140 mph speedometer from xs750

[thuffman]

A friend of mine is willing to swap the 140 mph speedo from his 1979 xs750 for my less-than- fully-useful 85mph gauge. My bike is an '81 xs11 midnight special. Any good reasons this won't work? Thanks alot in advance. Tim.

[Pat Kelly]

It works on my MN Special

[UncleSpot]

I've had a 140mph speedometer on my 80 SG for the past year - usable above 85mph

[Wet Rock]

This was a good short post on 140 speedo so i'll ask my ? here.

I just got a EBay 140 speedo off a xs750. My 80sg isnt running but I wanted to test it. Hooked it up to a 3/8 drillmotor and spun it.
Started it slow so it wouldn't peg, but it barely moved. Spun it as fast as the motor would spin, and it slooooooowly "floated" up to about 40 mph. Quickly let off the trigger of the drill to a dead stop, and it sloooowly floated back down.

This can't be the way it is to work. I read a post that said some people have put slow responding gauges on their bikes and it worked its way to proper operation.

How long do you guys think I would have to run it on a drill to get it to free up? Is it a bad gauge ? Don't want to hassle the person who auctioned it, if it's a easy fix.

Wrong Forum, sorry.

[GNEPIG]

.. sounds like it is working to me, your drill cannot spin up fast enough to "peg" the neddle, if the gauge has been sitting on a shelf for a while the neddle tends to get a little lathargic, after it gets some time in service it gets better.. make sure you lube your speedo cable good when reassembling

[jetmechmarty]

XS speedos

To the best of my knowledge, all of the XS speedometers are the same. The late model XS650, XS850, and XS1100 have the same 85 mph speedometer and run the same front tire. On the earlier models, they are the same, but have different indicated top speed. I think the XS650 is 120 or 140 mph, the XS750 140 mph and the XS1100 160 mph. They all interchange easily except for the XS650 models made prior to 1977.

The director of the XS650 Society rebuilds or repairs these units. The last news letter contained instructions for repairing these units.

http://www.yamaha650society.com/

[Pat Kelly]

I have a 140 from an XS750 on my LG. It works fine.

I wanted to hook-up my drill and turn the odometer to the correct milage. I found the drill has to run backwards and was painfully slow. I tried my dremel and it spins it alot faster (15,000 rpm) but in the wrong direction. I just keep in mind that the bike has 21,000 more miles that the (new) odo reads.

[Wet Rock]

Yeah, Pegging the needle wasn't my biggest concern. I did think that running the drill up to max RPM in less than a second would bring up the needle pretty quickly though. If the cable is spinning at 40mph the second I squeeze the trigger and it takes the gauge 10 sec. to register on the dial, I'm in for a few citations.

[Geezer]

For what it's worth, all Japanese motorcycles use the same ratio at the speedo. So in theory any cable drive Japanese bike speedo will work.

Geezer

[thuffman]

Veddy Interesting...

[GNEPIG]

.. ok Tim, i have just finished putting on my 140 mph speedo that i just received in the mail today from a recent ebay purchase. it looks as though it has been sitting on a shelf for a while also. as i was test riding this evening i noticed that the needle didnt really want to move at first, then all of a sudden it jumped right up to business. for a while it seemed reluctant to move at speeds under 20mph then would suddenly jump up to whatever speeds that i was going. after a while longer it started acting more like it was supposed to but not quite right just yet. we will see how it looks by this weekend, but so far it looks like i am leaving positive feed back for the person that i bought it from

[GNEPIG]

.. my apologies to Wet Rock, my last response was directed at him, as he was the one who revived this thread
.. i have recently joined the 140mph speedo club.. i have put about 25 miles on my bike since putting this 750 speedo on and it has turned out to be a good one. it works freely through its full range now, well at least up to 120mph where i ran out of room on my favorite test road.. today after work i followed the woman around while she signaled out of the window of her car how fast we were going and the 750 speedo agreed every time(the womans car is a 04 chevy malibu with 10700 miles)
.. i will be leaving positive feed back
as for your new/old speedo, the only way to get a real test is to put it on your bike (or a freinds) and ride for a few days
..i wish you luck and keep us posted
also may i ask where in fl are you about? i live about 40 miles south of tampa

[chevy45412001]

about speedos

sorry to hyjac post but it looked like a good place to put this???? Can i convert my XJ over to the older style gauges? i really don't care about the fuel gauge and diagnostics $hit to much, i of coarse would rewire turn indicators ,neutral light and such,are there any other concerns???

[GNEPIG]

.. how to mount it might be of concern also and does your speedo have the cable drive.. as far as the back lighting for the gauges and the dummy lights, you could figure out which wires go where easy enough. the tach might be something else. you would have some extra wires to hide

[Wet Rock]

GNEPIG......

I have never seen a XS model in the 26 yrs that I have been in this area,so running the speedo on another bike is probably a long shot.
I'll be awhile before my cycle will be back on the pavement. I guess running it on the drill every once in awhile is my best bet for now.

As for my location, A name you might recognise is DESTIN Fla.
East of Pensacola and West of Panama City.

Wet Rock