Final Drive Assembly

[crazy steve]

This question is going out to the guys that have had the pinion gear out of the housing...

HTH do you get the pinion gear back in? Mine came out hard all the way; the manual says to use a slide hammer to get it out, but is silent on reinstall. So do I just beat it back in? I'm giving serious thought to using heat to expand the aluminum, but if there's a trick I'd like to hear it.

As to why I took it apart, I decided it would look good all polished up. It does, but what a PITA. Probably won't do this again....

'78E original owner

[red bandit]

It's been a couple years ago but.....I just tapped mine back in.... CAREFULLY.

[XSokieSPECIAL]

Look here steve.


http://www.xs11.com/forum/showthread.php?t=11703

( ya gotta click the link under TC to get the pics)

[mxmikie]

i have a final drive for a 1100 and a 750 if you get stuck

[crazy steve]

Looks like I'll use heat. Mine WILL NOT 'slide' in; it's not in even a 1/4" and it's stuck.

I'm doing this on my 'spare' FD in case this went bad, but thanks for the offer Mike.

This particular housing must be on the (very) tight side of the factory tolerances. When I disassembled it (I pulled both the pinion and ring gears out), the roller bearing for the ring gear wouldn't come out either, but I figured leaving it in wouldn't hurt anything as I was going to thoroughly clean it all when I was done with the polishing. Midway through the polishing, I set the housing down for a second and the bearing FELL out. I checked, and the housing was pretty warm (you could hold it with bare skin, but barely), so I figured the aluminum expanded enough to open up the clearance. After post-polish cleaning, it wouldn't go back in until I put some heat on the housing with my propane torch. So I'll try the same thing for the pinion. It's all clean/dry, so I won't be carbonizing or setting any gear lube on fire anyway....

When (or if.... knock on wood) I get it in, I'll post how it went.

'78E original owner

[XS1100 Newbie]

Stick it in the freezer for a day. It will shrink the shaft. Works well on a lot of things. You can heat the housing to a little.

[bikerphil]

This question is going out to the guys that have had the pinion gear out of the housing...

HTH do you get the pinion gear back in?

Oil it up, and it must be lightly tapped back into place with it perfectly square. Tap around the edges at different points. Some pics in post 10...

http://www.xs11.com/forum/showthread.php?t=25113

[crazy steve]

...it must be lightly tapped.....

'Light' isn't getting it. I had to give this some pretty heavy whacks to get it out, and it came hard the whole way.

'78E original owner

[crazy steve]

Success!

Heat is the answer. No, let me rephrase that; even heat is the answer.

I tried freezing the pinion assembly and heating the housing with a torch and still wasn't having that much luck, although I didn't use any force.

But I then had one of those 'Dohh!' moments, and put the housing in my powdercoat oven. At 150 degrees, it was still 'sticky', but after going to 180 it went right in, no muss no fuss. That's nowhere near hot enough to hurt anything (ok, you just barely need gloves to handle it) but I wouldn't try this with SWMBO's oven....

'78E original owner