2005 "Exon Valdez" GPX250 Oil leak

[pengoau]

G'day guys,

I posted before but i dont know where the heck my post went... Anyway...

I'm suffering an oil leak on my 2005 GPX250 and can't for the life of me figure out where its coming from.

My next thing to try is to take off the casing where the gear lever is, exposing the front sprocket. As I think the oil is leaking out the gearbox, onto the chain, flicking up into where the left fairing secures with a bolt to the bike.. Then dripping down onto the sidestand and finally the ground.

Any ideas? From researching it looks like it could be anything and everything... Tho I have a sneaking suspicion its coming from the gearbox.. Checking the breather hoses, they aren't oily and where oil would exit them onto the ground is not where the oil is collecting. Its dripping on the sidestand and off the left exhaust near the sidestand onto the floor.

From the thread that lead me to here, they were talking about an output shaft seal being the cause. If thats the case is that easy/cheap to fix? Also they mentioned bearings in the gearbox or something being the cause possibly as well.. If thats the case wouldn't my bike sound unhealthy? As other than the leak it runs alright and sounds fine. The only other real problem I have is that it seems to not change gears and gets unstuck when I change from say 1st to 2nd and 2nd to 3rd. This typically happens after I've been ridding for awhile. Speaking to others they say it could just be me not kicking into gear properly, but honestly I don't know. As it seems to only happen when I've been on the bike for sometime and so the bike is quite hot.. Would this be related to my oil leak you rekon? I've recently gotten the bike serviced and the mechanic didn't mention anything to me about any major problems. Tho I doubt he would have been looking at the gearbox for an oil, oil filter and carby tune?

Well if you can offer any advice that would be great. Once I get my ass into gear and remove that casing where the front sprocket is, maybe I'll have a better idea. I won't be fiddling with anything much at all other than to clean it with some kero.

[robracer]

First step is to mark the end of the gear shifter so you know the position it is in (there might already be a mark punched on the end) take off the lever then the sprocket cover. There will be a fair bit of muck behind the cover so have a few$2 cans of degreaser ready (chain cleaner if you can afford it) & clean everything you can get to around the sprocket & casing but avoiding the chain. leave the cover off & reset the lever & go for a ride, have a squiz & now you should see where the oil is leaking from. I would guess that it is the shaft seal & they can be easily replaced, but make sure you get the replacement before taking out the old one..... once it is removed the bike cant be run
As for the gearbox problem, try positive gear changes with your foot to make sure the gear is engaged properly, if lazy gear changes is not the problem then you may have worn selector forks, or the main cause for the gearbox to jump is worn dogs & slots.
If it has been hammered the Selector drum could be damaged, anyway start with the oil leak & fix that first, as for the gearbox problem check in with you mechanic & get his opinion

[pengoau]

Thanks rob.

[pengoau]

Also others have said it could be the breather valve clogged up, how do I clean this out? The airbox has been cleaned recently by a mechanic so its unlikely its that but I guess it can't hurt to clean it? Is this a hard job? Will I need to remove the airfilter to run some kero down it?

[robracer]

Find out where the leak is first

[pengoau]

No leak so far today afte rcleaning hte bike down, didnt get to the front sprocket casing.

Tho looking at the oil window with bike level, its quite low but within the 2 lines closer to the bottom line tho.

Need to pickup some motul 5100 10w-50. Its what my mechanic used for the oil change, so will use what he used.

I notice in the owners manual it supports 20w-50 too, whats the benefit of using a 20w over a 10w oil?

Also the recommended oil is 10w-40 but I live in SE QLD and so gets quite hot here so I can see why the mechanic used 10w-50 oil.

[robracer]

You just answered your own question don't read into the oil specs too much, the 5100 is a god all round oil, you can get the 5100 in litre containers for top up's as well

[pengoau]

So use 20w-50 (thicker/heavier) oil over 10w-50 in hotter climates?

