fishtailing with motor trike

[driver10]

2006 Honda 750 with 2005 trike kit. this is my wifes trike and when she is running 65 mph it starts to fishtail with her so she has to slow down. I keep 23 pds. of air in the right side tire and 22 in left side to counter act crown in road. air bags are set at 30 ,any ideal why this is happening??

 

[Mr.Wizard]

You will want to check the tightness of your rear hine joints. Sounds to me like the trike is hunting and it gets worse the faster it goes. Loose hine joints will allow the back end to walk. This isn't uncommon... the installer of my Motor Trike, several years back, forgot and left all of mine finger tight.

 

[driver10]

thanks WIZ I will jack it up tomorrow and check them. Is their a certain torque to use

 

[Mr.Wizard]

Call MT to get the exact recommendations for your kit model. If memory serves, they aren't all the same but I digress.. LOL

 

[driver10]

will call MT in the morning. thanks again

 

[driver10]

called MT no specific torque just tighten as tight as possible. almost every bolt and nut on latter bars were loose. still walks but not as bad. Anyone think of something else that might be causing this ?

 

[Mr.Wizard]

called MT no specific torque just tighten as tight as possible. almost every bolt and nut on latter bars were loose. still walks but not as bad. Anyone think of something else that might be causing this ?

Rear tire pressure (24 #)

Front time to manuf max.

There are two shocks on each side, one is adjustable like a Dyna model. Check their adjustment to be the same.

The air shock bags should be set for two up at 40#. If you have the on board air compressor check your bag pressure gauge. If not, check with a hand gauge.

 

[Mr.Wizard]

Well... I may be wrong about the 4 rear shocks... forgot myself and thought you had a Harley. Not sure about Honda. Sorry.

 

[driver10]

WIZ I keep airbag pressure @ 28 psi for wife she is only 110 soaking wet. can you tell me how to check to see if axel is square with frame on one of the threads they mention something about using 2 floresant bulb?

 

[driver10]

there are 2 progressive shocks and 2 air bags

 

[Mr.Wizard]

Not experienced is aligning the rear.

Will this help??

http://www.triketalk.com/forum/honda-trikes/315.htm

 

[driver10]

Thanks Wiz that answered a lot of the questions I had.

 

[3W-lonerider]

heres your solution. just went threw this myself.
you said when you crawled under it that most of the bolts were loose. had the same thing with mine for the last couple of years.( bolts loosening up ).
i would tighten the bolts and everything was fine. up until this past summer. did'nt matter how tight i made the bolts i still had a shimmy and a fishtail coming out of curves. mainly right handers.
i bought all new heim joints expecting to have a bunch of them loose.
well when i started tearing it apart i found no bad heims. what i did find was the bolts going threw the upper heims back at the rear end was worn.
the part of the bolt going threw the actual rear end part was worn off and was letting the rear wiggle on those worn bolts.
replace the bolts holding the upper heims to the rear and check the bolts holding the lower heims to the rear and i think you'll have it.
those bolts looked like i put them in a lathe and turned them down to where there was no threads on the shaft. thats how worn they were. but you can't see it unless you take them out.

 

[driver10]

Thanks Lone Rider that could very well be the problem they were really loose. Ill check them in the morning.

 

[driver10]

Lone-Rider I just pulled and checked the bolts, and all four bolts were bent I couldn't hardly get them out. I replaced them with a harder grade bolt.

 

[driver10]

A little up date on fishtailing problem. My wife has put over 400 miles on her trike and only had one issue and that was on a really grooved 2 lane road that had a lot of heavy oil field traffic. So Id like to thank the wiz and lone rider for their help in making Momma happy again.