Ok. So I go to Mid-Ohio today for the superbike races. Great time!! Leaving for home at 4:30, tons of traffic, so i use the GPS to navigate around it. Come to a stop, pull the clutch in, hear a bit of grinding. Put the bike in gear, hear some really serious grinding. Bike barely moves. Pull into parking lot, call for help and a trailer. Clutch spline failure?? I have no idea . Whenever the clutch is pulled it grinds a bit, when put into gear it sounds like a mule going through a meat grinder. Now when the bike is off and in gear, it still rolls freely like it is in neutral. Can anyone give me an idea? I've been hearing so much about the spline failure, but have never really heard anyone explain or describe what happens when it occurs. I have an 04 Rockster with 16k on the clock. I am seriously thinkin of just baggin the bike and going in a completely different direction regarding a new bike. Help diagnose this please . Oh and by the way, I think this means I am definately out for the Hungry Mother gathering
See, I told you guys, half the time I dont know what I'm talking about.
09 Someting?? Lifer 607
Leaving for home at 4:30, tons of traffic, so i use the GPS to navigate around it.
It fits the plausible theory I mentioned before. Summer heat + stop-n-go clutch slipping heat added to the clutch disc and it's splined hub. In a 10 minute period you can slip and engage the clutch 30 times or more. Things get so hot the clutch disc's hub is annealed. Unless you select neutral occasionally and let the clutch out to dump some heat into the spinning flywheel, it will get very hot. Fueled with enthusiasm from the races, you may have even tried a few holeshots in that traffic jam.
It will have to come apart to make it right again. It'll be expensive even if you do most of the breakdown work, like deliver just the transmission to the BMW dealer. This is depressing to us all.
My friend I think you just joined the underserved......as no one with an expensive and supposed higly reliable BMW product should be exposed to this failure without OEM reparatin. Yes, let the pundits say that there is really no problem but just a few isolated cases.....BMW loves them.
Best of luck to you and thank goodness it didn't happen in the middle of slab traffic.
Member #312
06 Suzuki Burgman 650 "state of flux"
79 CBX
Johnny----very sorry to hear of this. I have an 04 as well with 25K on the clock. All this increasing talk of spline failures is making me a tad nervous. I put 42K on my 03 prior to the accident. I would expect these machines to go many times that without a major failure.
Since it appears I will be doing less winter riding this year I may put my bike in my shop and try my hand at pulling the tranny and doing whatever preventative maintenance I can. (provided it's in good condition when I pull it)
Good luck Johnny
Wayne
The Older I Get, The Less I know. (in honor of MikeCam
'05 RT
'04 R
'03 R
CB750
KZ750
HD 350 Sprint
CycleRob wrote:
It fits the plausible theory I mentioned before. Summer heat + stop-n-go clutch slipping heat added to the clutch disc and it's splined hub. In a 10 minute period you can slip and engage the clutch 30 times or more. Things get so hot the clutch disc's hub is annealed. Unless you select neutral occasionally and let the clutch out to dump some heat into the spinning flywheel, it will get very hot. Fueled with enthusiasm from the races, you may have even tried a few holeshots in that traffic jam.
It will have to come apart to make it right again. It'll be expensive even if you do most of the breakdown work, like deliver just the transmission to the BMW dealer. This is depressing to us all.
Definately no holeshots. We were in traffic for about 30 minutes. The funny thing is, I'd say 80% of the time the bike was in neutral, because we were going downhill, and my hand was getting cramped fussing with the clutch.
See, I told you guys, half the time I dont know what I'm talking about.
09 Someting?? Lifer 607
From what CycleRob says it appears that riding style plays a part in early failure. But you weren't riding in such a manner as to allow excessive heat to build. I'm wondering if there is anything we can do in a preventative sense to prevent this from happening?
Wayne
The Older I Get, The Less I know. (in honor of MikeCam
'05 RT
'04 R
'03 R
CB750
KZ750
HD 350 Sprint
Johnny - Sorry to read about your clutch/transmission. Crappy situation for all of us, really. We should stage a march on BMW's New Jersey headquarters. Please let us know how it turns out.
Perhaps it was fortuitous that Mrs. Sweatmark and I cancelled our big trip to the wilds of western Canada earlier this year... our roll of the dice might well have resulted in a disabled R1150R in the middle of nowhere, with the two of us riding the other bike home. That's our nagging concern, having two of these machines we love but don't trust 100%.
