Who's smug now?

[V11UK]

After 41,000 (almost) trouble free miles my V11 has developed a serious fault.....

 

I noticed a small blob of oil under the engine after a run this weekend - yup, a real genuine oil leak. I can now join that select band of disgruntled V11 owners and not feel left out

[tikkanen]

You can run but you can't hide Chris....

 

Hope you'll get it fixed soon so you can enjoy the last weeks of this biking season (It was -2 degree Celcius this morning - the second day in a row in fact. Icy roads and Guzzis are a baaad cocktail, so it's time to hang up the wheels now)

 

Good luck!

 

Søren

[V11UK]

You can run but you can't hide Chris....

Søren

35180[/snapback]

 

Not just any old oil leak the main drive (between engine and clutch) oil seal has gone so it all has to come apart

 

Oh well......still love the bike

[tikkanen]

What can I say but bollocks?

A little tinkering to be done here during winter

 

Good luck with the job

 

Cheers

Søren

[pete roper]

  Not just any old oil leak    the main drive (between engine and clutch) oil seal has gone    so it all has to come apart 

 

Oh well......still love the bike   

35365[/snapback]

 

Oh for f@cks sake!!! Look youse blokes, if a rear main seal goes it's like the bloody Exon Valdez, pints of oil everywhere in minutes!!!! I can't believe that even if your local dealer is a complete cretin that he doesn't know that Guzzi rear main seals very, very rarely blow unless the sump is grossly overfilled. In fact it is one of the few things that the *modern* motors do even less than the old ones!!!!!

 

While it may disapoint some of of our more naieve posters the basic Guzzi donk is exactly the same in all real respects as the venerable V700 of 1967 and oil leaks cone from the same places!

 

1.) Almost always leaks from the bell housing can be traced back to the breather hose that comes off the pipe from the top of the bell housing. Guzzi, for expediency clamp this with a shitty clamp like the sort of thing that they use for ringing birds! they also use really crap hose that tends to perish quickly and crack. When the clamp loosens or the hose cracks or collapses the hose leaks, it then runs down through the hole the pipe pokes through, through the bell housing and dribbles out of the drain slot and people who should know better say, "Uh! You've got a blown rear mainseal mate! That'll cost you a zillion dollars to fix!". If you're lucky while they are pulling the old tart apart they'll notice the pipe is a bit ordianary and replace it and then the leak will be fixed. If not then the leak will recurr within a few days, you'll get the sh!ts, the dealer will get the sh!ts with you, you'll sell the bike and then spend the rest of your life saying Guzzis are awful sh!theaps. Simply replace the hose first, make sure the ball valve is there and not gummed up and use decent clamps to secure it.

 

2.) If that doesn't work there are a couple of other areas prone to leakage. a.) The cam end welch plug. Solution? Clean it with carb cleaner and slather it in epoxy. b.) The two bottom bolts of the rear main bearing housing aren't in blind holes. They should be sealed with Loctite and, if you're paranoid, (Who? Me?) PTFE tape. Finally you may be unlucky enough to have a porous rear main bearing flange but this is stupidly rare!

 

3.) Sniff the oil. If it is gear oil chances are it's creeping up the clutch thrust pushrod because the seals have hardened. Offhand I can't say if the V11's use the same seals (But I'd bet London to a Brick they do!) as the older 5 speeds but these are notoriously leak prone, (Funnily enough mine never leak, I don't know why? I'm not a magician?).Replace them? Problem goes away!

 

Look, obviously I can't say definitively that you haven't got a blown rear main seal but if it were my bike I'd certainl;y replace the breather hose and, if suspected, the clutch pushrod seals, before pulling the motor out. No, I'm not trying to be smart but I've been working on these things for twenty five years and the only blown mainseals I've seen are on bikes that have sat idle for a few years or have been grossly overfilled with oil. Oh and the odd one that had been owned by the sort of moron who's idea of preventative maintenance is to bounce up and down on the seat and as long as the rims don't rub on the road? Well, it's fit to go!!!!

 

Always think *easy*! It's a Moto Guzzi for God's sakes!!!!! Put petrol in it and ride it till it stops!!!!!

 

Pete

[V11UK]

Thanks for your valued input Pete, I will investigate further .

 

What I can say is that the oil is from the engine and not the gearbox (first thing I did when I spotted the oil on the floor was to stick my finger in it and sniff it ) and there's engine oil in the bottom of the bell housing - but no clutch slip. The bike is well used, hence the mileage, but never thrashed.

[pete roper]

I didn't look carefully at your self-descripion thingy before. It's a '99 model, (Short frame? Yummy ) but that means that the poxy breather pipe is now 5 years old and if you ride it lots it's probably cooked. I'd go the hose before anything else. You haven't sudenly had a brain-fade and gone to synthetic oil from mineral have you?

 

I'm told that there is a replacement pipe of higher quality than the original that is a John Deere part, (Which I find wonderfully appropriate ) but i haven't got a part#. Sorry.

 

Pete

[V11UK]

Thanks Pete , it does seem that the breather pipe will need checking out. BTW, I've always used the same Motul mineral based oil since new and changed it every 3,000 miles

[jrt]

Pete, I generally agree with you but I did have a rear main leak on my bike- fixed under warranty and I got a new clutch out of it. It happened early on though- once a rear seal sets in, then you are absolutely right- they rarely blow. I would suspect one of the rubber tubes that carries oil or oil vapor around before anything in the motor.

For sealing the two open holes in the back, I use high stress silicon around the threads and an aluminum crush washer. Seems to seal it right up.

 

Cheers,

Jason

[pete roper]

Pete, I generally agree with you but I did have a rear main leak on my bike- fixed under warranty and I got a new clutch out of it.  Cheers,

Jason

35397[/snapback]

 

I'm not saying it doesn't or can't happen. Simply that it is extraordinarily rare. The thing is that I know for a fact that many, many people have had their motors out to fix seals that were completely fine and the problem just recurrs because the seal wasn't the problem in the first place. Just trying to save people the hassle, if they know this and the dealer doesn't a bit of gentle suggestion may save a heap of hassle.

 

Pete

[jrt]

True, true. I was surprised that rear main seal leaked. I've never had that happen before.

It's also always good advice to check the simple stuff, like hoses, first. Good call, Pete.

J

[V11UK]

FYI - the cause of the leak was the gearbox input seal. I was mistaken about it being engine oil.

I now have a new clutch - replaced while it was all apart, a new main drive seal and new gearbox input seal. The breather system was OK.

 

The work was carried out by Jason Sutcliffe at http://motostrada.co.uk - highly recommended.

 

I can now look forwards to reaching 100,000 miles in complete confidence

Fingers crossed etc. etc.

[Kiwi Dave]

I trust you checked your gearbox input bearing when you replaced the seal? I had a Cali 1100i that had a shagged bearing, the seal was serviced along with the clutch and the bearing was not checked. It started to leak a little oil, and then a lot from the gearbox.

[Guest davidb]

My rear main seal went at 1000 miles and the new one under warranty blew at 90 more miles. the third one in it now is going strong at 4700 miles. Then the timing cover gasket broke. I replaced it myself rather than do two trips to the dealer at 190 miles each round trip. And I don't over fill the crankcase.

[V11UK]

We went over the bike with a fine tooth comb while it was all apart - anything and everything was checked. Luckily, Moto Strada are only 8 miles from where I live and know what they're doing