Ownership Verified: I've Gone Full British! Triumph Sprint 900

Wow, that's one of my favorite parts about motorcycling- the adventures that come with it!

Great location. I hope I can do something like that one of these days.
 


So today I went to ride the bike for the first time since last week's trip and something's wrong. Just cranking the starter made a grinding sound then when the bike fired up there was an obvious ticking/knocking noise. It seems to smooth out a little at higher revs but it's very noticeable at idle. Oil level is good and I was going to check the spark plugs but my socket is 2mm too small. :shakefist:
 
And we're back! After messing around with it for a few days I decided to cave in and take it to a shop. After a thorough servicing the bike is running a lot, lot better. Idle is smoother, throttle response is much sharper, and I feel like I gained about 10 horsepower. Unfortunately I also found out my rear sprocket and front brake rotors are very badly worn and will need to be replaced but that should be an easy weekend job.
 
"Motorcycles, they're fun, until they break"

Sucks about the rear sprocket, is the front sprocket and chain ok? If they're a llittle worn, you may want to replace them too.
 
They didn't say anything about them but I would imagine they're due for changing too. I might as well do them all at the same time.
 
You generally replace the chain and sprockets as a set.
 
So I think the bike has a cooling problem. When I pulled into the garage a few days ago after a ride coolant was leaking from around the radiator cap and from the expansion tank overflow tubes. During the ride the temperature guage was always well clear of the red so I don't think it's overheating. I just took it out for a ride and no coolant is leaking now. The guage was showing normal temperature the whole time but when I checked the expansion tank the coolant in there was cold.

Now for some real weirdness: before all this happened the temperature guage would always sit about 1/8 the way up and not around the halfway point like it does now (and which I assume is the way it should always have been). I'm thinking it's thermostat related but since the coolant isn't bubbling or leaking out now I has a confuse.
 
Update time! Lately the bike has been making a loud ticking/rattling sound from the back of the engine. At first I feared the sprag clutch was going out (a matter of when rather than if with these engines) and that means an engine-out teardown. After some extensive Googling to get as much info as I could before tearing into the project I came across some stories of alternator drive bolts breaking and causing a similar sound. Seeing as this seemed a whole hell of a lot easier I decided to pull off my alternator and have a look. Bingo!! The bolt holding the drive gear onto the engine was finger-loose. The little rubber pads between the gears were also completely shot so I think that was part of the problem too. A bit of Loctite and new rubbers later and she's purring like a kitten again.

Unfortunately I now have a massive exhaust leak from the left side silencer. Luckily the exact part I need is up on eBay for the very reasonable sum of 35 GBP so that will be a cheap and easy fix. Now to fix this weather. :glare:
 
The exhaust is on and it bolted right up despite being from a different model bike. Hooray for Triumph's cookie cutter motorcycles on the '90s!

So I think the bike has a cooling problem. When I pulled into the garage a few days ago after a ride coolant was leaking from around the radiator cap and from the expansion tank overflow tubes. During the ride the temperature guage was always well clear of the red so I don't think it's overheating. I just took it out for a ride and no coolant is leaking now. The guage was showing normal temperature the whole time but when I checked the expansion tank the coolant in there was cold.

I think I finally figured this problem out. The leak seems to be coming from a crack the little plastic tube just under the radiator cap that the hose to the expansion tank connects to. Used radiators are going for about $100 on eBay so I think I'll try some RTV red first. Another problem was that the fan wasn't coming on. I troubleshot that down to a bad fan switch in the radiator so hopefully these will be easy fixes.
 
After trying a few fixes I decided to bite the bullet and shell out ?50 for some peace of mind in a replacement radiator. The fixes were holding but I kept having horrible visions of the tube completely letting go when I'm hundreds of miles from home. Getting the radiator swapped out was no easy feat as nothing was as easy as it should have been. It was so bad in fact that at times I was wanting to kick the bike over, light it on fire, and be done with it.

I also replaced the faulty fan switch with one for a Volvo 740. Some guy on a big Triumph forum cross-referenced the official part number with the Volvo part which turned out to be less than half the price. It also turns the fan on at a lower temperature so it offers a little more protection. The fan is working beautifully now and the bike is running considerably cooler now than before with no leaks. :thumbsup:

I'm currently in the process of flushing the coolant since I had the system torn apart anyway. Once that's done and the bike is put back together I should be ready to ride tomorrow. :cool:
 
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And we're back...both of us! I recently got back in the country after being away for work for three months. One of my highest priorities was getting the bike up and running and I'm happy to say it's done! It breezed through its MOT with the only advisory being the rear tire worn close to the limit. I just got back from a little shakedown ride and she's running strong, smooth, and cool. :thumbsup:

It also gave me a chance to finally test ride with the new 'flip-up' screen that I ordered way back in January. Wow this thing makes a huge difference! No longer is my head being constantly blown back and battered around by all the wind that the original screen directed straight into my face. Now my head rides in a nice, calm little bubble. Another nice thing is that it directs airflow to my arms and right into the zipper vents on my jacket keeping me nice and cool. And I think the screen looks a whole lot better than the original. It almost has a Tiger look to it now.





Next little project is getting some longer bolts to attach the Honda top box I also bought back in January.
 
More pictures! I finally got around to mounting up the top box I got back in January. I had been shopping around for a Givi to match the other cases but then I found a Honda box for less than half the price. Luckily all it needed was a pair of longer bolts and the plate mounted right up to the rack. Win! She's looking like a proper touring bike now. :cool:







I also forgot to mention that I installed some heated grips back in December as well. These things are nice! Installation was super simple. The hardest part was just routing all the wiring back to the battery and making it look neat.



And yesterday I did some much needed work on the brakes. They never really felt all that strong even after bleeding them several times. I was about to buy a new master cylinder when a search on a Triumph forum suggested that the brakes just needed to be cleaned after years of road gunk jamming them up. Wow did that ever do the trick! It feels like a completely different bike now! Before the brakes were like those tiny little rubber pads on a cheap Walmart Huffy. Now it's brutal how hard the brakes bite. I love easy fixes!
 
Aaaaaand it's dead. :( The infamous sprag clutch went out and since this is a post '94 model there's no handy access panel so it's an engine-out job to replace. The shop quoted me ?1100 ($1850) just for the sprag, plus another ?300ish ($500) for everything else to make it roadworthy again (MOT, rear tire, chain, etc.) At this point it's beyond economical repair. Although I'm sad I didn't get to put it over 100k miles, I'm not really too sad to see it go. I never really liked the bike...I tolerated it. Since I'm so short (5'7 with 30 inch legs) the bike was always just too big and unwieldy, especially at slow speeds and just maneuvering around on foot. Sometimes I needed help pushing it backwards out of parking spaces. Plus the ongoing reliability issues never gave me the kind of confidence I would have liked in a tourer. It was fun while it lasted and I'll always remember the good times, especially the Scotland tour, but in the end it just wasn't to be.

Not to worry too much though as I already have my eye on a replacement. It should fit my smallness much better and it's US-spec so I can bring it back with me no problems at all. Here's hoping everything checks out when I go to look at it tomorrow morning. :cool:
 
Ah, that's a shame about the sprag clutch. For that repair cost, I don't blame you for letting it go through. Excited to see what bike you end up with next!
 
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