YIKES!!! Tire Slice Discovered on New Rear Tire When Updating Spline

[joejeweler]

Before letting a shop mount a tire, I examine every square inch, inside and out. And I re-examine the outside after mounting the tire on the wheel, but before putting it on the vehicle. Examining tires is exceedingly boring work, and it is easy for someone who does it all day to get so bored that he loses concentration and misses defects.

You said a mouthfull brother,.......it won't happen a 2nd time!

 

[Guest]

I had the brand new stock front tire on my 750 develop a bubble the size of a quarter on the side of the tread area. Bike had less than 1K on it. I worked at a dealership at the time and i still couldn't get Suzuki to replace it. What was worse was, it hard to get any 16 inch front tires then. Had to wait two weeks for one.

 

[joejeweler]

Well,....got a call from JD Tire this morning at about 8:20AM,.....woke me up ( i had gone to bed at 4:15AM
or so) ,...... but my new tire was in!

Got dressed and was over at the store in 10 minutes,.....and was out of the store in less than 15 minutes!

The dealer said he was sorry "it" happened,......after i had paid the $109.42 total with tax. I took the damaged
tire with me,....figuring i could donate it to a playground to be used on a swing maybe?

......and that's why i was a bit surprised with the $2.50 added on labled as "waste tire management fee?
It is possible there's a federal or state requirement for the fee to be paid upon tire replacement,.....even
if the owner takes the tire. We all know how many of these tires end up alongside the highway that DOT
has to deal with later! :-$

First thing i did was give the new tire a pretty good "scan" out in the parking lot (within eyeshot of the office),
followed by a really close going over at home with my jewelry 2 1/2X bifocal headband magnifier!

.....new rear tire looked perfect so i put a healthy coating of the Honda moly 60 lube on the now squeaky-clean splines
(both parts), and began the wheel mounting. I was careful getting everything double checked and tightened
down,......so maybe an hour later the wheel was "good to go"!

Unfortunately, the bike was NOT!

No one to blame but me, but since i had a few days pause waiting for the tire to come in, i decided to take
out the battery box and clean the engine ground just in front of it......

.......and the problem was i went beyond my area of expertise and "pay grade", and added a 2nd (back up)
ground with lovely soldered on ring connectors protected with shrink wrap near the ends. Used some of the
10 guage black wire i had left over from doing the FH012AA Mosfet R/R upgrade last week.

I figured the soldered connections would be a great addition to the original ground leaving the same point
on the engine, and as i followed the original ground wire found it connected to the starting solenoid. (probably
an 8 or 6 guage wire originally there).

Anyway, i didn't remove the 1st ground wire, but when i added the newly made 2nd ground wire to the SAME
connection point on the solenoid all i got was a clicking sound,.....no starter turnover!

OK,......while i'm trying to figure out WHY a 2nd ground wire from "point A" to "point B" might be causing this,
(in my mind it "should" be a better ground,....having soldered on ring connectors?), i decide to unhook the extra
engine ground from the solenoid to make sure that was the problem.

Off it comes, and now the solenoid works fine and the engine cranks over fine and starts right up.

But what to do with that NEW, perfectly good engine ground? The answer should have been,....
........."Rip the $#@!%&!! OUT!"

......but i didn't,......i made the biggest mistake yet on any of my bike wrenching. Please keep it on the
downlow :-$, but if my mistake will prevent just one of you from making the same one,....my "shame" will
have had some meaning.

I decided to give the battery box a "great ground, and attached the new wire as a backup to the right side
screw of the starting solenoid,....the black wire/white stripe one that i "thought" was a simple ground. This
is the screw that you take out to allow the left side battery box componany plate to come off.

......attached it here along with the original (ground?), where the screwdriver is pointing:

......key on, engine starts, and a PLUME OF SMOKE rises from beneath my gas tank!

WTF???? Key QUICKLY turned off,......and then began a FIVE HOUR tour through my wiring harness to find
the damage.,.....geeze.

I take out the battery and b/box, gas tank and side covers also, and found that original black/white stripe
wire (pic above) had melted much of it's insulation,.....and about 6 inches into my following the damaged
wire found it had totally melted thru the copper wire.

....... opening up the wire harness further i was grateful to finally see the END of the damage. (maybe 15" into
the wiring harness)That was where there is a 3 wire crimp connect junction, and i soldered on a new black/white
stripe wire i had (from an old turn signal), and carefully sealed it up.

After the obvious damage was repaired, i spent another hour with my magnifying headband closely inspecting
all the other wires that the melting wire came in contact with. It was mostly just pieces of the melted wire
sticking to several of the other wires,.....and i found none of them compromised in their own insulation covering.

Anyway,.....once i spent the additional 5 hours repairing my self-imposed disaster,.....i am happy to report the
bike is now fixed and running strong as before!

Tonight i went on a 45 mile ride to scuff up the new rear tire a bit. (and check out my repair is case i missed
something) Beautiful weather today,.....75 degrees, 50% humidity, and sunny........

.....but i'm beat!

BTW,....if anyone knows definitively what went wrong here,.....please let me know.

cheers,
Joe T

BTW,.....i think i'll repost this in the electrical/ignition forum,....to allow folks to find it easier, and allow me to post pictures related to this "experience".

Edit: Thread here: http://www.thegsresources.com/_forum/showthread.php?t=194891

 

[Guest]

Maybe it's not a good idea having two grounds in the same place?? No idea here. The way I have my bike grounded is: battery to engine case, R/R to battery and R/R to other side of engine case. No problems.

 

[Guest]

..........and that's why i was a bit surprised with the $2.50 added on labled as "waste tire management fee? It is possible there's a federal or state requirement for the fee to be paid upon tire replacement,.....even if the owner takes the tire....

The fee is legitimate if the dealer disposes of the tire. Scrap tires are very difficult for standard landfills to handle, for many reasons. For decades, most tires were sent to specialized disposal sites that accumulated mountains of tires. When the mountains get big enough, the pressure, slow oxidation rate of oils in the tires, and insulating ability of rubber leads to auto-ignition fires. Tire mountains can burn for years at a time, with small rivers of black oil coming out of them.

Because of these messes, governments require some other type of tire disposal. I don't know what that is.

You should not be charged for disposing a tire that you still have.

 

[joejeweler]

The fee is legitimate if the dealer disposes of the tire. Scrap tires are very difficult for standard landfills to handle, for many reasons. For decades, most tires were sent to specialized disposal sites that accumulated mountains of tires. When the mountains get big enough, the pressure, slow oxidation rate of oils in the tires, and insulating ability of rubber leads to auto-ignition fires. Tire mountains can burn for years at a time, with small rivers of black oil coming out of them.

Because of these messes, governments require some other type of tire disposal. I don't know what that is.

You should not be charged for disposing a tire that you still have.

.....for sure,....IF the dealer disposes of the tire. As i mentioned though i took the damaged tire back with me. (1100 miles on it)

Possibly it is an automatic software addition when they punch in a tire sale, and he missed it. I noticed it on the
detailed invoice in in the car, but was not going back over $2.50 to get a credit on my CC for that.

......been there enough over the last few days!