I know where most of the grease fittings are, but have an extremely hard time getting grease into them. I have a manual cranking grease gun with a soild fitting. With the soild fitting, you need to keep pressure on the grease gun while it is on the fitting, then crank the lever. The problem here, is the lever needs to be cranked, and there is not enough room because the fittings are in too deep. I then bought a hose for the grease gun, but that didn't seem to help either.

What size grease gun do you guys use? And are you able to pump the grease in without any problems?

I use fluid film and coated the entire under chasis of my ATV to see how well it would benefit from it and to my surprise, it did a great job repelling mud and water. Usually fluid film will allow dry dirt to stick to it, because of it's oil base.

Performing regular maintenance on my ATV seems to be hard. When I bought my ATV it came with a winch, along with a thick metal plate that is on the bottom of the chasis. Anyway, there is a cut out slot to access oil drain bolt, but serves no purpose because I cannot get the sockets to turn because the wrench will hit the plate. So I have to take off two of the U-bolts that hold the plate to be able to get the bolt off. then putting the plate back on is not easy either, I have to use a floor jack to push the plate back up in order to tighten the dam thing. The oil filter is also kind of a PITA to take off too.

 

You can get a swivel hose type fitting for your grease gun like this one.

http://www.harborfreight.com/c....taf?Itemnumber=92657


With a deep well socket or a socket extension it should be no problem to reach your oil drain plug.

As for the oil filter, they are a pain to get to. Just gotta deal with it.

 

Hey There,

First off welcome to the forums! I do all the maintenance on my quad as well.. I find it helpful to be under the quad when doing the grease fittings on the drive shafts. I use a "needle" fitting and have replaced the zerk fittings on the rear suspsension with 90 degree ones (they are 6mm thread and available at any GOOD auto parts store.)

I bought a grease gun accessory kit like this one, the tip you need is the on in the middle of the 5 pictured.
Link to Zee Line grease gun quick coupler kit

As far as the thick metal plate, that is your skid plate and is most likely made out of aluminum, probably 3/16" thick, if you are lucky it might be 1/4" thick. You can simply cut a hole in it that lines up with the drain plug, my aluminum skid plate was from Yamaha so it had the hole in it. I have a custom front bash plate and each time I put it back on I have to use a jack as well to line everything up, so I feel your pain!


Also here is a link w/instructions on how to download a copy of the 03-06 Kodiak 450 manual...

Manual
http://www.savefile.com/files/74511

The link for the manual works but sometimes you just need to work it a bit...


1. Click the link in the Message
2. Scroll down to the Section in the BLUE Box that says "05-06 Kodiak 450" and Click "DOWNLOAD FILE"
3. Your download SHOULD start...

IF NOT

4. Scroll down to the Bottom.... where you will see
" Your download should begin shortly.
If it does not, try <u>Download file now</u> "


That should do the trick [img]i/expressions/beer.gif[/img] [img]i/expressions/beer.gif[/img] [img]i/expressions/beer.gif[/img]

 

<div class="FTQUOTE"><begin quote>Originally posted by: JLsparky7

You can get a swivel hose type fitting for your grease gun like this one.



<a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=92657
">http://www.harborfreight.com/c...temnumber=92657
</a>


With a deep well socket or a socket extension it should be no problem to reach your oil drain plug.



As for the oil filter, they are a pain to get to. Just gotta deal with it.</end quote></div>

I happen to have boght that flexible hose, you really need two people in order to operate it because oe person needs to hold the hose on the fitting, while the other pumps. Or maybe I should just splurge on the $350 grease gun that hooks up to my compressor and will not have these problems any longer.

I guess I need a "special" deep socket, becuase none of mine work as long as that metal plate is on. I thought about not having that metal metal and taking it off, but it serves a very good purpose.

 

Thanks for the tip on the fittings.

My skid plate is steal, and 1/4 thick, it's powder coated and has chipped on some edges from bottoming out over rocks and showed signs of rust in those areas, just surface rust. I used to hit rocks alot with the stock wheels on, and the plate took a beating.

I eventially got tired of getting flats with those cheap stock tires and decided to splurge on aftermarket. Those tires "Maxxis" it came with, got like 3 different flats in less then 6 months, and also two of the tires started cracking apart after 8, which Yamaha would not help me on, so I got in touch with Maxxis and emailed them pics of the tires, and they never got back to me. Finally after email after email, they decided to ignore me on the topic. So I guess Maxxis just does not care that they build cheap tires and that it will be known by millions over the internet.

Tires just do not start to crack apart after 8 months, yes techanically they would most likely been 1 year and 8 months old, becuase I bought the ATV as a left over model, but still. I've had my ITP 589's for over 2 years now, or close to it and do not have any cracks on the tires and never had a flat either. Those tires can tolerate the off road conditions

 

Alright, I used alot of patience and was able to get the grease gun onto the fittings and pump the grease, but the grease will not go in at all. This has been the scenerio from the day I brought it home brand new. It doesn't even feel like the gun is compressing the fitting in, like it does on my Ztwo and walk behind mowers. I'm thinking, maybe the pin hole on every fitting is froze up or something? Was thinking maybe get a small sturdy object to ***** the center of the fittings so that they go in and I can pump grease in.

I'm a little concerned about not getting the grease in, because I am not too familar on how long these parts will last without being greased regularly. I have about 348 miles on the ATV already.

Last time I was riding, which was in PA, I heard what sounded like brakes rotors scrapping but figured they must have had alot of dirt and mud on them. The brakes squeaked alot too at the time. Since cleaning it up, the sound has went away. I cleaned it up real nice today and then sprayed the under chasis with a generous coat of fluid film. I'm really considering getting another pressure washer (cause mine broke two years ago). I know it is not recommended to use one on the ATV, but there is so many hard to reach spots to get it cleaned out. Do they not recommend using a pressure washer because they fear you may hit the electrical wires and damage them? If thats the case, I would keep my distance when using the gun. I know the pressure washer would most likely tear off the stickers, but it's the under chasis that needs the pressure washer to clean it out real well.

 

I don't think the grease gun will make the difference. I have a problem getting the standard zerk coupler to go on to the zerk fitting. I now use one that is very thin but does not lock on. It is still a major pain but I can do it. The small tip has a funnel type shape that you press against the zerk fitting. If you press hard and point it just right you can get the grease in with only making a big mess.

 

I have been through the Kodiak 450 zerk situation in one of my threads. I have given up on greasing the rear U-joint of the front driveshaft.

I didn't have a special Yamaha oil filter wrench, so I took the oil filter off by gripping it tightly (smashing it) and turning it counterclockwise with a good big Channelock pliers and I tightened the new filter on with my hands.

The owner's manual says to drain the engine oil using the small plug located between the two skid plates. I made the mistake of using the large drain plug which has a cup-shaped screen and spring above the plug.

I see other engines use a screen and spring above the drain plug.

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_do_you...verine_350_ATV

http://www.bluetraxx.com/forums/yama...il-change.html

http://www.thumpertalk.com/forum/arc.../t-781719.html

http://forums.atvconnection.com/yama...il-change.html

http://www.dansmc.com/change_oil.htm

Well, it looks like it would be a good thing to use the big drain plug and check the screen and plug for debris.

I had trouble pulling the end plate off the air filter frame and the inlet end broke off the frame. I lined up the rubber the way it was and used it as a 3-piece instead of a 2-piece.

Sometimes it sounds like the brakes are squealing, but I ride it anyway and I guess it is normal.