Had a pucker moment this morning...

[azcycle]

Coming up on a red light this morning in rush hour traffic. Traffic was backed up as the light turned green, and I had just downshifted to 1st, ready to rev back up with traffic. It was then I noticed the shifter lever was stuck DOWN. Let out the clutch and was in neutral... could get the lever to pop back up... and I immediately thought "the transmission... oh no!" along with "how do I get across two lanes of traffic?"

Luckily I still had enough forward momentum coasting forward, so with some hand arm movements, I was able to show the folks behind me I needed to get over. They all stopped and I rolled up into a construction site alongside the road.

Looking down, the entire shifting assembly was loose, only being held on the the shifting linkage to the tranny.  Turns out the bolt holding the shifting lever to the footrest had backed out. It was still attached to the lever itself, thankfully!

A quick couple turns and I was back on the road. Add that bolt to the list that will get a couple drops of blue locktite!

[Patrick_Krivacka]

had a flash back to when I rode home 16 miles with a shift linkage made from the handle of a five gallon bucket, after mine broke. I thought i was mcgiver until it bent into a pretzel about half way home. ask me how I know the the r65 doesn't like to take off from a stop in third gear.

[Justin B.]

i-man, that's what prompted me to make the heavy-duty selector rod alternative after getting a couple bikes that the "wire" was visibly bowed.

[azcycle]

Thankfully that mod had already been made on my bike... no coat hangers for me. I tried to tighten that hex bolt on my lunch hour today but can't get the hex wrench in that tight space.  I'll have to keep it finger-tight at stop lights on my way home...

[Justin B.]

Yeah, pretty much a "remove footpeg assembly and tighten" kind of thing.  It would be a good time to clean and re-grease the pivot bolt and bushing as well.

[Rob Valdez 79 R65]

I've never needed to use a thread-lock product on my footpeg mounts.  As long as they have the wave washers, and proper torque (a lot), they won't come loose.

I wouldn't be surprised if checking the torque is on the periodic maintenance list.

Check the right side footpeg, and the engine mounts, while you are at it.

[Melena]

It seems that there are a few nuts that need to be checked now and then.  That's what happened to my clutch assembly at the back of the engine when the nut came loose and backed off.  

So, there's another place to check now and again.  My mechanic said that's one place he checks when he's doing a tune up.

[Bob_Roller]

After years of checking the hardware on the R65, I went to a product called 'torque seal' .

It's kind of like a thick caulking compound but it's some sort of lacquer substance, it dries hard after being applied, put it across a nut or bolt head, if the fastener comes loose the torque seal breaks and falls off .

You can give the bike a quick looking over to see if anything has loosened up .

http://www.chiefaircraft.com/airsec/Aircraft/Chemical/TorqueSeal.html

[soc7260]

yeah, I had the whole coathanger shift linkage disintegrate on the motorway once at about 75. That was absolutely no fun. I replaced it with the heavy duty bayt ype linkage, if you don't have it I recomend it, cos' that coathanger is going to go sometime, and probably when you least expect it.