Another BMW Final Drive Failure

[BanjoBoy]

2009 BMW RT with 60k miles on it. Owner Emelio Vazquez reported it broke in half while sitting at a stop light.
Oopsy.

Holy crap - that happened while he was sittng still?!

I put nearly 90K on my 1150GS and beat the living **** out of it off road quite a bit. There were a lot of flat, wide open, 100 mph afternoons trying to keep up with KTM950's.... thank god they used to build them stronger

The only way this happened when he was sitting still was for him to have basically dropped the clutch.

This IS NOT a final drive failure. It's a failure of the rear U-Joint. The rust colored dust indicates the drive shaft splines were dry and probably stopped sliding back and forth. That puts additional stress on the U-Joint and MAY have been the cause of the failure. The silver mark seen on the inner broken part indicate the U-Joint broke and contacted the housing front the inside. I've seen this before on other bikes.

However, as much fun as it is to simply call this a final drive failure, that is not what it is, nor is the photo in post #35.

Dunno if that's "rust" kinda looks like oily spooge to me? Really don't matter if'n it's rust, final drive, or u-joint, it shows lame ass engineering!

How NHTSA has let this go on fer decades is unbelievable.

 

[Twigg]

However, as much fun as it is to simply call this a final drive failure, that is not what it is, nor is the photo in post #35.

So ... I see that. That's TWO major faults in the drive-train then

 

[ionbeam]

...How NHTSA has let this go on fer decades is unbelievable.

I worked directly with the NHTSA agent setting up the Spider recall. The BMW final drive failure does not qualify as a NHTSA issue the way they define problems. It is key to remember that the S in NHTSA stands for Safety. While the drive line failures are serious, they do not qualify as a safety issue. Dan and I were able to demonstrate how a Spider failure could result in loss of ignition, loss of headlights and loss of the signaling system which all are serious safety problems. The only way the BMW final drive is a safety issue would be the shrapnel flying off the bike and debris left on the road And, perhaps getting your ass fried when the pumpkin lights up.

 

[exskibum]

...How NHTSA has let this go on fer decades is unbelievable.

I worked directly with the NHTSA agent setting up the Spider recall. The BMW final drive failure does not qualify as a NHTSA issue the way they define problems. It is key to remember that the S in NHTSA stands for Safety. While the drive line failures are serious, they do not qualify as a safety issue. Dan and I were able to demonstrate how a Spider failure could result in loss of ignition, loss of headlights and loss of the signaling system which all are serious safety problems. The only way the BMW final drive is a safety issue would be the shrapnel flying off the bike and debris left on the road And, perhaps getting your ass fried when the pumpkin lights up.

So these things will roll to a stop safely when these failures occur? Honestly just wondering, because I imagined some sort of rear wheel or swingarm seizure.

 

[eatpasta]

...Honeslty though, BMW's are great bikes, if you don't have a final drive failure.
Is that what the typical final drive failure is? I had only read generally about the final drive failures and had thought the final drive simply busted internally, I had no idea it was cheap metal just snapping the entire part?!??!?!

This circumstance is a little different - I read this guys posts on ADV.

He was on a trip and was noticing that his bike was slowing abnormally fast when he let off the throttle. He then realized something was wrong with the FD, but instead of having the bike trailered somewhere that it could be worked on, he simply rode it until it the resistance was so strong that it lit on fire.

I adored my GS and miss it every day. I've even kept the seats and the panniers anticipating buying another. It wont be a 1200 though..... 1150

 

[ionbeam]

...How NHTSA has let this go on fer decades is unbelievable.

...While the drive line failures are serious, they do not qualify as a safety issue...

So these things will roll to a stop safely when these failures occur? Honestly just wondering, because I imagined some sort of rear wheel or swingarm seizure.

If the NHTSA is contacted and a problem is recorded that says that the drive line failures cause the rear wheel to lock-up, and the NHTSA gets more than a couple of reports I would expect an immediate investigation.

After seeing the Spider failure consequences the NHTSA agent was back at his office less than a week before Yamaha issued a notice to all Gen II owners describing the problem and asking them to not ride their bikes until a recall was issued and the repair made.

