[dazco]

I've posted here in the past about belt issues, and i post here because my bike is the only triumph with a belt drive and you harley owners are infinitely more experienced with belts than any triumph owners. Heres the question....i saw a HD page with instructions on setting belt tension, and it was the same as triumph recommends...around 1/4" movement of the belt with 10 Lbs of pressure. But it's said to do this when cold. Thats a pretty darn tight spec, but the problem is i find the belt gets much tighter when hot. So if i set it to that when cold i'm afraid it will damage the output shaft bearing or the belt itself when it gets hot and becomes insanely tight. Anyone have any thoughts on this? Or do you find your belts don't tighten when hot?

Today i'll be checking the swingarm to see if it's torqued correctly. Maybe it's loose, i dunno what else to think if it's not normal for it to get much tighter when hot. Maybe you guys will have some ideas i haven't thought of. By the way, same manufacturer....Gates. Thanks...

 

[DR_DEUCE]

MOst HD manuals give a hot and a cold spec for the tension. I would assume that your spec should be verified before setting it tighter/looser. Are you having a specific problem....are you measuring the deflection at the CENTER of belt, and rotate the belt to different areas and recheck.............

 

[dazco]

Yes, in the middle. And the problem i have is that it changes so much when hot that i'm afraid to set it to thier spec when cold for fear it will tighten up insanely tight ! In any case, the hot and cold measurements are very different. Too much so that i can't imagine thats right, especially when they say to do it cold and the spec for cold is very tight. I hate to think of how tight it would then be once hot. Triumph only gives the hot spec, not cold. I guess for now on i'll just assume the spec is where they want it to be while hot and set it to that spec when the bike is hot. I'd call them and ask, but you know how that goes....ask 10 different reps, get 10 different answers.

 

[FXDRYDR]

Don't think you can go too wrong following the Triumph spec. Talk to any Triumph techs? Some guy who's been at it a while would have a good perspective.