Swing arm question

[DerekM]

My swing arm oil came out caramel.
I am assuming this means water got in the swing arm, probably via the rubber boot. Besides stoping water from getting in again, the bearings should be inspected according to clymers. Is there any way to inspect the bearings without tearing the swing arm assembly apart? I need to grease the splines still, so it's not too much extra work but I'm not too sure how concerned I should be without riding the bike first. It's a dual shock r65 btw.

[Bob_Roller]

The swingarm needs to be removed to get to the bearings, no way around it .

[Luca]

The bearings are greased, though, and not as critical as drivetrain components.  Wouldn't the real concern be that water had made it's way to the final drive pinion?

[DerekM]

The bearings are greased, though, and not as critical as drivetrain components.  Wouldn't the real concern be that water had made it's way to the final drive pinion?

This was my thinking, they don't seem to be critical, so although a inspection is warrented, I don't want to do unnecessary work before riding it. Currently I have to finish the carb rebuild, grease the splines and run new brake line before I take it down the block, do I need to do this inspection too?

[georgesgiralt]

Hello !
For me, given the very low volume of oil in the swingarm; it could simply be condensation.
If you ride in winter and/or suffer for heavy rain while riding, I bet it's normal for some water to get through.
If I were you, I would put a little more oil than usual, ride the bike and change the oil after a thousand K or so. Then you'll see...
P.S. for me you had too few oil in the swing arm.

[Luca]

There are a few things that can wait until after you have taken the bike around the block.

Before you do lap the neighborhood I would check the transmission and final drive fluids.  If they have leaky seals they might have picked up some emulsified oil from the swingarm, and the bearings in the FD/trans won't like that.

For the near future I'd suggest:

do the spline lube as snowbum advises.  He has you lube the throwout parts (makes shifts even smoother) and also regrease the swingarm bearings (with a rubber tipped grease gun) and re-center the swingarm as well.  Having the swingarm loose also makes the spline job much easier, and having the clutch arm off makes dabbing the tip of the clutch rod with moly grease much easier.

Pull the final drive and make sure the pinion and driveshaft don't have rust on them.  If left unchecked it will wear out a set of splines quickly.

As for checking the swingarm bearings.  You can disconnect the shocks and move the swingarm through it's range of motion.  Any gritty noises from the bearings would warrant further inspection.  You can also grab the swingarm at it's pivot and try to shake it around to make sure that the bearings don't have any slop in them.

Again, I wouldn't sweat the swingarm bearings immediately.  If they are bad they won't cause a catastrophic failure.  Just think of it as a Japanese bike with worn out swingarm rubber bushings  

[Barry]

The only time I've seen the slightest trace of water in any of my transmission oils it was in the drive shaft although not coffee colored like yours.  There is obviously a route in somewhere. There is so little oil involved we could all afford to change the drive shaft oil more often.

Not sure this works so well for the drive shaft oil but it's worth noting that the official BMW service schedule is to change the transmission oils at every major service and also to inspect the oil at the minor service which would pick up water contamination. It only takes a few secs to remove the fill plugs and look.

I would refill with oil a few times until it comes out clean. On the volume of oil to use it's generally accepted throughout the airhead community that the specified volume of 150cc is too much and can lead to migration into the final drive or gearbox. Not something you want to happen until you are sure the water ingress is resolved. 100 -120 cc is considered adequate.