FWIW, the agent says that as part of his job he reads the larger Forums looking for problems and trends. I know he reads the FJR Forum because his email referred to the grounding connectors as Spiders and when talking with him he called them Spiders. He was surprised to find out that the term 'spider' wasn't a technical term, but something we made up here on the Forum

 

[mcatrophy]

... the term 'spider' wasn't a technical term, but something we made up here on the Forum

And "we" got that wrong . . .



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. . . a spider has 8 legs.

 

[HotRodZilla]

Yeah...It's really a ground ant!

It could also be a ground roach!

 

[Redfish Hunter]

Yeah...It's really a ground ant!
It could also be a ground roach!

How do you cook that? Can you make burgers like with ground beef?

I appreciate ionbeam explaining the process and the criteria (I recall him posting that info here before) but I don't understand how the rear end of a two wheeled conveyance breaking loose from the rest of the bike would not be considered a "Safety Issue".

At any rate, I don't wish this kind of misery on anyone. I especially can relate to the misery of folks who are after all our fellow motorcyclists. They enjoy their bikes as much as we enjoy ours.

Knowing that SOME BMW motorcycles suffer these failures has absolutely no bearing on the level of enjoyment I get from seeing Dad on his FJR. I do feel a little smarter about picking the FJR for him though.

 

[HotRodZilla]

Like exskibum, I can't imagine the rear wheel wouldn't seize up if that swing arm came apart while going down the road. Say, hitting some bad pavement at 75mph and it snaps. That sounds very much like a safety issue to me. Actually, much more than the Spider Bites. Hell, at least with those, the rider could coast off the road.

 

[Twigg]

Like exskibum, I can't imagine the rear wheel wouldn't seize up if that swing arm came apart while going down the road. Say, hitting some bad pavement at 75mph and it snaps. That sounds very much like a safety issue to me. Actually, much more than the Spider Bites. Hell, at least with those, the rider could coast off the road.

There are two UJs involved here. If the forward one gives up, the bike would lose drive to the shaft. The bike would slow to a stop with the driveshaft being turned by the final drive and the bike's momentum. In this situation it is unlikely that the housing would break or the wheel lock up, although nothing is impossible.

Seems to me the real problems start if it is the rearward UJ that lets go. In that situation the driveshaft is still being driven by the engine, and could be thrashing around wildly at high revs with 100 hp pushing it ... at least until the rider realizes, and shuts it off.

The breakages seem to be happening when the rear UJ goes and are a consequence of just what I described. Under those circumstances the re are two problems. One is that the thrashing shaft breaks the housing and the back end of the bike could fall off. With only two wheels to begin with, this is not a happy situation.

The second potential problem would be that the broken shaft end could jam and lock the rear wheel.

In the few cases of UJs breaking that I have heard of, none of them has caused an accident, yet oddly this does not fill me with overwhelming confidence.

When the "final drive issues" were raised previously, the ruling was that it was not safety-related, and that may be true. These failures are not failures of the FD, they are a second problem, and I fail to see how they could NOT be safety related.

 

[BanjoBoy]

...How NHTSA has let this go on fer decades is unbelievable.

I worked directly with the NHTSA agent setting up the Spider recall. The BMW final drive failure does not qualify as a NHTSA issue the way they define problems. It is key to remember that the S in NHTSA stands for Safety. While the drive line failures are serious, they do not qualify as a safety issue. Dan and I were able to demonstrate how a Spider failure could result in loss of ignition, loss of headlights and loss of the signaling system which all are serious safety problems. The only way the BMW final drive is a safety issue would be the shrapnel flying off the bike and debris left on the road

And, perhaps getting your ass fried when the pumpkin lights up.

Often that's the trouble w/ the gubment; well intentioned peeps so often get it so wrong.

There wuz a school teacher 'round these parts who commuted every day on his RT. One day he wobbled under a truck 'n died. They wrote it off to rider error, butt I'd bet ya his FD (Or U-joint) let go. We will never know.

