KLR doohickey

[sctparker]

I borrowed the tools thru the mail and  I checked it on the '09 and the adjustment spring was just laying there with no tension I put a spring on I had from a previous bike  , now I'm going to go back and put the torsion spring in it's suppose to be better  So I've ordered the parts and decided to get the  tools   going to do this sometime after Christmas. If anyone  wants to get their parts and do theirs at the same time or  needs to borrow the tools I should have them in a few days .

[lazeebum]

It's not a hard job, and worth the effort.

[Zeus]

I'd say at least 95% of all KLR650 owners don't know about resetting the spring. The doohickey breaks because it starts slapping around with no tension on it from the spring after it gets slack in it. That's why one would put the torsion style spring in it, BUT if you reset the spring every 6000 miles or so there's never a need for doohickey upgrade.
http://youtu.be/Lot1NScmyGI

I stumbled across this video when mine was making excessive noise from the loose spring and was looking into the upgrade procedure. Mine is a 2008 oil burner btw

[sctparker]

The balancer tension adjustment has nothing to do with the spring tension. The spring should always  have tension to pull the adjuster to tighten the chain.The 2007 and earlier the adjusters were prone to breaking and causing damage. Then they redesigned the adjuster in 2008    The current 2008 spring is a little over 46 mm long should be approx. 35 mm. The 2007 and earlier springs (back to about 1989) were 40 mm long.The 40 mm spring is usually too long by 5k miles in the earlier bikes, and did not have enough tension to take the excess slack out of the system. The 2008 - current spring or adjuster is not likely to break. It will, at some point, fail to take the excess slack out of the chain hence the reason for the tension spring. This '09 has less than 6k miles and the spring had no tension, I bought it new and have adjusted it with every oil change. I have also seen where mechanics  have put the new shorter spring on with needle nose pliers and score the new spring and it break at the point where it slipped out of the pliers.

[Zeus]

I only know what I know. Mine had 18k on it making excessive noise. Once resetting the doohickey AKA balance tensioner it was as quite as Eagle Mike's doohickey mod.
I don't understand why spring tension wouldn't have anything to do with it since the spring is the primary piece that makes it operate or fail.
Mine is quiet after resetting my balance chain tensioner spring as Kawasaki calls it.
Maybe this is a reason why Kawasaki never addressed this as a factory defect and called them in for warranty repairs. And the Kawasaki Long Range has been around for a few years now.
http://youtu.be/eVHlyOzdv1A
http://youtu.be/Hsj72m7rm9w

You say tomatoes I say tomotoes, lol.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[sctparker]

I miss typed in saying it has nothing to do with the tension of the spring  every time you you loosen the bolt to tighten the chain you loose tension in the spring resulting in it being to short to keep doing it's job . Here Jurgen from South Africa explains it very well  https://youtu.be/hsYTaI1vL08

[Zeus]

That was a very informative video. I learned mine may be victim of the "dark hole syndrome".
I appreciate what he said and he did point out the fallacy of the OEM lever being almost out of adjustment at just under 7k miles which is why we reset the spring to give it the tension for automatic adjustment. Never once did he mention the reset mechanism that Kawasaki included for that purpose.
I mentioned that 95% of KLR owners don't know about the reset procedure. It's probably more like 99%.
It's a great topic.
The Eagle Mike doohickey mod is probably the most popular. When I reshim my valves I'll yank the jug off and put a 685 bore kit in it, do the exhaust cam mod and check for that deep hole syndrome thing he mentioned.
When are you going to do yours?
When you have the cover off, reset the spring as shown in the videos and watch what happens. You get that adjustment back 😎
Are you local?  I'm in Pelham.



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[sctparker]

 Resetting the  balance chain tension doesn't make the spring have more tension, it has what it has, if it's to long it runs out of tension and is as short as it can get the same as it would be if it was unhooked this is my stock the way it was at



spring hooked to the adjuster notice the coils have no space between them thats oil sitting on the coils of the spring not running thru ,was the same length when it was out


when you loosen the bolt the spring tension pulls the adjuster tightening it with it's tension holding it until  you re-tighten the bolt to hold the adjuster (you can't make the spring have more tension by loosening the bolt every time it does its job it gets shorter)  mine had very little adjustment left even if the spring had tension to do the adjusting

but now I should be good got a new better fitting doohickey that don't rattle on the shaft and has some adjustment left  and a torsion spring to do the tightening when I loosen the bolt and if it ever looses tension for some odd reason I can just re-drill the hole.

I also checked and don't have deep hole syndrome.  Glad that's done

[Zeus]

Thanks for the update!!!
I guess that answered a question for me that's been on my mind for quite a while if it actually worked.
Maybe when I do mine I'll upload a YouTube video to clear up any misconceptions one may have like myself.
Thanks again and Merry Christmas


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[sctparker]

If you don't have the holder and the puller you are welcome to pm me and borrow mine so you don't have to spend the extra $

[Zeus]

Thank you. I appreciate any help I can get


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk