Refurbishing an older Yamaha Kodiak 400

cathead

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Lately I picked up a 1994 Yamaha Kodiak 400 for cheap as a winter project. It seems to have a lack of maintenance
so there were a lot of things that needed attention. The most pressing thing was the rear ring and pinion drive that
was bad. The pinion gear needed to be removed so I had to machine a tool for the job. I was lucky in that it was
made so a long rod could be installed to be able to apply a lot of torque if needed. It was seemingly in there tight!
As it turns out, the collar for the pinion is left hand thread! I was lucky in that I sometimes try to break stuff loose
in both directions. P1030706.JPGIt was a twenty minute job to make the tool and well worth it because there is no way I would have been able to get the pinion gear and bearing out otherwise.
The ring and pinion are being replaced so once it is back together, it will be a usable ATV once again.

The reason I picked this year of ATV for a project is that it is over 25 years old and in Minnesota one can purchase a one time license
for $8.50 as opposed to the sixty six dollar standard three year license. I have another newer one (1999) that I drive occasionally on my
own property for firewood hauling mostly and it will be eligible for "collector status license" in 2024 I think.

After applying a new seat cover, replacing a pair of CV boots, painting the bent and rusty racks, fixing the brakes, going through the
carburetor, and other things, the machine looks pretty good generally except for finishing up on the rear ring and pinion assembly.
I have some parts ordered so looking forward to getting it back together in one piece. It's hunting season now in Minnesota so a
good time to get it in shape for later on.

It's a good way to spend some time cleaning up a machine that had seen some hard use. I suspect it has seen a few swamps
as there was a lot of cleaning of mire on top of the skid plates. It will get better care in the future as I drive around mud holes
and swampy areas. I expect it will be running in a week or so.



P1030707.JPG
 
Good project! Curious; what lubricant goes in that assembly?
 
Good project! Curious; what lubricant goes in that assembly?
I think it is referred to GL4 which stands for "gear lube 4" . Another name is EP90 I believe which is "extreme pressure 90 wt gear lube".
 
I'm going to guess you have a brass piece (bushing?) in there somewhere. That would explain the GL4. GL5 eats brass.
 
There is no brass in the drive assembly, just aluminum, steel and stainless steel. These machines are pretty much
abused by running them in water and slough holes. You just can't keep all that moisture out. Rust begins and the
deterioration commences to the point the bearings are shot at which time it quits working and the machine gets put up for sale.
I have more respect for machinery than that and love the challenge of restorations. I have restored many cars,
airplanes, motorcycles, jeeps, engines, machine tools, houses and who knows what else over the years. It's what
I do. Oh yeah, I forgot tractors and skid steers. The off-roaders around here use ATVs and mudder trucks with the
mindset that they are doing something great but they are only working themselves into poverty as it is not inexpensive.
I can be happy that I was provided with a rebuildable project for cheap and will end up with something that I can
have fun with in my own way. They are great to haul firewood or run on the trails that are not all ripped up. I paid $400
for the ATV which may have been too much but I will have a good running machine totaling about $800 and have
learned a lot in the process. You can say you know your machine if you take it all apart and put it back together
again. I can hardly wait till I can add the GL4 and shove it out the door and go for a ride in the snow.:eagerness:
 
While I was at it, I checked the side play on the front wheel bearings as well. One was pretty bad and the other
seemed usable but on further inspection, the grease was rusty and needed replacement as well. So the good
thing is it will have new bearings and seals the way around. Bearing and seal sets are available on E-Bay
quite inexpensively. The next project will be to inspect the U-Joints and lube and or replace as necessary.
After that is complete, it will be ready to test ride I think.:encourage:
 
After removing the bottom skid plate on the ATV I found a weak spot on the frame that is made
of pipe and there was a hole in the pipe and filled with river goo. I machined a piece of pipe to fit over the
bad area and sliced into two pieces longitudinally to make a repair over the bad spot. It took an hour or so to get all
the rust and crud out of the inside of the pipe using a welding rod with a bend at the end to drag out the accretions.
After a bit of welding and grinding, it was painted with some rust inhibitive stuff and painted in shiny black to
match the rest of the piping. As a finishing touch, I found that the front of the pipe that had a bolt to hold on the
front skid plate was open to the inside of that pipe. After that discovery, I used an oil can to inject some oil
into the pipe to inhibit further rusting. I won't be into slough holes anyway with it but liked the idea of adding
a bit of oil to preserve the inside of the piping which I did for both sides of the frame. My gas welding job
was better than expected because I saw no oil dripping out of the repair area to my surprise. Also today
I fixed three tires that were leaking on the inside of the rim using some liquid rubber stuff just for that purpose.
It seemed to work so time will tell I guess on that repair. About all that is left now is to replace the right rear
wheel bearing and seal and install a new carburetor. I was intending to order just a carb kit but since the
price of a new carb was so cheap I decided to spring for a new one. All in all it has been a fun and educational
project well worth my time. Thanks for reading along.
 
Whoa! Stop right there. Do NOT order a chinese knock-off. Can't point you in a good direction, but I (and others I'm sure) have had horrible experience with those. That experience would include getting them to honor any warranty.
 
Whoa! Stop right there. Do NOT order a chinese knock-off. Can't point you in a good direction, but I (and others I'm sure) have had horrible experience with those. That experience would include getting them to honor any warranty.
Well, if it turns out to be problematic, I still have the original I can put a carb kit in. I bought one for a Honda GX390
and that works just fine. Time will tell the story I guess. I did a little research on the web and there is an O ring on the
idle screw that can cause problems supposedly. The ATV starts up fine but runs rich after a little driving. That could mean it
needs a float adjustment possibly. Not knowing what the previous owner did to it, I opted for a replacement carb. Everything looks
fine in the old carb as I had it apart for a look.
 
The new carburetor showed up yesterday so today I had some time to install it. Further inspection of the old carb
indicated that it already had one of those aftermarket carbs installed. Anyhow the new carb idled just fine but when
revving it up with a load, it would burble with the rich kind of sound just like the one that was on there. In the package
for the new carburetor were two extra jets, a medium diameter jet and a fine diameter one. I loosened the new carb
from it's mounting bolts and turned it a bit so I could reach the bottom cover bolts. It took only a few minutes to remove
the original main jet(with the bigger diameter hole in it) and install the medium diameter jet. It was 10 below zero this
morning so not a good day to be out testing it. I have a 50 foot run in my new heated shop so tested it there in low range.
I'm pretty happy that it passed the test and it's seemingly running fine. Now I can rework the old carb if I want to and
have a spare carb on the shelf. I have to say that my 35 dollars was well spent as I learned a lot in the process. I find
it amazing that one can purchase a replacement carburetor for that kind of money which by the way included delivery!

Another problem was that three of the tires were losing air and needed to be aired every few days. I removed the
offending wheels and aired them up using a spray bottle with some dish soap to locate the leaks. Luckily the leaks were
on one side of the rim(inside side...) so only had to break the bead on one side of each tire. Apparently the clearance
on low pressure tires is minimal as it took tire spoons and a sledge hammer to break the bead. I had some black bead
sealer stuff I had used on a skid steer so used that. That was a few days ago. I see today that they were still aired so
hopefully I have that problem solved.

I still need a nice warm day where I can go for a long ride and see if all my work has paid off. It's winter so maybe
warm boots and a snowmobile suit would be in order and maybe a friend to ride along just in case. There are a lot of
trails out in the middle of nowhere around here so not a good place to have a breakdown.
 
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