Irritating noise or problem?

[jb1016]

Not an option in my opinion either,I think I`ll get ear plugs. thanks again for all advice

[Bill O]

I know this is a bit far off and far fetched, but it happened to me.

On my '94, I developed a tick that was more noticable when starting and at slow speeds. It drove me nuts, but when crusing at HWY speeds, didn't seem as noticable. Bike still ran good, and got expected milage. Last long ride was approx for 4k miles around the northwest.

Long story short.... next time I had the opportunity to remove the air box to do some maintenance on the bike, I accidently brushed against the #2 spark plug wire.....and it moved in a funny way. Reached down and grabbed the #2 plug, and it moved....too! IT WAS LOOSE!

Don't know how long it had been loose, but a quick twist of a spark plug wrench, and the ticking mysteriously went away.

Just a thought.

Bill O

[Bobby B]

Searched the site and came up empty. Need some help- esteemed Voyagers!

When cornering at 15-30 mph, I heard a groaning type sound from either the rear tire or shaft. I use Rotella dino changed every 3k miles, bike has 28,000 miles, 2001 variety. Tires are E3 with 10k miles and plenty of tread left. Air in tires and shocks are checked twice a month with only minimal need for adding air, if any . All ideas would be appreciated. Again, used search engine and did not get any pertinent hits. Thanks in advance

Colleague of mine has a 1998 variety with continentals and 45k miles and has the same groaning sound.

[doug of so fla]

Bobby B. The groaning is more than likely the tires if you just hear it into the turn. I had E-3 on rear and it was definitely the tire, Not necessarily the tire ,but tire and road type or condition, because some say E-3 do not growl and some do. Same with Metzler mine doesn't but some say they do, but they may be in a area where the road combination is different. If you are going fast you may not hear it but slow you may. You should be able to tell if it is the tire by just driving it and see if it does it when you go into right & left turns only. It is nothing to worry about if it is the tire unless you really do not like the sound , Again "earplugs" are the cheapest way out. The tread on the side of the tire gets very little wear so the design of the sipes in it may create the sound you here on the turns. Think of the "tire growl" letting you know you have good traction!! Also ck for any side movement with swing arm or rear bearings on center stand. You can run up the rear tire thru the gears on the center stand, if you are "CAREFUL" , to check for any loud internal growl. Hope all this helps!! Ride Safe..

[Bobby B]

Thanks Traveler. Feel much better now. Will check out other items, but tire is fine so long as it is safe

[Farmer Al]

Hello again, sorry for the length of post. I'm going to take back my thread. During the last two years my Voyager's HVAs have gotten noisier. It started out doing it just occasionally and despite various oil treatments continued to get worse. In March I started it, let it warmup and started down the road. Within !/2 mile it started pecking, then what sounded like half a dozen HVAs were pecking. Took it back home, checked things over. Had oil, nothing seemed loose. Was a week before had time to ride again, it did the same thing. Was nice and quiet while idling, then started pecking when I got down the road a ways. The bike was on the center stand both times while warming up. If took it back home and parked it. Finally decided to pull the motor and see what was going on. There wasn't anything loose externally that would have caused the noise. The camshaft bearing caps were tight, no loose bolts. There wasn't any gunk or dirt in the cam area. There was oil in the HVA galley. The HVAs were all pumped up tight, not a single loose one in the bunch and it had sat for two months. No broken valve springs that I can see. The rocker arms on cylinders 1 and 4 exhaust had wear/roughness that the others didn't. All the oil passages were clean, the tube from the pan to the cam. I have not pulled the oil pan off yet. I had fully expected to find several HVAs collapsed.
So have I been barking up the wrong tree. Is it an oil supply problem causing the hva noise? I checked the oil pressure last summer and it was within specs. Could the screens in the pan be blocked or need cleaned? I'm out of ideas as to what the problem is.
The bike has 45,000 miles on it. It's an '03, with California emissions. It had synthetic oil in it when I got it, changed it to Shell Rotella 15/40 and have run it since.
The wife says get it fixed, she doesn't like my Connie. Thanks for the help and info.

[Farmer Al]

Talked with Carl yesterday and parts are on the way.

[debron]

Talked with Carl yesterday and parts are on the way.

Parts to do what? Just curious.

[Farmer Al]

A set of hva's and rockers from an older motor. Carl thinks the tooling for the XII was wearing out and the last year or two of production suffer from it. I thought by buying a late model XII all the bugs would be out of it. The only real complaint I've got with mine is the noisy hva's. I sure hope replacing them cures it.

[Farmer Al]

Carl is fast, got the parts today. Now I have to remember how it goes back together.

[Bruce in OK]

>>Now I have to remember how it goes back together.

Same way you took it apart, only backwards.......

[Farmer Al]

The bike is back together, only have about 50 miles of riding so far but all is quiet. No leaks either. Put in used hva's, waterpump kit, and manifold o-rings. The water inlet o-rings came apart as I took them off, all the others were still pliable.
When I flushed out the hva oil galleys, the exhaust side reservoirs had a lot of dirty oil flush out. The rocker arms were scuffed like from lack of oil. That was the only thing in the top end that was suspicious. So maybe the oil passages were blocked enough to starve the hva's. I will post again when I get more miles of riding in.

[Farmer Al]

I've now gotten about 570 miles on the bike, it hasn't yet made any noise. That's the longest it has gone since I've owned without pecking. Wish I knew what cured it, the hva's or flushing out the oil galleries. Sure is nice to have a quite bike.

[debron]