I hate loosing bolts!!

**Nismo400rgtr** · 06-29-2011, 11:02 PM

This is a Rant

So after a stressful day at work I come home excited to install some goodies on the bike. One of them is an MRA windscreen. The last bolt I remove falls, complete with washer, into oblivion! I removed all the fairings looking for this thing. I didn't see the area it fell into but it seemed to stop in a lower area, just not the ground like I wished.

I gave up looking for it and it'll be my luck that it'll rattle free from wherever the hell it is and cause a tire puncture or bind on something. Arrrrrggghh!!! I know it shouldn't be something to loose sleep over but I will!
Thanks for reading

**Sal_R1** · 06-30-2011, 12:34 PM

To make ya feel a lil better, a friend was enjoying a Sunday drive (this past Sunday) in his recently purchased Jag XK8 convertible. Ran as smooth as silk, everything worked & looked flawless in & out.

Called me with a report of loss of steering / overheating & stuck on the freeway. Knowing that car has a serpentine belt, i picked one up & rode over to him to change the belt.

Opening the hood, upon closer inspection i saw that the idler pulley had vanished, thrown the belt that broke the electric fans & stopped the water pump from working.

Engine is toast
Cost of pulley bearing that failed & caused this mess $20
cost of engine rebuilt & installation about $5k

Pictures & more details coming soon.

**Nismo400rgtr** · 06-30-2011, 03:26 PM

^^^^
That's Awful ! My situation is definitely petty in comparison.

**Sal_R1** · 06-30-2011, 04:14 PM

Ive already started taking the jag engine apart.

It gets worse for my friend! He crashed his DB9 just this morning! He is easily another $4K maybe more in the hole!

Pictures coming tonight.

**Nismo400rgtr** · 07-01-2011, 02:31 AM

After I was done whining last night I ran the bike for a bit at idle just to warm it up. My second hand motive was that the vibration would dislodge the screw from wherever it was. It worked!! I found it tonight lying at the bottom of the belly pan! All I know is that it wasn't there before- I swear

.

Maybe your friend shouldn't drive anything for a few days! Seriously, terrible fortune he's having.

HyperM3 · 07-06-2011, 09:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sal_R1

Ive already started taking the jag engine apart.

It gets worse for my friend! He crashed his DB9 just this morning! He is easily another $4K maybe more in the hole!

Pictures coming tonight.

Still waiting on pics!

**Sal_R1** · 07-07-2011, 07:07 PM

Excuse the wait gents.

In my haste i neglected the main reason why i posted up! Ive learned to be as thorough as possible when taking engines apart as it saves a huge amount of time in addition to numerous other benefits but on this Jag job i managed to loose 2 bolts in 30 minutes!

They fell on an smooth concrete & clean floor but so far no luck. They are standard thread metric bolts used to hold the front engine cover & the other for the upper intake so even a home depot kind of place will have them.

Glad you found yours. It feels good when you do!

lol..

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nismo400rgtr

After I was done whining last night I ran the bike for a bit at idle just to warm it up. My second hand motive was that the vibration would dislodge the screw from wherever it was. It worked!! I found it tonight lying at the bottom of the belly pan! All I know is that it wasn't there before- I swear

.

Maybe your friend shouldn't drive anything for a few days! Seriously, terrible fortune he's having.

The bolt in the picture with the 2 rings depicts whats left of the idler pulley. The 2 rings are the outer & inner brace of the bearing in the middle of the pulley!

The pulley next to it is what its suppose to look like.

Looks like the bearing seized, through the pulley then next was the belt......extreme overheating leading to a 6" long gash in the expansion tank & long story short, toasted the engine!

Quote:

Originally Posted by HyperM3

Still waiting on pics!

V8M3 · 07-07-2011, 07:56 PM

I lose a bolt almost every time I take my bike apart. The worst was installing the Watsen rear blinkers. Getting your hands in that space sucked and I dropped a couple of bolts that wound up either on the floor or in the battery compartment. One I never found. One day I was riding on the freeway when I felt a clunk like something went between the chain and sprocket. I wondered if it was the missing bolt falling out.

**Nismo400rgtr** · 07-07-2011, 10:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by V8M3

I lose a bolt almost every time I take my bike apart. The worst was installing the Watsen rear blinkers. Getting your hands in that space sucked and I dropped a couple of bolts that wound up either on the floor or in the battery compartment. One I never found. One day I was riding on the freeway when I felt a clunk like something went between the chain and sprocket. I wondered if it was the missing bolt falling out.

That's what I was afraid in not finding it.

LiterBoy · 07-08-2011, 11:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nismo400rgtr

...The last bolt I remove falls, complete with washer, into oblivion! I removed all the fairings looking for this thing. I didn't see the area it fell into but it seemed to stop in a lower area, just not the ground like I wished...

I know how you feel! I dropped a fairing screw from my first CBR into the body somewhere, and it, too, disappeared into a mysterious black hole.

It shouldn't have bothered me so much, but I really searched for the stupid thing and was pretty miffed about it. I swore someone in some alternate universe found an extra fairing screw under their CBR.

A couple months later--NO LIE--during a routine oil change, I was twisting off the old oil filter and found the screw in the belly pan.