Overheated

Apr 23, 2012
56
2
Oceanside,NY
Name
Doug
Ran with a group of folks that were on two wheels. I was only triker. We got stuck in some bad traffic. Trike started to have difficulty finding neutral, then no neutral at all. Stuck in first gear, then engine stalled. Started up and pulled over. Let it sit for about 15 minutes and dove back into traffic. Made it out of traffic and then all good. Everyone else was fine only I had overheating trouble. Air temp was 70 degrees. Not hot at all.
This is a 2012, had the 1,000 mile service and getting near 2,500 miles. They used Dino oil all around. Still have stock exhaust. Did install wards engine fans. All that seems to do is keep engine from going into rear cyclinder shutdown. Hat blows across engine in traffic.
Thinking of fan cooled oil cooler next or Stage 1 setup.
 
Get rid of that Dino oil !!!
Put in some good synthetic, it will handle the heat much better.
There are plenty of posts with suggestions on oil.
Specifically get rid of that Dino oil in tranny, and get a good syn gear oil, most likely you problem finding neutral will go away. If not you need a clutch adjustment.
Unless you were sitting in traffic for a LONG time, you normally should not have a problem in 70 degree weather.
A stage One breather alone will not help you, now if you add headers and a tuner (which most of us would strongly suggest) you wil help the heat problem and have more power.
My suggestion would be to find yourself a good independent mechanic.
Any dealer that is stil using Dino oils still in the last century.
 
IF your rear cylinder didn't shut down, it is a good bet that the scoot didn't over heat, or maybe the feature is turned off. I'm surprised when you had the oil changed at 1000 miles they didn't ask if you wanted Syn oil, has a much better heat dissipation quality. Do you have an oil temp gage?? If you are going to ride in traffic, kind of helps know just how hot your scoot is. Wife and I rarely ride in traffic, if we get stuck for more than a minute or two, we shut them down. I've "Flintstoned" a couple of times when we were really stuck and couldn't get out of traffic (Las Vegas Blvd, mid day, 112*)

Good Luck!
 
Road in St Patrick's parade in my town Carmel NY last March. Out side temp around 70 stop and go for a couple of miles. Never again. 09 TG stage one syn oil. Rear cyl tripped out Eng started to sound like a old percolator coffee pot pinging bad. Got real hot. I dont know what oil temp was I have know oil temp gauge. I also was only trike. some two wheel Harley's got real warm all so.
 
Ran with a group of folks that were on two wheels. I was only triker. We got stuck in some bad traffic. Trike started to have difficulty finding neutral, then no neutral at all. Stuck in first gear, then engine stalled. Started up and pulled over. Let it sit for about 15 minutes and dove back into traffic. Made it out of traffic and then all good. Everyone else was fine only I had overheating trouble. Air temp was 70 degrees. Not hot at all.
This is a 2012, had the 1,000 mile service and getting near 2,500 miles. They used Dino oil all around. Still have stock exhaust. Did install wards engine fans. All that seems to do is keep engine from going into rear cyclinder shutdown. Hat blows across engine in traffic.
Thinking of fan cooled oil cooler next or Stage 1 setup.

Gamechngr, I don't think overheating is causing you to stall. I bet that clutch needs adjusted. I had the same problem and adjusting the clutch fixed it. I have several TTS data recordings to show that the Wards FCS really works. I let Big Blue idle in the garage for 13 minutes in 84 degree ambient. The engine temperatures never went above 230 deg. I let the temps climb to 230 deg before I even turned the fans on and the engine temps immediately dropped and hovered at 217-219 until I ran the engine at 2100 rpm. Attached, but it' kinda small. FCS WORKS!!!
 
Gamechngr, I don't think overheating is causing you to stall. I bet that clutch needs adjusted. I had the same problem and adjusting the clutch fixed it. I have several TTS data recordings to show that the Wards FCS really works. I let Big Blue idle in the garage for 13 minutes in 84 degree ambient. The engine temperatures never went above 230 deg. I let the temps climb to 230 deg before I even turned the fans on and the engine temps immediately dropped and hovered at 217-219 until I ran the engine at 2100 rpm. Attached, but it' kinda small. FCS WORKS!!!


Cooling the heads will go a long ways in helping it survive, especially the Ward which limits itself to just the head. The engine oil is still picking up a great deal of heat from the bottom of the pistons which are not being cooled any from the Ward fans. I'll bet the OP's oil temps got pretty toasty, enough so I wouldn't think twice about dumping the oil and putting fresh in since its Dino and not syn. Heck I'd even dump syn, oil's cheap when you look at the cost of engine repairs due to oil being broken down from excessive heat.

I would think the neutral issue developed from the clutch getting hot and loosing its air gap.
 
Cooling the heads will go a long ways in helping it survive, especially the Ward which limits itself to just the head. The engine oil is still picking up a great deal of heat from the bottom of the pistons which are not being cooled any from the Ward fans. I'll bet the OP's oil temps got pretty toasty, enough so I wouldn't think twice about dumping the oil and putting fresh in since its Dino and not syn. Heck I'd even dump syn, oil's cheap when you look at the cost of engine repairs due to oil being broken down from excessive heat.

I would think the neutral issue developed from the clutch getting hot and loosing its air gap.

Good point M3. I wanted to confirm for Gamechngr that his FCS fans were doing their job, based on my tests. I noticed that my oil temps in 100+ degrees with the FCS were down from 280 degrees to about 260 degrees. Moderate improvement to oil temperature. It took installing a Jagg 10-row fan assist oil cooler to do the rest and bring oil temps down to 230 degrees. I never worry about engine or oil temps in traffic. The OP wanted to do that too, which would be a good idea if stuck in traffic. Definitely easier on the pups than shutting down and flintstoning through town:D
 
I'm further out on LI. I regularly go through NYC traffic with no problems. Synthetic oil in everything. The rear cylinder overheat turnoff function can be activated at a stop in neutral by turning the throttle opposite way. You will see green light when armed and red light when disabled. I have stock '10 TG. Good tuning from HD in Oakdale, along Sunrise highway.
 
Definitely easier on the pups than shutting down and flintstoning through town:D

I've done that, last year the wife and I were caught in a traffic jam. It was in the high 90's and so I shut the engine down and told the wife to keep her seat while I pushed the trike with her on it and the trailer hooked up.
 

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