I recently experienced the "joy" of changing the oil on my DS. Has anyone else experienced a problem / hassle after everything is said and done and adding new oil and having it drain down in the reservoir VERY slowly? It took me 2 hrs for the entire procedure. I'm confused, am I doing something wrong?

I followed the directions in the manual. Disconnected the oil hose, let drain. Removed drain plug, replaced both, removed oil filter, replaced and re-capped, then added oil via dipstick hole.

I never experienced the oil light situation, so I'm assuming I did everything correct. Any suggestions?? If this is the way it’s supposed to be, that's ridiculous!

 

Did you bleed it?

Check out this site:

http://www.cochisemotorsports.com/ds650/oil.htm

They give some insight and help in changing your oil properly.

I get to try this soon, since we have pretty close to ten hours on ours (one drawback to having two DS650's in the family).

Laters,
CRT_Leech

 

I just changed mine and didn't seem to have a problem putting the oil in. I put in 3 quarts and it is over the correct level on the dip stick. Since it says the DS takes a little more than 3 quarts, I think it might want a little more once it has been run for awhile.

I do have a question on the bleeding. About how long should it take before oil starts coming out? It seemed like I had to crank the engine a lot before it started coming out. (several second bursts, of course)

 

KawasakiKid, Something doesn't sound right! I have changed my oil 3 times already and never experienced slow oil refill. I simply dump a new quart of oil into a funnel and it's gone in a few seconds. But, I have always refilled the oil while the oil filter cover is off and no oil filter in place, so I can bleed the system if necessary. Only 1 of the 3 oil changes the oil light did not go out without bleeding the system. I like to bleed the system even if it doesn't need it because it seems like there is a lot of old oil that comes out of the bleed screw and I like to have all of it out of the motor. If I were you I would bleed the system to be sure. Did the oil light stay on for at least a second or 2 when you first started the DS after changing the oil? If it didn't, I would be suspicious that the oil pressure sensor is bad. Also, in warm weather, it appeared that draining the oil WITHOUT warming-up or starting the motor resulted in more old oil in the drain pan. I'm not sure why, maybe I had more oil in the motor, I dunno.

 

tdporter, It does takes several seconds to get the oil flowing out of the drain screw. I have held the start button down for 4-5 seconds at a time and repeated this several times until I saw clean fresh oil start coming out. I'm always worried that I'm draining the battery down.

 

Scooby,

I ensured the DS was warm when draining, however I did not bleed the system. According to the manual, it's only necassary if the oil light comes on. I guess that's my bad, I should have anyhow, like you did.

Yes, the light stayed on for a few seconds then when out after I started it. Also, when it was warm, at idle it would flicker, I presume this was because I didn't have the correct amount of oil in it (spilled a s**t load, due to it going down so slowly) immediately after putting a tad bit more in, the light stopped coming on.

Think I'll bleed the system anyhow before my trip to Silver Lake, just to be double sure. I've heard the screw is a big pain in the a** to get off. Any suggestions on that?

 

I think it must have taken about a dozen 4-5 second bursts before any oil came out the drain/bleed screw at all. I wasn't worried about the battery, I can charge it. I was worried about the metal parts moving without oil.

 

KawasakiKid, Is this the first oil change for the DS650? If so, the dealer loosened the oil bleed screw up, so it shouldn't be as tight as it comes from the factory. If not, you could have some problems getting it loose. I bought a sears $20 hammer type impact wrench with flathead and phillips head. I don't recommend this tool because the flathead was too small and too soft and turned into an "S" shape because the oil bleed screw was so tight. I ended up hammering and hammering many many times, stripping the oil bleed screw. I ended up buying the largeest flathead screwdriver I could find at sears. I had to hammer on this screwdriver several times as well as use channel locks on the handle to give myself some leverage to turn the screwdriver. Eventually I got it loose, but had to replace the oil bleed screw.

 

I too had a he** of a time getting the bleed screw loose. I had read postings about this problem and started with a huge screwdriver end that fit onto a 3/8 drive socket wrench. Couldn't get it with the socket wrench, too tight. Ended up getting it loose with a 1/2 inch break over with an adapter to 3/8 inch. Didn't ruin the screw.

 

Well, luckily I had a big a** flat head screwdriver laying around. Leaned up against it with a pair of vice grips on the screwdriver, and it came right out.

I ended up just repeating the whole process over again, better safe than sorry, a few bucks lost for oil is a hell of a lot better than a few grand rebuilding the motor.

This time I purged it, oil went right in, no problem, started it up, oil light was on for bout 3 seconds, then went off and stays off.

Another question though, Scooby, you mentioned in another post your DS was potentially overheating? I was riding mine fairly hard yesterday, practicing on my home made track, and only after a few laps I could feel a considerable power loss and the bike was very warm. I stopped to take a break and left the key on so that the fan would continue to run, and it ran for about 10 minutes, the longest I've ever noticed it to. Think I may try that watter wetter and / or different anti-freeze (Peak).