2006 Yamaha XVS1100 Transmission and drivetrain Problems

“My 2006 Yamaha v star started making noise on deceleration. It appears to be the middle shaft drive nut has come loose or sheared off. I was driving on a city street, had just exited the creepy.”

“Yamaha v-star 1100 middle drive shaft engineering defect last september, I accelerated from a stop to a speed of approximately 5mph. I heard a loud clunk, and lost all power to my rear wheel. I pushed my bike to a nearby repair shop, who reported that the middle drive shaft nut had become loose , which caused the shaft to shear completely off, in turn causing irreparable damage to the gear and the middle drive shaft. In order to repair this issue, the engine case would have to be split to get to the broken item and replace it. …”

“2006 vstar with 15,750 miles. While slowing down at appx 45 MPH, metallic whining from transmission started. Had never heard this noise before. After initial incident, any time I decelerated or downshifted, same noise was made. As long as I was on the accelerator, seemed run fine. As soon as I let off the gas, grinding/whining started. Spoke with a dealer, had no clue what I was describing. Showed them a page from this website, suddenly had heard of but were unfamiliar with the problem. Decided they would need to tear down trans to see what was going on. Wanted $1,100 just to diagnose. …”

“I had just started out from a stop, shifted to second gear when the bike started to clatter. As I had been stopped at the local motorcycle repair shop, I returned there and left the motorcycle. The next day I called the shop and had the mechanic check the bike out. He told me that the middle drive shaft had come apart. Upon further inspection it was found the shaft had broken behind the retaing nut for the universal joint. This problem has been reported on several year model's of this motorcycle (Yamaha v-star-1100) complaint's to NHTSA. …”

“While riding, I began to hear a whining or siren like noise while decelerating. When I got home I explored where the noise seemed to come from and found when looking through the passage where the speed sensor is mounted that the nut had come off of the middle gear because it had not been staked properly and was not properly secured. Furthermore it has no safety, key, retainer, cotter pin, or any other device designed to retain it should something go wrong, as it did in my case, and so seems to be improperly engineered or at the very least incompetently installed from the manufacturer.”