I put on my big tires today to go play in the mud. The quad was doing great, this was the first time I had my 500i with my big tires on in the mud. Well I was playing in this one mud hole going back and forth trying to get some good action shots (I'll post those later on.) Well I heard the worst thing you can hear when you run big tires, a pop. I looked at where the sound came from and noticed my tire stopped spinning, I looked over on the other side and that tire was spinning, thank god. I thought to myself it was a broken CV-joint, no prob, not the end of the world. Well I got winched out of the hole and the tire would not break loose so the other quad pulled me and I was giving it throttle. Well during the tow we both got stuck. It was a hill of sand, so we unhooked the rope and I backed down, when I backed down I could see the rear tire moving, I was happy. I put the cat in two wheel drive praying to get 2 tires to spin, nope. Ok, it must be a CV-joint. On the way home I drove through a little water pond to clean off the quad. My quad partner followed me in to clean off too. He made it through the first time but he went back through for a second cleaning. He didn't make it, he some how got stuck in the middle or something and drown his quad. I had to go in and push him out with my bumper, the water was up to the bottom of my racks. I guess the short Honda couldn't handle the water that high. Anyways I had to tow him home, I found that pretty funny, so did most of people we met.

Well I got it home and took a closer look at it the problem. Its not a CV-joint after all. The axle pulled out of the rear differential. I don't know how that happened. The rear differential was exposed to mud and water all the way home, well most of the way home. I don't think it totally was oponed all the time though.

Lets talk about how I can fix this now. My dealership is 10 hours away (one way), so there is no way I will be going to them to get it fixed. Isn't there a snap ring inside that holds in the axle into the differential? I kinda remember something like this on my King Quad when my dad and I would change the u-joints on that quad. I'll be taking a closer look at it tonight or tomorrow sometime. Any ideas or suggestions would be great appreciated. Thanks.

 

I can not see how it would come out,and there is a snap ring on the end of it.I hope you can snape it back into place. i would also call my dealer to let know, he may be able to help you out. the rear end is about $600.00 thats if its damage. check out www.brownsleisureworld.com it will give you a idea what it looks like and it will give the prices. Good luck..

 

Easy removal snap in ( and sometimes out) halfshafts are a fact of life, design limitations exist BigCat. Big tires mean more torque, and more stress on the drivetrain possibly leading to the condidtion. The good thing is you can probably do a good job on that gear box in the time it'd just take to round trip to your dealer. Do all the dirty work and get the box off the bike (the hardest part) open the halves, hopefully it's Oring sealed in which there's no resealing issue. If it's not engine building silicone will do on reassembly. Keep track of the placement of any shims that may come free when opening the rear end, with luck not enough damage was done to need reshimming components. Flush loose stuff out with water, then engine degreaser ( or switch to a parts wash if you have one ) The bootom line is to clean all the grit out, then all the water, the most paticular bearings [that may] be needle type on the pinion, if they got contaminated it's imperitive to clean them too, a little grease will keep the needle rollers where you want for reassembly. All the bearings should turn silky smooth(avoid turning the bearings much when they're dry), if not they're still contaminated or ruined. The gears will survive if they only got a little chewing from sand and gravel in them, broken teeth aren't likely. Anyhow when clean and dry reassemble, overfill with oil, then test the action of the box, if it still turns smooth install it on the atv, test drive it for a few miles(listen for noise or increasing noise), inspect the oil very carefully. If there's no metal or contaminants showing in the oil correct the level, and continue to check it a little more frequently that the other box, if it's not developed bad habits after a few hundred miles it'll probably be fine for good. if not then you'll have to order from the dealer for sure.

 

I can probably do what you said but it sounds like it might take me a long time. I don't have much experience with that stuff. I'll call my dealer on Monday and ask them if I can ship the rear end to them, along with the axles. My dealership has on several occasions told me to never work on my bike. Its still under warranty luckily. If I have to bring them the entire bike I'll have to wait till late June at best or September at worst. I'll see what they have to say.

 

hey gillam this is winnipeg wheres your dealer ship.

 

Sorry to hear 'bout your 500...Was wondering how many miles on the AC at the time of the break....If I remember correctly, you put 26" Titan 589 MT's on there...Do you think the big meats had anything to do with the failure, or was it maybe just wicked mud? (or snow, way up there!)Hopefully your dealer will cover the problem, I hope you can find a day (soon) to haul that rig to the shop for the service...Keep us informed, good luck...

 

I have 26" outlaws on my 500i, I'm almost positive it was the tires that caused this problem but it may have been a defect in the quad or just a bad piece. My old quadrunner 500 never had a problem with the big tires and this is the first time I had my big tires on in the mud too. The mud was pretty thick but not the really thick stuff that I was going in earlier on. My dealership says I'm covered under warranty and they may even let me do the fixing because I'm so far away. I also have a friend coming up north in my area in a couple of weeks and he can take the quad back down south with him to the dealership. I think I would rather let my friend take it down south and have them work on it. I'll be going down south at the end of June so I could pick it up then. But I wouldn't tell my dealership that I broke my quad with the big tires on it, they might just say, "We don't cover that."

I bought my quad from Tomcat's Motorsports and Marine in Selkirk, they gave me the best deal and I found them friendly and so far they are great with service.

I'll keep you all posted on my prediciment, luckily I have my Z400 to play with.

 

bbertram, just a hypothesis (I don't own a "I" just piecing together some pieces of the puzzle) here but don't you run wheel spacers with your bigger tires. Now the wheel spacers leave a 1" gap or there abouts between the axle and the rims, don't they? Now let me see if I can explain this so it makes sense. I have read many topics on the axles of the "I" models rubbing on the center of the rims making some kind of noise, where grease quits this down.
could it be possible that A/C designed the I's so the axle would hit the rim and that would help hold the axle in place.I do understand how a cv-joint works and there should be something that holds the axle into the diff. to. I may be way off the ball here just guessing.

 

I don't have wheel spacers but I do have offset rims, the axles don't rub on those. You might be on to something. If this is true I will be pissed off. But I don't think thats possible, the axle is held onto the wheel hub with a big nut. If this happens again to me I will be trading off my cat on a Grizzly.

 

Well I just talked with my dealership and they told me the local mechanic can not fix my problem and that they would have to do it. So I asked them if I could pull off the differential and send it to them. They said sure. So tonight I'll be attempting to take off my diff and axles. I'll be sending them my diff and both axles. I sure hope they just don't go and flush out the diff with lots of oil and slap on the axles and be done with it. If they do that then I'll be a little pissed, there are parts inside that must get cleaned out. On the phone he was saying maybe they will just send me up a new diff, that would be very nice but it probably won't happen. It looks like it shouldn't be that hard of a job but who knows. Any suggestions before I get wrist deep in grease and parts? Thanks.