crack in the weld on the swing arm

trav72 wrote:

Wow! That does look severe! I wouldn't ride with that even if it was welded again. I jump mine all of the time, ride lots of whoops and ST every weekend. There are no cracks anywhere that I can see (I went and looked after seeing your pic). Maybe it was a defective weld?

If I had to make an early guess, without seeing the part in person or either end of the crack (especially the top side), I'd say the weld in the picture was simply in the cracks path. From here the weld pictured looks decent, about as good as I'd expect from an assembly line weld done by hand. Now, that's not to say one of the welds on the top side were sub par. Or, the most likely culprit, some junk in the metal.


.....That or it took a really big hit sometime, or both.... or a combination of the three!

ya i saw that in the weld and wondered? i know my welds and i agree about the fatigue cycle. we will see what yamaha has to say about it and what they want to do.

i know what i want to do? it's ride! so squeaky wheel gets the grease.

drater wrote:

we will see what yamaha has to say about it and what they want to do.

I hope they replace it for you. good luck.

Watching to see what Yammie does for drater...

well the verdict is in and the bike has no more extended warranty on it so i am going for the weld first and see how that goes.

oh well i guess it's good to have the extended warranty???

drater wrote:

well the verdict is in and the bike has no more extended warranty on it so i am going for the weld first and see how that goes.

oh well i guess it's good to have the extended warranty???

Bummer. Not going for the one on ebay?

drater wrote:

well the verdict is in and the bike has no more extended warranty on it so i am going for the weld first and see how that goes.

oh well i guess it's good to have the extended warranty???

I have the four year extended warranty (which I thought was a good deal for $260), but I just advised somebody that I thought it was a waste of money because of how reliable the bikes have proven to be since I bought one of the early ones out and they were a new and unknown model. I think your swingarm problem is the first problem of that kind of read of on the forums

Are they saying your bike had an extended warranty but it's expired, otherwise they would cover it?

I can't remember if there were different options for the YES thing, but mine is covered until the fall of 2013.

Maybe I should go look at my swingarm... just because.

I got the extra 48 months of warranty also. If I recall correctly, you could purchase it by the year. I figured it would be a good idea since it was a new bike and all. The only issue I've had (fuel pump) I've payed for so far since the dealer didn't see it my way. I'll have to look over my YES contract to see if this issue would be covered.

ya i think the best warranty is with yamaha and not a other company covering just certain parts, thats when yamaha will back it easier.

i have no warranty any more on the moto.

OK HERE IT IS, THE NEW WELD! just put everything back together and i will go thrash it and see how it holds boys and girls. my capt. welded it, he has a sweet set up at his house to make anything. he ground it out nicely and used some of the old weld to go up against.

i am going to go for the one on ebay if this goes south on me. thanks trav72 thats a good score! and i do like the black.

drater wrote:

ya i think the best warranty is with yamaha and not a other company covering just certain parts, thats when yamaha will back it easier.

i have no warranty any more on the moto.

OK HERE IT IS, THE NEW WELD! just put everything back together and i will go thrash it and see how it holds boys and girls. my capt. welded it, he has a sweet set up at his house to make anything. he ground it out nicely and used some of the old weld to go up against.

Okay,

I'm a noob here and know NOTHING about welding. Is this a good welding job or not? Can you tell just by looking at it or????

Pete

Looks nice and clean to me however I may have made it a little wider. But hopefully will be good enough.

Did he drill a small hole at each end of the crack??

When repairing a crack you have to drill a hole at each end to terminate it. Then grind out a "V" and lay in a new bead.

If the crack wasnt terminated properly it will return and propagate through the new weld.

vnp514 wrote:

Okay,

I'm a noob here and know NOTHING about welding. Is this a good welding job or not? Can you tell just by looking at it or????

Pete

Well it's clean. Thats one of the hardest things to achieve when welding Al. I would have dipped the rod much more frequently than what they did. The "ripples" are pretty far apart.

What you can't tell about the (this particular) job just by looking at the end result is the prep work before welding. If you've ever painted anything you know the preparation is everything. Well the same goes for welding, especially aluminum TIG welding.

that original crack is something i would seriously take up with Yamaha motor corp usa and fight it. hard... im no paper certified welder but i can mig and tig pretty good. that bead looks very built up, (layer on layer) the bead looks good but hard to tell how well the first layer penetrated and took. Any good weld should only take one pass to complete...not multiple layers


Like said by Rider Wv, it is important to terminate the crack by at least drilling a small hole at each end to "help" stop the crack..i wouldnt ride on that arm.

Please send some of those original pics to Yamaha and ask what they can do. Pretty scary if you ask me. thats a fault right in the weld

little squirt wrote:

Any good weld should only take one pass to complete...not multiple layers

This is far from true. I AM a certified welder. Also, the original looks to be only one pass. There are far, far more factors than just the weld when it comes to cracks. There were many miles on this swingarm which leads me to believe it was not solely the weld or welding techniques that caused the crack.

as far as small welding like this, motorcycle or car stuff. i never have seen layered welds, even on frames.......if thats one pass, he didnt grind the original weld very much

You can still see the original weld underneath if you look. Usually welds I've had done have the old weld completely removed and started fresh, unless there was next to no material left to grab onto.

Good weld, bad weld, I don't know as I'm not a welder. Although I do wish I knew how. But whatever, I would have bought a new swing arm.

Along with an oversized tank...

and paid to much for it in the process

little squirt wrote:

as far as small welding like this, motorcycle or car stuff. i never have seen layered welds, even on frames.......if thats one pass, he didnt grind the original weld very much

Chances are it's because most motorcycles or autos don't use anything thicker than 1/4" material. If you have the proper machine, you are correct in that one pass is all you need.

I agree that it doesn't look like much prep was done. The original weld is still there.

it's nice to read all the feed back, my buddy ground out most of the old weld but kept a bit for material. he prepped the crack with a nice v. i have been motoing, hill climbing, and street riding and everything looks to be holding. close to three hundred miles on it now, ya the bike has over 27,000 so i dont know if yamaha can back something like that. they saw the pictures? i dont know im just stoked im riding!

well if you feel comfy with that, ride on.

Fwiw, I would ride it. But I would inspect it frequently. It might not be a bad idea to do a liquid penetrant test on the area every 6 months or so.