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Determining that rear wheel bearings are bad.
Several months ago, January, I had the gf on the back with
stuff in the saddlebags and I noticed a rhythmic sound coming
from the rear wheel as I rode in corners. I immediately decided
it was the rear wheel bearing. So I banished the gf for five months.
I could also sometimes hear it if I was solo, had enough weight in
the bags, and cornered.

So today, right now, I have the rear wheel off and I am rotating the
bearings by hand and they seem fine. Can they be bad?

I ask because swapping bearings for most of us is right there
with having your teeth pulled, maybe as bad as pulling
your own teeth. Well, that was my one experience many years
ago. I already have the bearings at the ready.

I'm probably breaking for dark so I will likely take this up again
tomorrow. Anybody's help would be very greatly appreciated.

If not the bearings, what might be that noise? What are the odds
here?

A comment on rear wheel removal--it stinks. I had to remove the
bolt from my left luggage support, upper rear, to get room to move
the tire. And I definitely had to deflate the tire to get it past the
drive hub. The manual never mentioned that. And I checked the
tire size, it is the correct MV85B15 Elite II. Is this normal?

Thanks again.
Reply
#1 05-28-2009, 07:49 PM,
The Elite II is a tad wider than the stock tires that were fitted when new.
So yes you need to deflate the tire to remove and replace.
That being said, my friend bought a K491 and it slid right in when it was new and inflated.

Did you check on the drive splines, they could be worn.
The only stupid questions are the one's that are not asked.

Reply
#2 05-28-2009, 08:09 PM,
The issue with the bearing isn't so much the bearing itself, but rather the hub that the bearing fits into... Check on the right hand side bearing (side with the drive slines on it)... That bearing has a tendency to become loose in the hub... This allows the bearing to swim while your riding... The sound it makes is much like a stone stuck in the tread... As it gets worse it will make the sound all the time and get louder... I had this issue occur twice on mine... I have now put a GL1500 final drive and rear wheel on the bike as the final cure (much bigger hub on the gl1500 rear wheel)... If you check around the trike shops, you usually can get the whole works pretty cheap... I got the final drive, wheel with good tread on the tire (over 90%), calipar mount, rotor, axle, and the gl1500 swing arm (not needed for the conversion) all for $60... It was from a very low milage bike too... I bought another GL1200 swing arm (of eBay) for $9.99 so that I could go back to the GL1200 setup if I ever wanted to (the final drive bolt holes get drilled out to next size larger for the conversion)... So for $80 total and a few hours work, I have the problem solved for ever (hopefully anyways)...
Here's a write up on it... I've not yet finished the cleanup on the article so you will see it just as I got it (a bit garbled)...
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://pete-marge.us/Rebuild/">http://pete-marge.us/Rebuild/</a><!-- m -->
Ed Zogg
Reply
#3 05-28-2009, 08:35 PM,
Ed Z Wrote:<snip>That bearing has a tendency to become loose in the hub... >

No looseness detected with the fingers.

<Myriad of GL1500 swap-overs.>

I'm thinking you should open a shop! Smile

I don't ride that many miles per year per bike so I kinda
just want to escape with the minimum of effort. (Am I bad?)
Really, it is less that I'm lazy and more that I don't feel
that good about swapping bearings without damaging
the hub or the new bearings.

What I'm hearing, hopefully, that if the bearing is not detectably
moving in the hub, then I'm a ways from serious issues?
I mean this won't lock up on me or something, right?
Maybe a lot of heat and noise at some point, the point at which
I will KNOW that a problem exists and needs to be addressed?

One of my concerns is that maybe that apparently wide Elite II is
rubbing on something and making this noise. I don't see
anything obvious now that the tire & wheel are off, but if that
tire is that much wider then that could maybe be the source
of the noise? Like I said, it is dark and I will have to wait
until tomorrow evening or later to look at this again.

Nice website you have. Very thorough with the mod.
I've bookmarked the site.

Thanks to the both of you that have responded.
Reply
#4 05-28-2009, 09:14 PM,
If you have the wheel off the bike then you could take it to just about any bike shop to have the new bearings installed... Be sure to ask them if the right side bearing came out real easy or not... If it did then you are on the way to having the hub get worse... One temp cure I did find was to use JB Weld on the hub and then install the bearing... I then used some all-thread and large washers to clamp it in tight and square to the hub while drying... This method worked for over a year and was still good when I installed the 1500 rear-end in the bike... I would just hate to be the poor guy that trys to replace that bearing when it comes to needing it...
Ed Zogg
Reply
#5 05-29-2009, 02:34 AM,
in lieu of buying a new rear hub -wheel, or a 1500 rear assembly. I have used JB WEld on outside of the new wheel bearings, let it dry 24 hrs before using bike, last time I did that it lasted 100,000 kms before found a low mileage 1200 rear wheel assembly w hub .
Reply
#6 04-08-2010, 09:39 PM,


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