# Starter Idler Gear Assembly Grenaded - carnage pix inside!



## whoolieshop

All I gotta say is ****! Got some pretty graphic carnage going on inside here.

I attempted to start my 650 h1 other day and when the starter spooled up I heard a loud CLUNK, the bike didn't start and the shifter jumped from neutral to high range..

Got it towed back to my shop and this is what I found:

Pulled my flywheel side cover and could immediately hear crap falling down inside the cover as soon as it pulled loose.









It looks like the side cover let go here and this was the result










here it looks like the second idler gear ate up the inside of the case pretty bad when it came loose.









The starter idler gear spacer and the starter gear shaft are both trashed about 1/2 inch of the hollow shaft was left broken off in the gear. The aluminum spacer is split and oblong shaped now.









The idler gear was lying in the bottom of the case. All the teeth on these gears look okay none broken or missing









The rest of the idler gear shaft extracted from the gear and case









Chunks of the flywheel cover where the idler gear broke free









Metal wiped from my magnetic drain plug









Busted spacer and shaft



Okay so where do I go from here? Obviously I should order a new flywheel side cover, idler gear spacer and shaft, but what about the engine side case that's chewed up? The flywheel/one way bearing seem to be working properly, it freewheels easily and will turn the engine over if turned the opposite direction.

I'm REALLY hoping i'll get a re-assuring answer that doesen't keep me from riding memorial day weekend!

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## whoolieshop

Alright! Got the engine out of the frame, P.S. to remove the headpipe you have to have both the front and rear plastics off!


After milling away the chewed up metal and cleaning the engine out, I swapped the two idler gears in the stock setup for some gears out of an older motor, apparently around 97-98 they had a clutch setup to avoid this issue, no idea why they dropped it unless it was just to save $ on manufacturing.












This is a photo of the two new gears, the one on the left has a steel spacer made on the gear where as the one in my 05 had an aluminum spacer that didn't survive.



The gear on the far right is way different, and has a clutch built into the gear so in the event of a kick back the clutch spins rather than taking out your starter or your case!


Note the steel shaft on each gear is SOLID, the stock ones in my 05 were hollow and one of them snapped in two.




I had a LOT of metal fragments from when everything flew apart in the side cover, I pulled the what can only be described as a small oil pan on the quad and found chunks of metal down near the pick up as well as a small spring! I guess it was part of the recoil starter assembly, anyways filled the motor to the brim with kerosene twice and pulled the drain plug then the oil pan again until I got no more bits of metal out of the engine. Hope to get the engine back in the frame tonight or tomorrow and get her running again.

Since it was this far apart, im also going to do the exhaust mod, full snorks and a radiator relocate over the weekend.

I would also like to give phillips automotive (phillips atv) in New roads, La a HUGE thank you for having everything I needed to do this conversion on hand and shipping it out to me so quickly. By the time I got the motor out and machined away the damage fed ex had dropped off the parts.


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## Polaris425

OUCH :bigeyes:


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## bayou_boy_22

that sucks man.


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## 2010Bruterider

I'm glad you were able to fix it without getting a new case. Holy crap, that kind of damage would have made me stroke out.


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## whoolieshop

Yeah, glad i didn't have to get new cases too, it would have increased the time to do this mod/fix quite a bit. I shouldn't have any further problems now! 

I am going to miss busco beach memorial day weekend now though


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