New to this forum. Recently inherited an 07 Nomad 1600 from my father. It only has 9200 miles on it, well maintained, completely stock, yet knocks worse than any other bike I’ve owned, including a 2013 VN900. I was going to post a video but haven’t figured out how. It knocks at idle worse than while driving. It has very little power for a 1600, and I’m concerned that I’m hearing piston slap or worse.
I’ve read other posts about the classic Kawi-Clank, but they don’t quite fit the description of my noise.
Traffic on this site is a shadow of what it once was. Not unusual to seek assistance and get nothing unfortunately. I'm not a wrench so I'm of no help with this. This was once a very active site so it's sad to see what it has become.
A lot of other things to check 1st, these engines should be good for at least 100K+ miles. (saw a 99 1500 Nomad with over 300K miles) I'd 1st try some Amsoil PowerFoam or SeaFoam DeepCreep combustion chamber cleaner to remove any carbon build-up in the combustion chamber that could be making noise. Also clean the back side of the throttle body butterfly and the intake manifold. Cam chains have an automatic tensioner, though if it's been run hard and possibly stretched out or had a lot more miles they can reach the end of the tensioner and rattle. Stretched cam chain can eventually saw through the spark plug well tubes and leak oil out the head. Tubes screw out with spark plug tool, easily replaced. There are aftermarket cam chain tensioner extenders available that are pretty easy to put in and will fix that problem. Also might try some colder spark plugs, My 04 Nomad rattled and pinged terribly even on premium 91 octane until I went to a colder plug like the older Vulcan models ran.
Shouldn't be an issue with that low of miles, but the crankshaft counterbalancer has rubber dampers that can go bad and cause a knocking at idle. fairly easy to change, have to pull left side engine cover and flywheel etc. Mark everything and DO NOT turn engine over or otherwise get it out of time. Any rubbery bits in the oil screen (which should be removed and cleaned at least every other oil change imho) could be a clue. And pay attention to orientation on removal, don't put the screen in backwards.
All that said, these are noisy engines, all could be normal noises...
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