Hello from Holland!
- Thread starter Carl
- Start date
Welcome to our 'special' group, we are the 'select few' that LOVE and ride the Dino. Be VERY careful of her and she will treat you right. (Parts ARE hard to find!!)
Good choice Carl!
First: change the engine oil! This is VERY important! And to do it properly both oil filters must be changed. And use high quality oil. And next oil change would be good to do after 5000...6000 km not crazy 12800 km as said in manual (in the case of DN I think the 5000 km oil change interval will be better anyway to keep the HFT alive).
Then it would be a good thing after bike long sitting to change other liquids also: cooling liquid is very important as the cooling system of the DN is running on full cooling power at summer temperatures.
And those brake liquids must be changed after every 2 years, so obviously time has come for those also.
Check the brake pads condition while already there.
Change the oil in final drive.
New spark plugs may be a good idea, those may spoil just sitting in time. And new spark plug caps (I suggest to use NGK VD01F instead of OEM).
Do oiling the throttle cables.
Check all the lights and horn are working.
And you are good to go.
If you are thinking to keep the DN for some longer period I think stocking some spare service parts in your garage is a good idea as there are some service parts DN-specific only (not used on other bikes) and delivery time may be long for those and not every Honda shop have those in stock. BTW I myself use dutch Doubler Trading (www.doublerparts.nl) service to purchase bike's OEM parts.
- transmission oil filter 15412MEH003 (only Honda OEM available).
- transmission oil filter gasket 91301PH8005 (only Honda OEM available).
- engine oil filter 15010MKR305. You will get a nice oil filter wrench included with it. Ofcourse you can use a good aftermarket oil filter like HiFlo HF204, but Honda OEM oil filter price is close to it nowadays, so why not use the OEM one.
These listed above parts must all be changed during every engine oil change.
- air filter 17210MEH000 (there is available a paper type Honda OEM and washable from K&N, but I will not consider K&N version suitable as it's density is too low to act as a real air filter in case given).
Hi Knob (?)
Many thanks for your reponse.
So far I've cleaned the Dino, and did some visual inspections. It all seems in pretty good shape! Including the brake callipers, pads and disks.
I replaced the battery, and removed some accessoiry wiring which was not stock (for a battery charger and navi unit).
Next is the replacement of the shaft drive oil. Seems an easy job to me.
I've ordered new sparkplugs (expensive, allthough the Denso's are much cheaper and 100% compatible?), spark plug caps (updated version) and ET wiring. My hope is that the coils are still OK - I will do some resistance and voltage measurements later on.
Then I will bring the bike to the local bike shop for oil replacement (and both oil filters) and new brake oil.
Also I've my doubt about the fuel - it migt be in there for some years... How do I drain the petrol from the bike to pour in fresh fuel?
Any tips for additives to clean the fuel system?
Kind regards,
Carl
Many thanks for your reponse.
So far I've cleaned the Dino, and did some visual inspections. It all seems in pretty good shape! Including the brake callipers, pads and disks.
I replaced the battery, and removed some accessoiry wiring which was not stock (for a battery charger and navi unit).
Next is the replacement of the shaft drive oil. Seems an easy job to me.
I've ordered new sparkplugs (expensive, allthough the Denso's are much cheaper and 100% compatible?), spark plug caps (updated version) and ET wiring. My hope is that the coils are still OK - I will do some resistance and voltage measurements later on.
Then I will bring the bike to the local bike shop for oil replacement (and both oil filters) and new brake oil.
Also I've my doubt about the fuel - it migt be in there for some years... How do I drain the petrol from the bike to pour in fresh fuel?
Any tips for additives to clean the fuel system?
Kind regards,
Carl
Changing rear end oil is easy, only thing to pay attention is to keep the bike upright in time pouring the new oil in to get inserted the right amount of oil. Did this yesterday, as a part of 20k km service. And ofcourse the right type and viscosity oil to be used: the DN's service manual say "hypoid oil SAE 80". This kind of single viscosity oil is quite rear nowadays, so I used synthetic 75W90, same german produced oil I used many times and many tens of thousands km's in my Goldwings.
I saw the Denso plugs used on DN (and some other bikes) but somehow those did not convince me. Generally Denso plugs are used more on cars and NGK plugs on motorcycles. It just may be kind of a prejudice, but so it is settled by experience of many years. NGK plugs (those not faked chinese ones) take pretty well higher cylinder pressure common on motorcycles than some other brand plugs.
