To Lube or Not to Lube... That is the question

I have a 2012 RSV with 4000 miles on it.

Tomorrow I am removing the rear wheel and driveshaft.

I have read back and forth on here that GEN2 ventures have their differential splines lubed by differential oil and that you just need to lube the splines in the U-joint end. Some say you need to lube both ends.

In the enclosed picture, for the life of me I cannot figure out how -any-, or at least a -significant- amount of 80w-90 can make it past, the gear, the seal, the bearing, the bearing retainer, the oring, and the oil seal, not to mention the nut and washer in the middle of the drive shaft coupler to get to the differential side drive shaft splines.

Some folks have said that by lubing the differential side drive shaft splines that it will plug oil holes in the gear coupler.

As I said, this is tomorrows project and I have not actually viewed the parts in real life yet.

So... which is it? Lube the differential side drive shaft splines with moly, or do nothing and let it get lube from to 80W-90 in the diff sump?

Thanks!

There isn't any reason to grease the splines at the diff end on the 2nd gens but most guys do. There is a hole through the bearing retainer (#6) through to the female spline (#10), a little of the gear lube does flow through to the spline. What can happen if you use too much moly or grease and it will plug this hole. I have never used anything when putting together and the spines are always coated with gear oil from the diff every time when I take it apart. My '06 RSV was like this and I had it apart quite a few times in 100,000 miles and I've had this 2000 apart twice and the splines at the diff end are ALWAYS coated in gear oil.

It certainly doesn't hurt to put a little something on the splines at the diff end if it makes you feel better, just make sure not to use so much that it packs in the end and plugs off the oil hole.

I'll 2nd Ace. Differential oil gets in there through holes in the back of the coupler (#10). It doesn't take much and enough gets in there to keep it from wearing.

It only needs grease if it's been disassembled, to protect it until some gear oil works in there.

The slip joint is on the engine side. It needs grease. The differential side does not require grease although it won't hurt it.

Mike

Thank you to all of yall. Just trying to be prepaired for what I was getting into.

Here is what I found.

The PARTS drawing is wrong and the service manual drawing is correct.

If you will look at the parts drawing it shows #33 through #36 in the picture in the wrong picture order but in the right assembly order. In other words,

Put #33 (the oil seal) on the diff end of the drive shaft first, then slide on the washer #34 , then slide on #35 the circlip, then install #36 at the yoke end of the driveshaft.

is the parts drawing

is the service manual drawing. Notice the difference.

I had close to 4000 miles on the bike and I wanted to bring it up to a known condition.

I found dry rusty drive pins

Dry rusty cush drive holes.

Hardly any grease on the drive splines

Found that the diff end of the driveshaft is lubed by diff sump oil that it gets from the two holes in the coupler and that factory puts a little moly on there as a pre-assembly lube.

notice the seal on the diff side....

Hardly any grease on the yoke end.

So I cleaned it up, greased it, and put it back together. I used a brass 1/2" pipe cleaner to clean out the cush drive holes and scotchbright to clean everything else. The wheel is hollow so I plugged both ends of the axle shaft bearing holes, then gave each hole a shot of brake cleaner after the pipe brush. I used straight lith grease (red and gc-lb rated) on the diff side oil seal and internal of the drive pin assembly and moly (black smelly stuff also gc-lb rated) on the brake side needle bearing and the cush drive pins.

and put it all back together.

Installing the drive shaft was tough. I eventually made a tool out of a coathanger bent in such a way that it had a -U- on the end of it that would hold the yoke up so I could stab the driveshaft. The other toughie was getting the wheel back on in that I had a hard time pushing the wheel into the diff splines without scooting my bike off the jack. After about 30 minutes of wrestling with the wheel, I finally called the boss (my wife) for some assistance. I had her stand where the left rear crash bar is and told her to push against me while I was trying to get the wheel towards her and that the goal was to get the wheel inserted without pushing the bike off the stand. On the first try which took only 30 seconds the wheel was engaged and the bike was still on the jack. I don't know how I would have done this by myself. You'll note that in the picture of the cleaned up diff that I also had a brass drift in there trying to hang the wheel off of that to get the splines engaged. Maybe I was under hydraulic lock from so much grease, I dunno. I just know that it was very easy to get the wheel back on with two people.

Thank yall.. Maybe this article will help somebody in the future.