Stuff On A Motorcycle You Wouldn’t Expect To Break

broken speedometer

Notice anything funny about my speedometer in the photo above? Yeah, that’s weird. The top portion of the face of the speedometer just snapped off and slid down on the side, exposing the gears and inner workings. Anyone seen something like that before?

I was out on my 1980 Honda CB750 Custom on Friday, making a run for the Tag-O-Rama game being played on Adventure Riders, and getting annoyed at the howling coming from my speedometer. For as long as I’ve owned this bike, more than 20 years, the speedometer has periodically made this squealing sound, but it has only been occasionally. Recently, however, it has been doing it all the time, and it has been louder than before.

So I was watching it closely to see when the squealing starts (around 20 mph) and when it stops (around 15 mph). And then one time I looked down and . . . WTF?

I happened to be near Mountain Thunder Motorsports, at 2670 W. Hampden, where I take my bikes for service, so I swung on by to let Joel take a look. I figured he could see what parts were needed and get them on order. Even Joel was surprised by what he saw so I suspect this is not a very common problem. Joel did say, though, that the squealing is definitely an issue with the speedo, and that replacing it will solve both problems.

He also looked at my mileage, 84,549 when I got home later and shot this picture, and remarked that even with a used speedometer my bike is going to shed a lot of miles. Hey, someone want to buy this 32-year-old bike with only 27,000 miles on it? Ha! Not for sale.

I’ve often wondered if the speedometer was going to break some day, considering the squealing and all, but I never imagined this would be how it would break. You never know.

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Biker Quote for Today

The faster it goes the faster it breaks. And high performance=high maintenance.

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3 Responses to “Stuff On A Motorcycle You Wouldn’t Expect To Break”

  1. fasthair Says:

    HI Ken,

    Yes as a matter of fact I have seen this before on a buddies Harley. His broken around the screws that hold the face on. Was kind of funny to ride along and watch it spin around going down the road.

    When you get the new speedo you’re going to have to hook it to a drill for a few weeks to get the mileage back up there :)

    fasthair

  2. Flmotorbikes Says:

    I’ve never seen that in my 26 years of riding bikes

  3. » Blog Archive » Knocking 55,200 Miles Off My Honda Says:

    […] it could just mean you replaced the speedometer. I mentioned awhile back how the dial on the speedometer on my 1980 CB750 Custom has broken (see photo above) and I needed […]

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