Yes the plugs NGK SIMR8A9 are quite expencive, but Honda promises those iridium tipped ones to live on DN for 50k km's (while using bike regularly ofcourse, not letting it stand for years). So price per /km in the end will not be so tremendously high.
Spark plugs will clean and so kind of "maintain" themselves while being used regularly (and not used with gasoline octane number too high!). I saw plugs got red isolators by using some gasoline E98 because of the extra octane booster added to this gas. In Europe probably you can get E95 gas and this is better, as DN will run well even on 91 octane lead free gasoline. This probably is not on sale anymore at least in EU.
Regular tip plugs (like CPR8EA9) will survive for about 10k km's. Basically it is possible to use those regular cheaper plugs also, just remember to change them in time. My friend professional bike mechanic says if engine is in good shape, it will run on any plug, so said with little humor. And if you feel you need to fix your engine by changing spark plugs - then the real culprit is somewhere deeper...
Here it seems not overwhelmingly pricy (by means of EU prices):
https://www.louis.eu/artikel/variante/ngk-iridium-spark-plug-simr8a9/10035343
On older similar engines like on VT600C or XL600V (direct heritage to DN's engine) for example Honda used two spark plugs per cylinder. And demands for spark plugs were lower in this case. I see no good about dropping this practice on the newer 680cc engines using only single spark plug, thus demanding expencive and very good plugs. These Honda's V-Twin engines have quite low and flat burning chamber and igniting the fuel mixture from two places will be a better idea.
If you are keen to try then it seems safe to install the "regular" NGK CPR8EA9 as this plug is used on XL700V and NT700V sharing similar cylinder group engine components. Just remember these plugs will live much shorter life than iridium tipped ones SIMR8A9.
The ignition coils used on DN are pretty regular type ones (OEM part 30500MBG003), used on many Honda models, it is pretty sure you do not get any problems with those.
If still the worst happens and you need new ones here is an alternative:
https://www.motomike.eu/en/search/30500MBG003/in/all/article/613573
Fuel draining from DN's tanks is complicated, I would try first to use some fuel additive with cleaning features to add to new gas for couple of tank fulls. If the engine runs well there is no real problem in this area, no need to extra cleaning, the fresh gasoline will do the thing in the end.
DN has two fuel tanks: upper plastic with filler neck and lower metallic one. The fuel pump sits in the lower tank ofcourse. Tanks are connected together with rubber hose. It is pretty sure there will not be any problems with the upper plastic tank, it is like a plastic fuel canister, it will not get rusty. I personally have no experience with the lower metallic tank about how it catches rust or not. My bike obviously had sit also for some years with some old gas in it before it was put on running. And when I last summer got the bike it had only 11k km on odo and age was 12 years (produced 2008). The bike was put in traffic in 2011, so it had made about 1400 km per year only, I presume most of the time it was just sitting in garage. And I experience no problems with fuel system.
So I think if yours is starting and running, just use couple of bottles of fuel cleaning additive with fresh gasoline and don't worry.
About spark plug caps. I installed the NGK VD01F as those have 1k Ohm resistor in them against OEM caps (with marking NGK VD05FB on them) having 5k Ohm resistors. As the spark plugs themselves also have 5k Ohm resistors in them it seems for me too much 10k Ohms altogether. I'd like to use caps and plugs with 0 Ohm in them, but it is a bit complicated as NGK does not produce iridium plugs with 0 Ohm nor angled caps with 0 Ohm. The less resistance in caps and plugs the better will be spark and less possibilities for crawling discharges over the plugs/wiring. All this resistance is needed only to suppress radio interference for AM radios, but nowadays this is not a problem as everybody uses FM- or digital radios and for those the spark system is not a source of interference. Too much resistance inline with spark gap will rather cause troubles to your engine.
Please note there is slight difference in angles of VD01F and VD05FB caps, therefore it is needed to route the high tension wires a bit differently. The OEM wires are still usable, no need for new ones. Fortunately they still install copper core HT wires on motorcycles, not the silicon cord crap like on cars.