I had the whizz go outta mah lame-ass whzzy brakes 'n if'n I had ta stop fast, I woulda crashed, 'n they woulda blamed it on rider error.

This iz another problem I have w/ Bite My Wiener; they'z the most moraly bankrupt co on the planet cuz they know 'bout all these problems, they know their bikes are garbage.

 

[Top_Speed1]

way too funny!

 

[BkerChuck]

This same situation just happened to a friend of mine on Sunday afternoon on I-81 South in Va. She was riding her GS with her daughter as passenger when it let loose. 92k on the bike. Hopefully it will be fixed in time for the Butt Lite.

 

[Brodie]

If that's a single sided swing arm bike, perhaps one could come up with some device to keep it with the bike when it fails like that. Kind of like trailer safety chains. Another safety farkle for the BMW crowd.

I think there might be a way to make some money here. Hmmmmm

Brodie

;-)

 

[Twigg]

If that's a single sided swing arm bike, perhaps one could come up with some device to keep it with the bike when it fails like that. Kind of like trailer safety chains. Another safety farkle for the BMW crowd.
I think there might be a way to make some money here. Hmmmmm

Brodie

;-)

It's likely that keeping the two sliding halves of the driveshaft lubricated might prevent it entirely.

 

[BanjoBoy]

If that's a single sided swing arm bike, perhaps one could come up with some device to keep it with the bike when it fails like that. Kind of like trailer safety chains. Another safety farkle for the BMW crowd.
I think there might be a way to make some money here. Hmmmmm

Brodie

;-)

Like the other side of the swing arm?

 

[eatpasta]

this reminds me a little of the catastrophic Fork failures on the 650's. Have you guys seen any of the pictures from those? Terrifying....

95 miles on the bike - beginner rider!

There are a lot of these "sky is falling" stories about BMW. I can understand people's hesitance to get one but my experience with my 1150GS was exceptional for 90k miles.

 

[Twigg]

There are a lot of these "sky is falling" stories about BMW. I can understand people's hesitance to get one but my experience with my 1150GS was exceptional for 90k miles.

There is nothing "sky is falling" about real examples of a catastrophic failure of a structural part of a very expensive motorcycle.

No one in the 3 pages of this thread has been much other than sympathetic and constructive.

 

[Checkswrecks]

...How NHTSA has let this go on fer decades is unbelievable.

...While the drive line failures are serious, they do not qualify as a safety issue...

So these things will roll to a stop safely when these failures occur? Honestly just wondering, because I imagined some sort of rear wheel or swingarm seizure.

If the NHTSA is contacted and a problem is recorded that says that the drive line failures cause the rear wheel to lock-up, and the NHTSA gets more than a couple of reports I would expect an immediate investigation.

After seeing the Spider failure consequences the NHTSA agent was back at his office less than a week before Yamaha issued a notice to all Gen II owners describing the problem and asking them to not ride their bikes until a recall was issued and the repair made.

FWIW, the agent says that as part of his job he reads the larger Forums looking for problems and trends. I know he reads the FJR Forum because his email referred to the grounding connectors as Spiders and when talking with him he called them Spiders. He was surprised to find out that the term 'spider' wasn't a technical term, but something we made up here on the Forum

Alan -

The NHTSA person had been fed electrical reports for a while and several of us previously had worked with him to get the ignition switch recall. As we live under 10 miles apart the idea was for him to see my FJR, but with my travel we we just were having trouble getting together. When you popped up it was an opportunity and he really enjoyed getting together with you. It seems to me that he was riding up to Americade or somewhere. Anyway, the point is that he'd already had meetings with Yamaha before seeing your bike and he had wheels in motion.

He is a long-time die-hard rider and has several bikes of his own. People would be amazed at how much of his own time he put into his job. While he & I haven't talked for a while, I think he's recently retired or is just about to.

I am aware that NHTSA does have a file on the final drive problems. They are a very tight-lipped bunch and don't let on what they are up to or when. People knock us Gummint workers, but miss little facts like if we talk about a recall before it happens we can influence company stock prices, get caught (easily), and go to jail.

Bob