posted November 25, 2014 10:05 AM
Doesnt go down the road right... My ZX14 was in an accident when I bought it. The forks were slightly bent however you caouldnt tell with the naked eye. It seemed to go down the road ok than. I replaced the forks and triple tree and put on new tires and now it feels squirrelly going down the road like it doesnt track right. I cant find the issue. Im thinking of taking it to the local shop- I guess they have like lasers they said to check out the alignment of everything? What I heard.
Any ideas? Any inspections I can do? I know the forks are straight as is the triple.
posted November 26, 2014 09:35 AM
rear tire aligned right? What type of accident, low or high side?
____________
2006 ZX-14: Murdered out, in the dirt, extended, sprayed, air shifted, geared--GONE
posted December 01, 2014 12:02 PM
Yeah the rear tire LOOKS ok. The marks are lined up and I used a caliper to check the alignment. I guess the swingarm could be bent but I'm not sure how to check this. The accident was the guy went off the road taking a turn too wide. Thats all I know.
Also who does frame inspection close to Michigan? Can I inspect it if so how? Everything LOOKS straight.
posted December 01, 2014 02:54 PM
Make sure all the motor mount bolts are tight.
I had a few tha managed to work themselves loose and my bike felt weird .
____________ '06 Passion Red ZX-14
posted December 01, 2014 03:00 PM
Also you can look at the contact area down the middle of the tires to see if at least they are riding straight.
Sometimes if something is off enough you can spot it that way.
If you rode through a little dirt and stopped straight you examine the center of the tires to see if the" dirt stripe" down the middle of the tires are straight down the middle or off to one side or the other.
posted January 07, 2015 02:26 PM
Steering head nut to tight will cause problems, will cause you to constantly be correcting steering direction.
The bike will feel like its wandering on its own.
Also check: Tire pressures , cable binding, sticky brakes, bent wheel, bent brake disc
posted January 07, 2015 06:33 PM
Really? Steering head too tight? What is this nut supposed to be torqued to? What do you mean constantly correcting steering condition? Thats kindve how it feels - wandering.
quote:Really? Steering head too tight? What is this nut supposed to be torqued to? What do you mean constantly correcting steering condition? Thats kindve how it feels - wandering.
The best way imho to adjust the steering head is to jack the bike up straight and have the front wheel off the ground,
let the steering fall in both directions.
The steering should fall on the steering stops softly .
if the steering falls short of the steering stops then the steering head nut is too tight.
if the steering bounces off the stops then th steering nut is too loose.
____________ '06 Passion Red ZX-14
posted March 25, 2015 08:52 PM
I wanted to report out what I've discovered. It was due to over tightening the steering stem. I was overzealous tightening up the top bolt but by doing this it tweaks the triple and it does feel weird. Loosen it up so where its tight and not real tight and wow - much better. Does anyone know what the torque of the top bolt on the triple is supposed to be torqued to? Thanks for the help. Nevr wouldve thought it woudl be something like that.
posted March 27, 2015 09:39 PM
Edited By: INTIMIDA2OR on 28 Mar 2015 05:40
quote:I wanted to report out what I've discovered. It was due to over tightening the steering stem. I was overzealous tightening up the top bolt but by doing this it tweaks the triple and it does feel weird. Loosen it up so where its tight and not real tight and wow - much better. Does anyone know what the torque of the top bolt on the triple is supposed to be torqued to? Thanks for the help. Nevr wouldve thought it woudl be something like that.
Awesome news!
But sounds like something is out of place by the way you describe it.
So under normal circumstances the large nut that locks down the top tripple clamp is supposed to be pretty tight . I don't have the service manual in front of me but i will take a look at that in a bit. But my point is that the nut can be overtightened but it shouldn't tweak the top clamp. I think the top clamp isn't sitting flat on top of the spanner nut under the top clamp.
Loosen the top clamp allen bolts all the way and then tighten the large top nut and see if the top clamp bottoms out and tightens evenly with out tweaking .
posted March 27, 2015 09:44 PM
Also do all the adjustments and tightening with the front wheel off the ground otherwise there's too much pressure on the top clamp to allow it to go together properly.
____________ '06 Passion Red ZX-14
posted March 27, 2015 10:01 PM
The hardware order goes : large nut ,washer ,then the top clamp, and under are the spanner nuts. There should not be any other hardware under the top clamp . When completely loose (also loosen the handle bar allens) the top clamp should bottom out and sit flat on the spanner nut . If it doesn't and there is a gap between the top clamp and the spanner nut then you wont be able to tighten the large nut on top properly without tweaking the top clamp.
____________ '06 Passion Red ZX-14
posted April 18, 2015 08:40 AM
YOu're the man intimida20r. Been a lot of help. What I did was tighten the forks before the center nut and the top clamp wasnt sitting flush with the spanner nuts. I loosened up the top clamp so now it sits flush and tightened the center bolt FIRST. Hopefully that fixes everything.
posted June 10, 2016 05:54 AM
Edited By: wildncrazyguy on 10 Jun 2016 06:56
sigh- problem has resurfaced.
Ok so I had bike in storage for a year. Drove it and wow - no issues. Everything was great. I've put about 500 miles on it and now out of the blue when driving down the freeway the bike feels unstable. I can weave side to side and is dotn feel anything but when i'm driving in a straight line the bike wobbles. Feels so bad - it feels like a bearing is shot with the tire wobbling everywhere yet when I pull on everything in the garage- everything is tight. The patch on the tire is right down the center too. Just feels real unstable at highway speeds. More ideas? Seems weird it was fine and now it isn't. Is there something that could've loosened up where the bike would be fine after sitting a year and after riding it awhile something loosened back up? Fork oil? Bearings loosened etc?
posted June 12, 2016 01:50 PM
I never got rid of the "doesn't track right" feeling after I crashed my 12 many years ago. Shop couldn't find anything wrong, aligned everything. But just never felt quite the same.
Any chance you are just being fooled by a piece of bad road? Does it feel off if you drive it down the same road you did when you first got it out of storage?
posted July 07, 2016 10:00 PM
My 06 14 had a very unstable feeling at speeds of 100mph and higher after i crashed it in 07. Restored the whole bike and rode fine at low speeds and turned fine in the canyons. It eventually got worst and i couldn't go fast anymore so i tore her apart and checked every thing. I fouund that all the motor mount bolts and mounts were loose and some were hand tight.
After tightening it all up she was back to being a rock steady bike all the way to 200 and beyond. Could be a similar problem with yours.
____________ '06 Passion Red ZX-14
*Lee*
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posted November 25, 2014 10:05 AM
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