Moto-vdHoog
New member
Hoi Carl, ik zie dat jij en een Dino hebt en uit Nederland komt. Ik heb helaas nog geen Dino, wel één op het oog en woon in Friesland, Ken je meerdere nederlanders op dit forum? Zou het leuk vinden die te traceren, wie rijdt er op zo'n motor en onze ervaringen delen.
Groeten Hans
Groeten Hans
Hallo Hans, ik weet het eigenlijk niet hoeveel er in Nederland zijn. Maar het idee lijkt me leuk. Ik woon zelf in Noord-Holland. Ik heb een paarse gevonden met weinig km's erop. Gekocht van een particulier. Ben nu druk met onderhoud, want dat heeft ie al jaren niet meer gehad bemerk ik nu. Ik doe het zelf om de motor beter te leren kennen, en ook omdat uitbesteden aan een specialist je al gauw 600 EUR kost voor een onderhoudsbeurt. Heb je er al 1 op het oog? Met vriendelijke groet, Carl
Hi Knob, I'm proceeding with the maintenance work. One thing, is it really necessary to remove the upper right cowl on the back to add coolant?? That seems crazy to me. Is there any trick to overcome such? Kind regards, Carl
First thing: find out why you have to add coolant? Cooling liquid will not disappear without reason. It may be some problem leading soon to bigger problems. Like when cylinder head gasket fails or so.
But yes, you have to remove the upper right cowling to add the cooling liquid. There is no other nice way to do it. We all know the DN is not service friendly bike at all, so said between us. You always have to dismantle a lot of things to get close to regular service points. These nice looks will come with high service price.
But good news is it is hard and complicated only doing it first time, actually removing cowlings is the kind of easy part while working on the DN... Just follow the service manual. You can survive removing/installing cowlings with very few tools in the end. And get some of those new plastic clips ready for a case you have to replace them. There are 3 different models of clips used on DN, local Honda probably do not have them in stock, just for case your life in summertime seems too easy...
And replace the pedal brake liquid also while you already are there under the right side cowling.
And meantime remove the left side upper cowling also and check the air filter for chipmunks not having their spare nuts supply installed there. Or maybe even exchange the filter element, it seems about every 10...15k km to be good time for it.
If the bike has sit for a long time, I'd suggest to exchange the whole cooling liquid. It's lifetime is not eternal and just adding a bit will not improve it's lost quality. You can also see the color of old cooling liquid and decide some things about the engine health situation about it.
While you already started to dismantle the cowlings, then remove both the lower cowlings also and a muffler too. Then you get access to the water pump on left low (check for leaks! And pouring out the old cooling liquid happens from the water pump lowest bolt) and by removing muffler you get access to the cooling liquid expansion tank installed close to the catalytic converter. It is not possible to clean the expansion tank without removing it and it needs cleaning when you put in the new cooling liquid.
Ok, there is not absolute need to remove the muffler, but it just is a bit easier to get to the cooling liquid expansion tank if the muffler is out of the way. No need to remove exhaust tubing nor the catalytic converter itself.
All pretty easy things to do, except only when you are doing these first time. Use the full capacity of the rainy days and then sun will always shine in the end
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Hi Knob, many thanks again. Suppose I've got to get used to removing body panels once in a while ;-). In case one needs new fairing clips - where do you order these?
And about the collining liquid, with the bike on the stand and cold engine, the level is just below the MIN mark on the container. The liquid seems to be green as far as I can see. I don't see any leaks. Maybe better to check again with hot engine and bike standing up? Hopefully it will be allright then.
The ignition trouble has been solved. I've put in new spark plugs, replaced all rubber sleeves on the spark plug caps (after thorough inspection for cracks and afterwards cleaning en drying them) and there she runs smoothly as before. I did use the original resistor caps to keep the bike original - and it well may be that the Japanse engineers decided to use 5k resitor caps for some reason I don't know. Interesting though: one new spark plug measured 3,2 kohms and the other 5,1 kohms...
The change of the transmission oil was indeed an easy job.
Next may be to replace all brake fluid - how difficult would it be to do it myself? Because of CBS and ABS there might be a complicated procedure for it? Can I find it in the big workshop manual?
Kind regards, Carl
And about the collining liquid, with the bike on the stand and cold engine, the level is just below the MIN mark on the container. The liquid seems to be green as far as I can see. I don't see any leaks. Maybe better to check again with hot engine and bike standing up? Hopefully it will be allright then.