Called the Dealership in New Philly Ohio, spoke to the service tech. As soon as i said clutch splines, he literally said "oh Sh*t". I asked him if they had experience with this problem, and he said "Oh yeah, we have 4 of em sitting here right now waiting for "transmission" work". And that he couldnt get me in till the 25th of Aug. Also said I'm looking at a MINIMUM of $1600. He also said he used to be able to call BMW and they would help pay 50% of the repair bill as a show of goodwill, but now their is a new guy there that tells them "If its not under warranty, we're not doing a thing". Wish one day I could meet up with this corperate F#!ker in a dark alley, I'd shove the worn clutch shaft so far up his ....., it'd knock his teeth out. Ok sorry brief moment of rage, I'm better now
See, I told you guys, half the time I dont know what I'm talking about.
09 Someting?? Lifer 607
1st - who diagnosed clutch spline/input shaft spline failure? You have a driveline problem - no specific part/component identified yet.
2nd - if you go the dealer route, let them do the troubleshooting to identify the problem. Don't pre-diagnose for them - it tends to cost more and adds little value.
3rd - if it is clutch splines or input shaft splines, try to get the old part and send it to Al or Lobo for their analysis.
Johnny,
Good move on calling Mathias in New Philly. They got me back on the road within 2 hours, on the way to the Bash. Never heard of any complaints about their work, etc.
Jeff (lifer #289)
'17 F800GSA
'04 R1150R
There ain't no education in the second kick of a mule!
Leaving for home at 4:30, tons of traffic, so i use the GPS to navigate around it.
It fits the plausible theory I mentioned before. Summer heat + stop-n-go clutch slipping heat added to the clutch disc and it's splined hub. In a 10 minute period you can slip and engage the clutch 30 times or more. Things get so hot the clutch disc's hub is annealed. Unless you select neutral occasionally and let the clutch out to dump some heat into the spinning flywheel, it will get very hot. Fueled with enthusiasm from the races, you may have even tried a few holeshots in that traffic jam.
It will have to come apart to make it right again. It'll be expensive even if you do most of the breakdown work, like deliver just the transmission to the BMW dealer. This is depressing to us all.
I doubt heat is a contributing factor given that we would see a lot of failures coming from the Soutwest, where riding in traffic when it's 100+ is the norm this time of year. And, no one on the sport-touring site has ever mentioned heat as a contributing factor and those guys have done some serious analysis on spline failure.
In trying to figure out what's causing these failures I came up with a few most likely answers. What causes too many of these failures before 20K miles?
1--Poor shaft heatreat or spline surface case hardening.
2--Errant process in pressure forming the sintered metal hub of the clutch disc.
3--Excessive clutch friction heat weakens splines.
4--Misalignment of the crankshaft & input shaft axis centers.
I'm leaning toward #2, the fault of the parts supplier more than BMW, but BMW should grant free, goodwill customer repairs. This kind of failure should NEVER happen. Four bikes in the dealership with the same spline problem as yours? They expect the customer to pay for it????
Good list. Across the industry, where clutch hub splines and input shaft splines fail with more regularity than many realize, the number one cause of failure is axial misalignment, followed by excessive loading, poor metallurgy (heat treatment, hardening, castings), ambient heat, and overrun. Solutions in the manufacturing, fabrication, assembly process are to use more high quality parts and hand labor but that adds substantial cost.
I'd wish for a Mean Time Between Failure in the 100,000 -150,000 mile (many millions upon millions of revolutions) range rather than the 40,000 mile range even for a high wear and tear assembly such as this one.
BMW's position is irresponsible with total lack of sensitivity to those loyal to the brand. As far as I'm concerned they deserve anything they experince as a result of their actions.
It's always the consumer the one that has to pick up the tab for the ills of the provider.
Member #312
06 Suzuki Burgman 650 "state of flux"
79 CBX
. Whenever the clutch is pulled it grinds a bit, when put into gear it sounds like a mule going through a meat grinder. Now when the bike is off and in gear, it still rolls freely like it is in neutral. Can anyone give me an idea? I've been hearing so much about the spline failure, but have never really heard anyone explain or describe what happens when it occurs. I have an 04 Rockster with 16k on the clock. I am seriously thinkin of just baggin the bike and going in a completely different direction regarding a new bike. Help diagnose this please 
. Oh and by the way, I think this means I am definately out for the Hungry Mother gathering 
. I cannot believe that BMW will not recognize this as a problem. So......how much bank are we talking about to get this thing fixed? 
