New Owner and have a Bevel Gear Question?

[drocker74]

My father in-law gave me his 2001 Nomad FI last weekend. I come from having a sport bikes in my late 20's to just recently a hardtail shovelhead bobber. The Nomad has around 62500 miles and is in pretty decent shape. It's been on many 2000 plus mile trips across the states. That being said, it has sat for 2 years since he believe the bevel gear went out while in Texas and had it towed home in Kansas. I started tearing the bike down per the manual and videos as I plan to rebuild the clutch, new plugs, Caddman air filter mod, pipes, tuner, fresh oil and numerous other maintenance issues and upgrades.

Back to the bevel gear. I removed the dust cap that you can see the nut for the bevel gear assembly and I checked for play. There is zero play up down side to side and even in and out. No metal shavings in the oil screen either. Do I go ahead and tear it the rest of the way down and replace it anyways or do I move on to find the real issue. All my father in-law knows is that it would make a whining noise when letting of the gas and I believe pulling in the clutch lever when he was in Dallas area. Does anyone know what else the culprit could be?

[DragonLady58]

Well, check your oil in the rear drive also....make sure it has lube in there....whining is a indicator, so yes, check it.
Get your self a repair manual....remove your angle gear housing as per the manual. If the bearing isn't trashed and all looks fine, while you have it out, have the bearings replaced. If your mechanically adept, you can do it....though I might say, unless you know about bearing shimming and preload....its not for the weak of heart.
If you don't feel completely confident replacing the bearings yourself, pull the housing and take it to one of MaKawas Houses. They'll charge you about $150 to redo it....but they got the bearings, press, etc....
Takes me about a hour & half to rebuild one once I have the parts in hand, if I don't have to play musical shims to get things were they need to be....
Just ask MAS, sometimes its close, sometimes its like a total monkeyfrak....
You'll need a gasket and some gasket sealer to boot....

[MAS Tequila]

Swap the bearing in the FBGD cover, and the one on the case that the output shaft runs through.

You're doing enough to justify it.

I'll bet the bearing in the cover shows signs of going out.