'86 rear wheel Q

[kevin-vic-b.c.]

My '86 Venture has felt kinda unhappy on the road lately.... as most of you know that is not normal for a Venture. I got home from my ride today and put it up on the center stand and with my wife as a helper I gave the wheels a good shaking. It seems that the rear wheel has play in, I assume, the bearings.

My question then is..... is there supposed to be some play? How much? The front wheel seems to have none.... should there be? Are wheel bearings still available from Yamaha ?

I will have to also assume that at least the right hand bag and I suppose both mufflers will need to be taken off to remove the rear wheel.... is there a tech link on a "how to ...." for the rear wheel some place here I can refer to?

I know from reading others calls for help I will get lots so thank you up front.

 

Kevin

[capn eddie]

No there should be no play in the rear or front wheels. yes yamaha still sells wheel bearings but are high on there prices, i bought some for the front from allballs.com a lot cheeper. i think they sell most of the bearings except the cylinder one for the rear , but i could be wrong on that. even if they don't just get that one from yamahapartsnation.com they are one of the cheepest when it comes to oem parts. Go to the top of the home page click on search tab inter rear wheel removal then click go and you will see a lot of posts click on some of them to find the one you need . there will be more than one just check them out you will find what you need. good luck with it it's not that bad of a job.

Ed.

[skydoc_17]

Hey Kevin,

You didn't say how many miles you had on your 86'VR, So it is hard to speculate about other things that might be causing this but if you were visiting "my little shop by the creek" I would also have a CLOSE look at the swing arm bushings. But lets help you get to that rear wheel first! With the bike on the center stand, remove BOTH side bag lids. You will see "Acorn nuts" at the rear of the side bags that will allow you to remove the rear reflector with "YAMAHA" on it. A 1/4 inch drive ratchet and metric sockets are "as good as gold" for removing plastic items from rear of your bike. 4 10MM bolts and a few Phillips head screws under the rear fender and under the chrome (plastic bumper) will allow you to remove both side bags. (I put all of the screws, bolts and washers in the side bag they came off of to help me remember where they go) Also my shop is small, so I usually move ALL of the plastic items outside, FAR AWAY from the rear of the bike, so my big feet or a rear tire doesn't end up breaking any of the plastic! Now, with the plastic out of the way, Go to the right foot peg, get down on the ground and remove the pinch bolt for the right side muffler. move back to wards the passenger foot peg and remove the bolt that holds the muffler support bracket. "Wiggle the muffler back and forth and up and down pulling to wards the rear of the bike, the muffler will come off, sooner or later. (don't be shy about that wiggle job) Move the muffler away from the bike. I usually remove the rear fender but some people don't. Now, go to the left side rear of the bike, on the final drive side of the rear tire, remove the cotter key and nut. (big metric crescent wrench time!) I use a piece of plywood placed under the rear tire to lift the rear tire just a bit to take the pressure off of the rear axle. With a decent sized screw driver in the "head end" (right side) of the rear axle i elevate the plywood and pull/rotate the axle until it comes out. (Watch your fingers under the plywood, that tire is going to drop when the axle is removed) Pull the tire to wards the right side of the bike to disengage the splines and roll the tire out of the way. This would be the time to check the swing arm for sloppy bushings, but keep in mind that the rear shock has the swing arm pre-loaded, so you are going to have to "tug" on it pretty good to be able to tell if the bushings are shot. (You are looking for side to side movement, there should be none) Now to the rear tire, place your index finger inside the inner bearing race and move your finger up and down to check for bearing play. Also roll the inner race to feel for the "crunchy" feeling of a bad bearing. Frankly, if your bike has 35,000 miles on it or more and I went to all of the trouble to take the rear wheel off,

I would change the bearings, remove the final drive and grease the drive shaft splines. If your bike has 50,000 miles on it I would redo the swing arm bushings and add zert fittings, but thats just me. Everything goes on in the reverse that it came off. I have pretty good pricing on Yamaha parts, or if you have other questions, please feel free to PM me. I have attached a few pics.

Good luck with your project,

Earl

[Squidley]

Make sure it's your wheel and not your swing arm, pretty much all the 1st gen bearings and sauch is available at a dealer of online parts house.

[islandmech]

Hi Kevin, I live in Victoria and just rebuilt the rear bushings and had all that stuff off my bike. If you need a second set of eyes, PM me and I'll come over and have a look.

 

Cheers, Gary