XS1100 Speedometer Lubrication and Parts

[3Phase]

How to lubricate the XS/XJ 1100 speedometer drive and internal parts.


Spray oil, silicon, lithium grease, or your own special lubricant of choice between the speedometer input coupler shaft and the coupler outer casing.
Tightly wrap a cloth or some plastic film around the input casing threads and the small straw for the spray lube.
That should help to force the spray up between the outer casing and the input shaft, then onto the input shaft drive worm gear and odometer driven worm gear.

Do not spray into the blind hole for the speedometer cable, it will just shoot back out and lubricate your face and hands.

Lithium grease will last longer than oil or silicone spray but it will bubble and outgas as it settles onto the parts.

Except for whatever can flow back down and out around the input shaft, the speedometer housing is sealed cannot drain so don't overdo it with the lube.

Too much of any lubricant can contaminate the odometer/trip meter number wheels, the glass cover and the faceplate.
You may be able to open up the speedometer and clean the glass and the number wheels but you will never get it off of the black paint on the faceplate.




The internal parts are difficult or impossible to access without disassembling the speedometer.

The speedometer indicator needle movement is controlled and damped by an adjustable coil spring on the indicator needle shaft.

The spinning magnet on the speedometer input shaft rotates the bell on the indicator shaft and pulses the
turn signal self-cancel reed switch Closed/Open.

The odometer and trip meter number wheels are moved by a series of worm gears driven by the input shaft.




When the speedometer screams before it grenades, that's the input drive shaft binding in the input casing and if it hasn't done it already, destroying the odometer worm gear.

[donebysunday]

lube

I have a cable luber you connect a spray can to, I've extra speedo drive cables I could cut so I could use this luber.
I wonder if the spray from the can would be to powerful and get in the wrong places ? ?

[3Phase]

I have a cable luber you connect a spray can to, I've extra speedo drive cables I could cut so I could use this luber.
I wonder if the spray from the can would be to powerful and get in the wrong places ? ?

If you can get that tool over the cable outer sheath then it should work. You're only trying to lubricate the speedometer input coupler so it doesn't bind in the case, don't go crazy with the spray. You can take the speedometer out of the instrument cluster and pop out the reed switch to grease the worm drive gears but 999.999 times out of 10 that tiny little glass tube will break. You can also pull the speedometer, leave the switch alone, and turn it upside down so that when you spray the oil or grease it will try to flow onto the worm gears instead of just pooling in the bottom of the housing. Don't go crazy with the spray.


The speedometer, odometer and trip meter all work like one of those old wind-up music boxes. The speedometer inner drive cable is a three or four foot long coiled spring that's squished into a square on both ends. When the cable or the speedometer input coupler bind, the cable has to slow down and starts to wind up like the rubber band on a toy airplane propeller until it breaks loose and suddenly unwinds.

When the inner drive cable unwinds it tries to instantaneously turn and accelerate the input coupler faster than any normal, real, acceleration could do it even on a drag bike. The magnetically coupled bell on the speedometer indicator needle shaft can 'bounce' and roll with it but for the odometer/trip meter it's the same thing that happens when you turn a windup key with your hand to force a music box to play faster and spin the little ballerina: the driven gears and shafts start to skip, strip and lose teeth until the key unscrews or breaks off inside the box.

[donebysunday]

Just

realized how much capacity that empty cable sheath would hold before the lube got to the speedo, a bunch.

[3Phase]

realized how much capacity that empty cable sheath would hold before the lube got to the speedo, a bunch.

A bit of rag, paper towel, or scrap of plastic around the straw will work... but the cable lube adapter is okay too! Don't spray too much into the sheath and flood the housing and keep your feet out from under the end of the sheath when you take off the lube adapter.

You'll have to flush the sheath anyway to get the gunk out of it before you put the inner cable back inside so do that before you shoot oil through it and fill the speedo with cable trash and gunk.