Post by ruckydog on Jun 30, 2022 7:49:15 GMT -5
Hey all,
So I bought a 2016 Ruckus (3800 miles) last summer and love it! Unfortunately, this spring I ran into some issues. To make a long story short, the engine died on my girlfriend while she was riding it. I went to pick it up, and it would start, but made tons of noise, then crap out again. Pushed it home, tried to get it started to hear exactly where the noise was coming from (dumb, I know) and ended up seizing the motor. Awesome.
I have the ruckus completely torn down, and I'm currently cleaning up the motor to get all of the metal particles removed before reassembly. I'm still waiting on a few parts to arrive before I get going here.
I changed all fluids (10W-40) as soon as I got the ruckus, so while I'm prepared to own up to it, I'm hesitant to believe that the issue is from lack of maintenance on my part (the oil had less than 300 miles on it). The ruckus was previously owned by a guy who bought it for his daughter in college and did all of the maintenance on time through his honda dealer (I have the paperwork to back this up), and it was garage kept. The only other maintenance that I've done is raise the idle speed on the carb because it would occasionally bog out coming off the line at stop lights, and that seemed to solve the problem (it ran fine for 4 months or so afterward). The ruckus is entirely stock with no modifications.
I know that the crank bearing failure was common in the pre-2006 ruckus but not so much now. So, I'm wondering if the crank failed this time because of something else that is screwed up. I just don't want to go through all the time and money of rebuilding the motor without addressing the main issue and have this happen again. I'm mostly concerned that there is a carb issue (and I'm now paranoid because I looked closely at the carb and there is a screw stripped, so somebody has definitely been in the carb at some point).
Parts that I'm replacing now (all OEM parts from Honda):
Belt
crank/piston
cam bearings
all gaskets
spark plug
air filter
fuel filter
fuel pump
rollers (oem)
all fluids (obviously)
I also cleaned out the very dirty reed valve. I bought a small engine tach and feeler gauge to make sure I can properly tune the motor once it is back together.
So here are my questions:
When I drained the oil, it smelled like straight gas. Why? What would cause this?
Should I rebuild the carb or play it safe and just get a new one? (I'm going to tear this one down and clean it either way)
There was dust and grime in the compartment that houses the stator. Is this normal?
There was also a ton of dust in the CVT housing, is this normal?
The rollers were quite worn. Is this to be expected at 3800 miles?
Has anyone experienced this sort of issue on a post 06 ruckus before? Would love to hear your thoughts.
Sorry for the super long post, I have just spent a significant amount of money on parts already and would like to have some input before putting it together. You simply can't put a price tag on peace of mind!
Thanks for your help!
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