350 Forza recalls

[Orcadian]

Hi Folks,
A friend down in Lancashire has had a recall notice from Honda regarding some issue with a drive bolt in the final drive/pulley area. His bike is 72 plate, mine is 23 plate. I checked with mother Honda AND DVLA and there is no recall showing for mine. Does anyone know if the problem was resolved from 72 plate onwards (sorry, don't know his frame number) and therefore mine is OK?

Separately his is due for MOT with 12,000 miles on and on a pre- mot inspection, the tester said he would fail it on notchy steering head bearings. His dealer agreed to do the work (6 hrs labour) if he bought the bearings (£70+). Trawling the net, this seems to be a VERY common problem. I jacked mine up (9000 miles) and sure enough, notchy right at the dead ahead position. Not an issue particularly noticeable when riding but mine is due for first MOT next May. Looks like Honda are ducking the issue and putting it down to 'wear and tear'. I assume it's ball races - anyone fitted taper rollers to theirs?

Definition: Ball Race - a tom cat with 10 yards start on the vet!

Any thoughts or definitive answers from the collective?

Ian

[scootabout]

I've had two Forzas and both needed steering head bearings @ 15K. Honda just don't use enough grease!

[Orcadian]

That's interesting - was either bike done under warranty? If not did you do it yourself? I think I would rather do mine myself over the winter - there's a hell of a lot of dismantling needed and plenty of scope for ham-fisted 'mechanics' (read spare part fitters) to break tabs off plastic bits and stick them back with silicone sealer. Yes, it happened on a friend's Pan European. Rather than just replace with the same, possibly sub-standard original bearing, I would favour a change to taper rollers if suitable sizes are available from Timken. I've restored quite a few 70's Honda fours where the bearings had become bone dry with hard grease and they were still not notchy after almost 50 years and 40,000 miles. This has to be down to the 'bean counters'


Ian

[Argyll]

My SH300i needed new steering bearings at just under 3,000 miles - £260 garage bill.

[scootabout]

I know the limit of my skills, so I got my trusted garage to do both. They happened when they were just out of warranty

[Orcadian]

Thanks for that, 15000 miles is not acceptable really - Honda must know this is a recurring problem and not just on Forzas. I'm too old now to fight these companies selling products 'not fit for purpose', so will do my own over the Winter and source taper rollers - I'm certainly not fitting Honda parts for them to fail again so soon - 9000 miles in my case. I can't get my head (no pun intended) around the fact that most of the weight is on the real wheel on a scoot, when compared with a conventional bike.

Ian