Sold the 86 "rat bike", and bought this

I'm not super active on this forum, but some of you may remember my 86 vfr 700. Somewhere along the line it got its name "rat bike" lol. I put 4,000 miles on it sine I bought it 6 months ago and loved every minute of it. It served me well.




I knew it was a matter of time before I got myself something nicer looking though. 3 days later I found an awesome deal on a 95. Here it is.




The only issue was that I didn't warm it up enough on the test drive. When I took it home, it kept overheating. The fan never came on and the radiator felt cool to the touch. I found a broken fan fuse, but that didn't seem to fix it.. I read a post on here, and all signs point to the fan switch. Is this what it sounds like to you guys?

 

Thats a nice bike you found there. Re the overheating, it sounds like the thermostat is siezed shut. 4th gens traditionally run pretty cool. How hot did it get? I find my fan only comes on once the gauge is worryingly high. Threre is a way to test if the fans are working.

 

Cold rad seems to indicate a blockage somewhere. As Bryan88 already ststed, a good place to start looking would be the T-stat. May as well flush the whole coolant system. while you are at it.

The bike looks great though!

 

I pulled the fairing off yesterday and it turns out the radiator barely had any coolant in it. The nipple on the coolant resivoir was bent and the hole was tiny... So I bent it back and drilled the hole bigger. Now coolant can actually flow to the aux coolant resivoir. I ran it, and now it heats up to halfway on the gauge, but not much more than that (but it's only been like 65 degrees out ) And I still don't know if the fan kicks in or not, or if the thermostat is stuck (the other day, it heated up right to the red then I shut it off) which could have ruined the thermostat.

 

If it was dry enough that there was no coolant in the rad, I would not be the least surprised if that Tstat is not seized up. I wouldn't think they are very expensive so I would be inclined to change that regardless.

 

agreed. a new t stat and o ring is cheap insurance that you're not left out in the middle of nowhere looking for a ride home.

 

I agree with you guys on that. I'll replace the t-sat soon.

Does anybody have a pic of what the fan thermo switch looks like? and will it be visible is I pull the LEFT side fairing off?

 

I'd change that thermostat right now. Then you can go after the thermo switch (you might as well buy both at the same time).

We'd hate to see you bake that sharp looking machine due to an inexpensive and relatively easy to replace thermo.

 

Ya. That is kinda like running your car so low on oil your lifters are tapping but waiting until they tap louder before you add more oil.

 

I hear ya. That makes sense now. I'll pick one up tomorrow. The clutch also slips when its cold. But, when its warmed up, it doesn't. Iv been reading that its usually the rod thing that sticks out of the slave cylinder when you remove the front sprocket cover. Does that sound right?


Thanks fpr the help guys.

 

Can't help you with that one. Someone here probably can and may chip in.