seal failure (ala BMW's typical failure mode), but the wheel hub where the splines engage the whee is dry, the drive shaft cavity is dry, the final drive oil level is right up to the fill hole, and the aft end of the driveshaft where it engages the pumpkin has only a tiny bit of seepage and no sign that even that tiny bit of seepage is moving forward to the weep hole at the bottom of the swingarm just forward of the acorn nuts. The back of the engine is completely dry and there is no oil in the airbox. And the biggest concentration of oil is forward of the final drive pumpkin.
I do have oil all the way forward towards the bottom of the shock which is a Penske. I thought this oil had just been blown forward by turbulence, but I'm now suspecting I've got a blown seal in the shock, perhaps aggravated by riding in very cold weather. The upper part of the shock with the connections to the remote reservoir is dry, but it is pretty oily down near the bottom. But this seems like a lot of oil to be coming from the shock. Any other theories I should consider?
- Mark
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