The ignition trouble has been solved. I've put in new spark plugs, replaced all rubber sleeves on the spark plug caps (after thorough inspection for cracks and afterwards cleaning en drying them) and there she runs smoothly as before. I did use the original resistor caps to keep the bike original - and it well may be that the Japanse engineers decided to use 5k resitor caps for some reason I don't know. Interesting though: one new spark plug measured 3,2 kohms and the other 5,1 kohms...
The change of the transmission oil was indeed an easy job.
Next may be to replace all brake fluid - how difficult would it be to do it myself? Because of CBS and ABS there might be a complicated procedure for it? Can I find it in the big workshop manual?
Kind regards, Carl
Moto-vdHoog
New member
Hoi Carl, goed van jou om zelf de motor te onderhouden, is iets waar ik niet meer aan ga beginnen (ben 74 jr) vind het wel erg onterrasant hoe de techniek van een motorfiets in elkaar steekt. Ja ik heb er een gevonden en ga ik as mvrijdag de 13e naar kijken in Doetinchem. Overigens heb ik 52 geregistreerde kentekens gevonden met een Honda Dn-01 of NSA700A, maar uiteraard geen namen van eigenaren. By the Way ik woon in Oudega Friesland. Als je dichtbij zou wonen kan ik wel eens langs rijden om jou motor (uit elkaar gehaald) te bekijken. Groeten Hans van der Hoog 0644804813
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You can use Honda OEM clips, but there are available similar ones also on ebay for example.
By my experience most needed is clip Honda OEM part number 90116MCSG00. Similar to this is for example this one:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/363421162406
Second needed clip is 90657SA6003. Similar version:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/131131338227
And third version you may need to use on upper side cowlings: 90666SDAA01. Similar version:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/313256364744
I have some of all of those models at hand and I do not even try to re-install used clips, it will make you regret not spending this little money while opening cowlings next time.
Do you mean the bike is on side stand (tilted) and you are looking at the cooling liquid level in expansion tank? If the situation is so (bike is tilted and engine is cold and you still see some liquid in the expansion tank) there is no need to worry about the cooling liquid level.
You have first put the bike vertically (not tilted), then you can check the real level of the cooling liquid. If the liquid level in the expansion tank is about MIN marking, then probably there is no problem with the liquid level. You can add some liquid directly to the expansion tank, but for this you have to open the rear right side cowling as the expansion tank cap is behind it and it may also be a bit complicated process.
Anyway the lifespan of even the best cooling liquids will not extend 5 years (but better count on 2-3 years), after that the liquid will loose anti corrosion properties. No matter if the bike is used or not in this time. So for me it is a good idea to exchange the cooling liquid if I do not know it's age.
I can tell you why they are using these 5K Ohm resistors in plug caps: to kill the AM-radio interferences, to make the appearing of the spark "softer". There is not any good idea to make spark producing harder and more prone to surface misfiring.
But as nowadays nobody uses the AM-radios any more, I can not see any real reason for those resistors in plug caps or plugs themselves. Actually better and stronger spark will appear without any inline resistors.
Even Honda engineers happen to design sometimes weird things, just remember they are japanese and therefore samurais, culturally searching for troubles to fight with.
And they are a bit conservative too: there are more some weird design flaws on this bike utilized for some historical reasons, having roots from old 1970's. For example the PAIR system is meaningless on this fuel injected engine.
Take a look at service manual chapter 4, page 18 and on. There is a short samurai style explanation about brake fluids. I personally would not start working on brakes with this short help and no experience.
The brake fluid must be washed thru by adding it gradually to reservoir, pumping the brakes and releasing the fluid from nipples on brake saddles. In home garage there are two persons needed for this procedure, one of them must have some experience how to do it. It will be a bit too long to explain the whole process here.
So if you are not experienced brake fluid changer, do not have some friend who will know how to do it, then just visit some local m/c repairshop, they have more specific equipment for doing the brake fluid replacement. The job must not take more than 1 workhour, even for DN removing and installing the cowling included, so it's not so expencive in the end.
Brakes are your life insurance, don't mess with them.
The lifespan of brake fluid is 2 years, no matter if the bike is driven or not. You may surprise how good the brakes will be after changeing the fluids.
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