v-v-v-v-v-vibration
Posted: Mon Mar 05, 2001 1:29 pm
This vibration thing is for the friggin' birds.
About a week ago, I posted about how I removed and re-installed my upper
engine mount while doing the valves on my new A14. I think the vibration
increased afterwards. My thought was that removing the mount allowed the
engine to "settle" against the other two mounts (maybe the upper mount was
carrying more than its share of weight prior to the removal).
Well, last night I did an oil change and I also did the counter-balancer
chain tension adjust procedure (where you loosen and re-tighten the little
bolt). I backed it out exactly three turns and upon re-tightening, it
turned easily for the first turn and had some resistance thereafter.
Seems curious.
Anyway, I went for one of those
10PM-on-a-Sunday-I-really-should-be-going-to-bed rides and the bike was
doing fine for the first 10 miles. At one point, I went down a side
street, turned around, and got back up to 4k rpm (60mph) on the highway.
Gee, this vibration is pretty bad all of the sudden. I don't remember
feeling my spine transmit seat vibration into my cranium a few minutes
ago. Not good. I rode the bike home and checked the tightness of the
engine mount fasteners that I could reach without taking the bike apart.
They were all tight. I plan to check the rest of them tonight (once I
have my service manuals).
Is it possible that my counter-balancer chain has jumped a tooth due to a
defective tensioner? How much effort is it to remove the engine cover and
check the timing marks? Are any special service tools required for this?
I rode the bike to work this morning on the freeway. 45 miles at steady
5k rpm - I've made this commute several times before. I've been here for
90 minutes and my hands still haven't recovered from the vibration.
Something is definitely wrong.
This A14, with 1600 miles on it, has been reduced from "swiss army knife"
to "pathetic toy". Hell, it's not even a toy - Toys are supposed to be
fun to play with. I'm going to cross my fingers and hope that it's just a
loose engine mount fastener.
While we're on the subject, I want to buy a throttle lock, gel grips, 16T
sprocket, and maybe handlebars. Even if I get the vibes fixed, I'd still
like to have some improvement over the "normal" vibration level. If the
vibes are here to stay, I have to try to make it tolerable for a while
until my conscience will let me sell the bike.
I've seen quite a bit of discussion regarding install procedures for
various throttle locks. Are there any "no futzing required" solutions on
the market? Buy from Fred? Which grips are the agreed-upon best grips
for reducing vibes? I'd like to add as much grip diameter as possible.
Get these from Fred, too? Handlebars? Which ones? Fred?
I'd search the archives and try to fish for all this information but I
need to be doing work, not wasting time while fighting with Listquest's
damned lousy search engine looking for solutions to this $5000 problem I
just acquired.
RM