Alternator core failure

[Andrew Shadow]

Note: I have yet to find a replacement o-ring for the oil cooler (outer ring - Never have seen one in the diagrams? ) Anyone else find one?)

Bob:

ST1300 oil cooler O-ring.

I did a little digging and the below is what I came up with.
The ST1300 and several other bikes use this same oil cooler. The only difference seems to be the orientation and location of the nipples for the coolant hoses. As the actual oil cooler seems to be the same it should follow that the O-ring would be the same as well. The P/N O-ring listed for these other models using this oil cooler is Honda P/N 91316-PE7-730 listed as 62.4 X 3.1 mm. If I needed an oil cooler O-ring for my ST1300 I would order this part number.

 

[ST-Traveler]

Well here is a short update, I am working on cleaning the engine as best I can, Got the V- fairly clean.
On the way into the clutch I removed the water pump cover and the odd shaped O-ring is all but dry rotted and was on the verge of failing in a catastrophic way. So glad I am inspecting and replacing. The surface of the water pump cover where the O-ring meets the mating surface is caked with dried old antifreeze that is going to take alot of patients to clean.
Got most of the parts in today to replace all vacuum hoses, all the T's, 5 way's and all water hoses. Some of these hoses come in bulk qty and you have to cut to length what you need. The part fiche is great to give you the needed length on the hoses.
Glad I can take my time and get this bike a good going over.
I will post a pic of the O-ring deterioration a little later.
If you have an older ST with over 120,000 miles I recommend going in during this winter and going over everything you can and replace what you can afford to.

 

[ST-Traveler]

It's easier to clean gasket residue off the removable clutch cover, because Honda didn't use any adhesive on that part, and the clutch cover can be taken inside and soaked in a solution of hot water and Simple Green to soften the gasket.

Michael - I think mine is the opposite, Most of the gasket came off the engine case with the cover. The cover is what I am having trouble with. The gasket is fused into the aluminum and I have tried everything to get it off with not luck.
Also I am finding out that that gasket remover is not available in the states. Must be to caustic? I have to resort to simple green and it ain't workin.

I refuse to use a razor blade for fear of damaging the soft aluminum sealing surface.

 

[SupraSabre]

Michael - I think mine is the opposite, Most of the gasket came off the engine case with the cover. The cover is what I am having trouble with. The gasket is fused into the aluminum and I have tried everything to get it off with not luck.
Also I am finding out that that gasket remover is not available in the states. Must be to caustic? I have to resort to simple green and it ain't workin.

I refuse to use a razor blade for fear of damaging the soft aluminum sealing surface.

This is what I used to remove the gasket from the engine and the front engine cover:

Gasket Remover

You apply it, let it sit, carefully scrape off what will come off and reapply and repeat until the gasket is gone.

 

[CYYJ]

Michael - I think mine is the opposite, Most of the gasket came off the engine case with the cover. The cover is what I am having trouble with. The gasket is fused into the aluminum and I have tried everything to get it off with not luck.
Also I am finding out that that gasket remover is not available in the states. Must be to caustic? I have to resort to simple green and it ain't workin.

I refuse to use a razor blade for fear of damaging the soft aluminum sealing surface.

Hello:

Well, in a perverse way, you are luckier than I was - when I took the clutch cover off, 90% of the gasket remained on the front of the engine block, and my lower back is still recovering from all the time I spent crouching and squatting when I was labouring to get the remains of the gasket off. At least you have the luxury of carrying the two parts into the house and working on them at the laundry room sink.

The first piece of advice I would offer to you is "be patient". The weather in Ohio is probably the same as the weather in Toronto, which means you've got at least a couple of months to get the job done, there's no hurry to get the bike back on the road again.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I found that 'gasket remover' did a good job of softening up the gasket, and if I used a STIFF plaster knife (not a thin flexible one) I could scrape the softened gasket off without rising damage (gouges) to the aluminum.

The product I used (purchased in Canada) is also available in the USA, packaged slightly differently, here is a link to the manufacturer's website: Permatex. Walmart sells it.

You might also want to consider placing the clutch cover with the gasket side down in a thin pan (cookie sheet, roasting pan) with some light-duty generic solvent in it and letting the gasket soak overnight. That might soften it up. Either way you go about it, you will need to "rinse & repeat" the process several times, so do be patient.

Eventually, though, you will get the remains of the gasket (and Honda's factory adhesive, which is the primary cause of the difficulty) off.

Below are a couple of pictures to provide you with some encouragement.

Michael

Front of Crankcase
90% of my gasket was stuck to this surface


Clutch Cover, after cleaning

 

[ST-Traveler]

Man that looks clean. Found a small can of remover at NAPA but it primarily is for silicone gasket removal. not the paper type. I am letting it soak, and you are right I have to be patient. I got most of it off using a piece of wood as a scraper but it is mighty tough even at that. The inside of my cover is scorched brown not nice and shinny like yours?


I am making progress- slowly- The last pic is the water pump O-ring that is degraded and as you can see not really sealing as there is a lot of corrosion I had to clean up off the WP cover. I was worried some of the gasket remover would get into the WP bearing so I zip tied a plastic bag around it to protect accidental contamination of them while cleaning away.

 

[ST-Traveler]

Bob:

ST1300 oil cooler O-ring.

I did a little digging and the below is what I came up with.
The ST1300 and the several other bikes use this same oil cooler. The only difference seems to be the orientation and location of the nipples for the coolant hoses. As the actual oil cooler seems to be the same it should follow that the O-ring would be the same as well. The P/N O-ring listed for these other models using this oil cooler is Honda P/N 91316-PE7-730 listed as 62.4 X 3.1 mm. If I needed an oil cooler O-ring for my ST1300 I would order this part number.