Also I'm reading you can get away with using Castrol GTX2? But then there is issues with a slipping clutch at high speeds or you can "stuff your clutch"? Then I read anecdotal evidence about bikes running up to 100ks on car oil? (e.g. Castrol GTX).

Also the american ninja wiki recommends full syntehtic but thats quite exxy for a simple top up, I'll use it for a full change but I think I might just go some Castrol mineral oil for a 1L top up. I shouldn't damage the bike mixing mineral and semi synthetic (motul 5100 thats already in there). I can do the full oil change this weekend, but before then I just want to top it up and think mineral/standard oil specific for a bike should be fine?

Hmm on these forums I've seen Valvoline XLD 20W-50 been mentioned a few times, but thats not bike specific motor oil just "motor" oil. I'm just concerned about clutch slippage and damage thats been mentioned is possible with car/motor oil not made specifically for bikes.

If I'm understanding right, if the motor oil is the right grade and does not have fricition modifiers in it or energy conserving oil then it should be right for a bike?

[robracer]

What I meant was the diff between the ratings is partly from the temp range so you were partly there, but realistically I would not bother with getting that picky.
Stick with the 5100, it was good enough for your mecahnic to use & it is not recommended to mix oils & def don't use car oil as it is true what they are saying about the wet clutch.

[pengoau]

Don't know what I was thinking last night, I'm going to do an oil change and switch the oil from Motul 5100 to the Castrol 20W50 bike oil (Actevo).

[pengoau]

After posting elsewhere, got put onto shell advance sx4 20w-50.. good thing too as no one seems to stock the castrol or motul I was after. Fortunately found one place stocking the shell advance. Will do an oil change and clean out the front sprocket casing.

[robracer]

+ newspaper under the bike for the clean out...... if you like your driveway to not be stained that is
let us know what you find.

[pengoau]

bloody 2nd hand bikes! In the supplied toolkit for hte bike, it doesn't have the tool to undoe the front gasket casing... Not to worry saved me from a bunch of work . So since I can't work on the bike and try and fix this leak, I call up a mechanic i got put onto, without going into to great detail he was able to name the symptons to a tea i'm having. He rekons its some gasket behind the coolant bottle. So booked it in next week, about $160~ all up for parts and labor (new gasket, oil change). So there you go where I thought it was, is totally off the mark and would have been a waste of time . I would have needed to take it to a mechanic anywhere if the problem is where this mechanic I spoke to rekons it is.

[robracer]

Mate the TORX sockets are readily available from bunnings you might save some dollars & you will have a new addition to your took kit

[pengoau]

Any excuse to get out of work . That said I really want this problem sorted and so I'm just going to get the experts to sort it for me. As much as I'd like to save money, I want the problem fixed rather than backyard mechanic it.. if you know what I'm mean (valvoline, heh). I'm somewhat reassured that it will be fixed by the place i'm going to since he nailed all the symptons of the problem without me going into much detail.

Also the shell advance sx2 oil is 15W-50 instead of 20W-50 that my manual say it runs. The manual does not list any 15W-XXX oil, but the mechanic that sold me the oil says he uses it in the workshop and in the qld climate it will run fine... Being that the bike runs 10W and 20W, is 15W ok even tho its not listed? What pisses me off is I rang up asking if they have 20W-50 in the shell advance and they said yes. And I asked them to double check as most places stock only as high as 15W then I get there and notice its 15W grrr. Tho the mechanic did show me some things on the gpx he had for sale which was the same as mine, when I was describing my problem.

I bought it as the bike is low on oil and its time anyway to do an oil change. Then I get home and can't work on the bike, then speak to a mechanic about the problem and find they will change the oil as part of the fix and I'm like fuck why did I bother with this oil lol. Guess I'll put it aside for the next oil change. Then I had to run around tracking down some motul 5100 so I could at least top up the existing oil so I can ride it next week to the mechanic I'm seeing. Also this dude aint exactly local either, up in Brissy so they better fix it. Tho he seems knowledgeable enough and has a big reptuation for being really good. Alot of people recommend him off another forum, so yeah lets see how good he is!