Oil leak after high side wreck at 60 mph.

Idaho_Rocket

Standard Bore
Joined
Feb 21, 2014
Messages
3
Ride
2007 Rocket III
It has been a long time since I last posted. This May, the Rocket myself and GF were in a pretty nasty accident on the freeway. First off, I have been riding over 40 years and had well over 200,000 miles and this was my first. I have logged over 38,000 Rocket miles on two excelent, trouble free Rocket 3 (2006 and 2007 Classics).


Some old lady came up on a construction zone on the freeway and froze. Stopped dead in the lane, the van in front of me hit their brakes late and the truck behind me, was also late on the brakes. The truck behind me did stop, but was less then 3 feet from the back of the van that was in front of me. I ended up going to the right emergency lane and things got bad. There was this big sand bag in the emergency lane and I avoided it with the front tire but the back tire hit it, loss of traction, big-time. The rocket went down pretty fast, after the a couple of side flips . Good thing we had all of out safety stuff on. We went down going 60mph on the freeway…


My GF on the back was thrown in the air and landed on top of me and the bike (now on it's right side. She eventually rolled off me and got a small road burn about the size of a quarter. I was not so lucky. My right foot was caught under the bike and I was dragged over 300 feet. I was finally able to kick free of the bike with my left foot but only after trying to do it 4-5 times. My right foot was the drag point during most of the sliding. I was wearing race boots and they pretty much saved my foot from being ground down to a nub. After the skid stopped, I looked at my right knee is straight pointing at noon, my right foot was pointing towards 8 oclock. It was broken in 2 places. I now pack 2 plates and 2 pins in my ankle. The accident did tear my held glove off my right hand, and melted my jacket down to a ball.


I did send several pictures to Alpine Stars of the boot that saved my foot. They had me send it to them in and they sent me a new pair free. That is mostly because they were special order (Size 52 - US size 16-- EEEE wide). Thanks to them….


Anyways, it only cost $135,000 so far in medical bills…. But the bike had only $4500 damage. When the bike was fixed, it was time for the 30,000 mile adjustment. That was done with the other repairs. Now I have this strange oil leak. I can't seem to track it down, as it is a slow one. I have included a picture of where it is. The bike has been sitting for 3 weeks now. Has anyone ever had this type leak?
 
Welcome again.... Good to hear you both are ok. I would think final drive overfill too.
 
Wow!!! Sad to hear about your "off", but glad to hear that you are (relatively) okay and getting better.

It is hard to tell about the leak, but it looks like brake fluid to me. However, it is hard to tell from the picture.

If the final drive unit was overfilled then it will come out of the breather at the top - especially at Interstate type speeds.
 
Thanks for the info. I will check that when I get home. I was looking at it coming from the engine, but that makes more sense. I just can't get under the bike like I used.


Yes, it is good to be back on the road again. The first ride after the rehab and repair was a little tense. I mean who wants to be the guy that wrecks the ride back from a wreck, I don't want to be that guy. We did still log in 500+ miles after. Our normal year is 7500+ miles. But, I did take up target shooting while I was unable to ride. Now i will do both...
 
Wow ! That is some story. Sad you were wrecked but glad you are alive and recovering. The final drive should only be filled with a bout 4 oz. Drain the drive by removing the small plug at the bottom. Stand the bike up straight and fill to the bottom of the large fill plug thread. Be sure to tighten the small drain plug to ONLY 15 Newtonmeters and the large fill plug to 50 Newtonmeters.

What shop did your repairs ?
 
Ouch sorry about your mishap glad you are on the mend and GF was not to badly hurt!!
I'm guessing like @idk That it is brake fluid as the final drive oil should not be that clear and for it to be coming out of the breather you would have had to fill it with bike laying on it's side, I would run a clean dry rag around the the rear brake caliper to see it there is any traces of fluid, If the banjo bolt washer on brake line has been cracked during repairs it might be seeping out and dropping on to rim then across to other side before dropping on to ground, it could also be a split brake line I recall there was someone some time back that had a brake line start to leak.
Good luck with finding the source of fluid also you might try having a smell of it as Final Drive oil has a horrid smell to it where as Brake Fluid has almost none
 
you asked for opinions so you will get a lot of different ones.
i think judging from the pic it can not be brake fluid because the brake caliper is on the other side. hanso has a good idea about smelling the fluid. i think it is either diff fluid or oil coming from the rear of engine running down the diff tube. if the diff is leaking it won't take long to have problems because. it might be leaking at the oring on the drain bolt. use caution when tightening.
my approach would be is to drain the diff to see if it matches the oil on the ground. the diff oil is usually black that is why i change mine every time i change oil at 5000 miles. hth
 
you asked for opinions so you will get a lot of different ones.
i think judging from the pic it can not be brake fluid because the brake caliper is on the other side. hanso has a good idea about smelling the fluid. i think it is either diff fluid or oil coming from the rear of engine running down the diff tube. if the diff is leaking it won't take long to have problems because. it might be leaking at the oring on the drain bolt. use caution when tightening.
my approach would be is to drain the diff to see if it matches the oil on the ground. the diff oil is usually black that is why i change mine every time i change oil at 5000 miles. hth
remember the bike is leant over on side stand the brake fluid could easily drip on to the centre of hub and gravity would do the rest to take it to the other side ..... mmmmm I still suggest you sniff it First before you go any further
 
Back
Top