I did order this today, I will let you all know if indeed this is the correct O-ring for the oil cooler.

 

[ST-Traveler]

I wouldn't worry about removing the oil cooler as the hoses are easily changed without disturbing the oil cooler. A part of 45 or 90 needle nose pliers are essential and come from the underside.

Dave, I have no idea how you did this without dropping off the oil cooler, I was not even close to being able to get the clamps off let alone route new hoses and then reinstall the clamps, it was fairly easy to drop the cooler down and easily get access to the hoses and the clamps.

 

[dduelin]

Dave, I have no idea how you did this without dropping off the oil cooler, I was not even close to being able to get the clamps off let alone route new hoses and then reinstall the clamps, it was fairly easy to drop the cooler down and easily get access to the hoses and the clamps.

Post #44 here: https://www.st-owners.com/forums/threads/help-removing-st1300-throttle-bodies.125107/

PS The long handled HF 45 and 90 degree needlenose pliers did not break the next time I used them. Both were very handy when replacing the "devil" coolant hoses under the intake manifold of the Miata a few months ago.

 

[ST-Traveler]

Bob:

ST1300 oil cooler O-ring.

I did a little digging and the below is what I came up with.
The ST1300 and several other bikes use this same oil cooler. The only difference seems to be the orientation and location of the nipples for the coolant hoses. As the actual oil cooler seems to be the same it should follow that the O-ring would be the same as well. The P/N O-ring listed for these other models using this oil cooler is Honda P/N 91316-PE7-730 listed as 62.4 X 3.1 mm. If I needed an oil cooler O-ring for my ST1300 I would order this part number.

This part number is a no go. I got mine in today and it is too large, have to re-use original as no part number listed anywhere for this O-ring.

 

[Andrew Shadow]

This part number is a no go. I got mine in today and it is too large, have to re-use original as no part number listed anywhere for this O-ring.

Do you have the dimensions of the correct size O-ring by any chance? I will see if I can back track it somehow. I was hoping it would be the right one because the only difference was the model of bike the cooler was used on but the actual cooler part number was the same. Doesn't make sense to me somehow.

 

[ST-Traveler]

Do you have the dimensions of the correct size O-ring by any chance? I will see if I can back track it somehow. I was hoping it would be the right one because the only difference was the model of bike the cooler was used on but the actual cooler part number was the same. Doesn't make sense to me somehow.

I don't have the dimensions but it is slightly bigger than the one needed, I would say by about 5mm. The only thing I can figure is the O-ring must come on the assembly and not sold separately.
I will post some pics of what I had.

 

[dduelin]

I don't have the dimensions but it is slightly bigger than the one needed, I would say by about 5mm. The only thing I can figure is the O-ring must come on the assembly and not sold separately.
I will post some pics of what I had.

Maybe its found in Gasket Set A by dimension.

 

[ST-Traveler]

Maybe its found in Gasket Set A by dimension.

Good thinking, when I looked at the gasket A and B kits I did not see any O-rings close to what is needed. 62.4mm is what I bought and it is more like 58 or 59mm if I was to give a good guess. I don't know the proper way to measure O-rings though when I measured the goove it was like 62 mm and I thought for sure that one would fit?? But not even close. I cannot imagine why there is no part number for this anywhere when the SM states to replace with a new one??

 

[ST-Traveler]

The bike is back together for the most part ( still have the middle cowls off until I fill with radiator fluid and bleed the system) and when I was rustling around in the basement I found something shinny on the floor.... It was a dowel pin that must have fallen out of one of the covers. I knew the crank case cover was correct because I put the 2 dowels in place to help hold the gasket. So the only other option was the water pump cover. Well when I looked at the manual - indeed it shows 2 dowel pins-- so back off with the water pump cover and sure enough I only had one dowel pin in there. So I put the other in and it is in there now. Luckily I found it when I did because I had not installed the radiator back yet so it was fairly simple to remove the cover and put the dowel pin in. Oh yeah that weird O-ring is a pain to keep in place when placing the WP cover back on. I see where the factory used some type of glue to hold it in place- I had to dig all that out though. The mating surface of the O-ring got quit corroded with coolant so I wonder how well that O-ring actually works anyway.

 

[ST-Traveler]

Image 1 shows the new O-ring is not fitting. Image 2 shows the new O-ring with part number

 

[ST-Traveler]

Here is a pic of the new alternator in place and also all the water hoses were replaced along with vacuum lines and a new tube to the canister from the bottom of the throttle body. I also replaced the alt harness with a new one and the RS sub harness because one of the knock sensor coupler got brittle and broke. That pesky bottom alternator bolt is best installed using a 1/4 inch drive extension and then run in all the way by hand before final tightening. That's what worked for me anyway.

 

[ST-Traveler]

Here are some of the many water hoses I have replaced along with 2 of the harnesses.

 

[ST-Traveler]

On an off topic slightly for this thread- I also replaced the clutch as you may know from following my posts - My clutch was what I would consider heavily used since buying the bike new back in '08. However I can tell you this, after 137,XXX miles the clutch did not really show any signs of wear. most of the discs were in new condition, when measured against the new ones I had on hand they were with in .005 mm and some were the same. I really don't understand the OEM clutch basically had no wear at all. I did replace it anyway because I had the crank case open and had spent days cleaning off the old gasket. Who would have known. The clutch on these machines I would say is basically indestructible from what I have seen and I even took the "ride like a pro" class this past summer where we were in the friction zone constantly during the 4 hour class.

 

[dduelin]

While I never replaced the clutch in my ST I'm not surprised at the clutch wear. I had 40,000 more miles and the clutch felt just like always even often practicing slow speed work - usually a few minutes a week but week in and week out since 2006.