Good info Hondo - as always. Keep on reporting what you find. You're a high miler and will be one of the first to know what to look for regarding maintenance and so on.
Chaincase lubricants - I have been using fully synthetic engine oil in my sleds for the last 4 years, both the stock RX-1 and the Turbo RX-1, with good luck, in fact I use the same oil as I use in the motor. I've had no problems with chaincase bearings, changed all drive chain bearings on the turbo sled when going turbo, all chaincase bearings were in good shape, but changed them for the piece of mind.
I add 100 cc or 1 deciliter (approx 1/10 of a quarter) more when using engine oil than the book calls for using gear lube. If the service manual says 250 cc of gear lube, I use 350 cc of engine oil.
My take is:
- motor oil is thinner so you will have to add more to properly oil the chain and gears as motor oil does not stick to metal as well as gear lube.
- more oil will help keeping temps down.
- more oil takes more time before it breaks down
- I change the chaincase oil every 2000 miles
Chain deflection is paramount, adjust the chain finger tight, meaning tighten it as hard as you can with your bare hands, no tools used. When tightening the locknut make sure you do not tighten the adjuster bolt any further, this can happen and your chain deflection gets too tight, putting too much strain on the upper and lower bearings, causing a premature failure of one or both bearings.
I know for a fact that using fully synthetic engine oil works well on my two RX-1s, but I have no way to tell if it will be a success on other sleds.
I have this idea from, my friend who is Yamaha mechanic, who also is a partner at my local Yamaha dealership.
