Trip Meter Repair

  NOTE:

Please use this article very care fully because I am not an experienced repair person but I was willing to take risk. The worst case scenario was that I might not be able to use the Trip Meter again. The Odometer and Speedometer would not be affected. I still wanted to share my successful experience. The second option would be to purchase a new Tachometer ($150)?

Repair History:

I am the second owner of my 1997 Valkyrie. The meter was not working when I got it. I found the knob was missing and the shaft was bent. I removed the entire Tachometer and was able to repair the knob and straightening the shaft following removal of the chrome cover. You can buy the knob but I wound up making one by using few things from my garage stuff.  Well, it started working but all the four digits were rotating together as if they were all locked. [ I did post a message few days ago).

I opened it again, This time I removed the outer bezel which is crimped on to the inner plastic body. This was little risky in the sense that I might damage the bezel.
I examined the four digit discs and lubricated and tried again by rotating manually and it seemed working but unfortunately I found out during my ride that all the discs were still rotating as one unit.

I opened one more time. This time I even removed the Trip Meter assembly. Please note that the entire Tachometer is not designed to repair easily. I dismantled the entire unit by carefully arranging the parts in the order they came out. The parts involve four plastic discs, locking clips, circular springs, as well as nylon driving discs which are located in between the digit discs.

What I did was to increase the spring tension by bending the tabs on the circular springs, cleaned each nylon driving discs and removed the old lubricant. I believe, the old lubricant was the primary problem in the sense that due to the small clearance, the oil film was creating surface tension and rotating the digits without the driving force. I reassembled the unit and installed in the Tachometer. Then I used a nail and made a square shank at the end to fit the tachometer cable housing and rotated by using the drill. Make sure you rotate the drill in the right direction. I was able to go up to 25 mph with the drill and found out that all the digits were turning properly. In order to satisfy myself further, I took a a 12 mile ride and was please to note that the meter was still working.

I will still watch it for several miles.

I did my best to describe the details. However, if anyone wants to more details, please contact me.

Note: I am sure some of you might have experienced similar experience and solved the problem differently. I will appreciate feedback so that I can use it in the future if necessary.

Valky02