17k miles.....fearing the head gasket. radiator was half empty...oil level isnt rising... thought i saw a 1 spot of oil circulate in the rad. but the fact that i see no coolant leaking where i park it just is not a good sign.

blown head gasket @ 17k seems kinda....rare. anyone hear of a blown gasket that early on?

need to throw a rad pressure tester on it over night and see what happens.

 

Just smell your exhaust or pull the plugs and give her a sniff ... if its sweet then your done... sucks man.. and it could have been a manf. defect or something.. as long as you have kept up on its maintenance that would be the only explination I could come up with... for the record ... may be a pain but the head and gasket aren't too horrible to replace .. its getting to them that sucks.

 

Fill the radiator back up and keep riding her.

What do the plugs look like? Perform a compression test. That should tell all.

A headgasket isn't a mileage item. It's not accurate to say 17k on a HG... You blow your head gasket due to high revs on a cold motor, etc...

 

if your head gasket goes wouldnt your oil look like milk? Check the oil the next time you change it and see if it looks healthy. It has to be going somewhere. how about a slow leak at the radiator hoses, are all the clamps tight?

 

Milk is close, I blew a head gasket in a car a few years back and when I changed the oil it looked like melted milk chocolate. Definetly not dark like typical oil is.

I'd throw some coolant back in it and keep riding keeping an eye on the oil and radiator levels. Maybe you just had some evaporate out over time. I know My F4i overflow lid doesn't seal as good as it should and I tend to lose a bit over the summer from evaporation.

 

Yep I agree what these guys have said. If anything change your oil and see what it comes out as. Very possible to blow a gasket on a bike due to the higher stress of rpm's. Its not common but it can happen to anyone.

 

just wish i had an air compressor and a leak down tester at home. always one at the shop...never feel like i should buy one for the house lol.

honestly just keeping an eye on it is my game plan until it finally gets too cold to ride here... (live in SC) been in the 70's all week but in jan-march itll be way too cold to bother to ride....so unless it gets significantly worse....blowin smoke or turnin the radiator and oil into sludge....im just gonna ride it til it gets under 50 degrees outside then start diving into compression tests. i filled it up yesterday...rode around for an hour or so today....didnt have any significant coolant loss when i checked it tonight so its not *bad* yet.

i got the bike in august so...who knows how it was treated before i got it. id love to think it was babied but.... i got it from a younger guy who probably saw the RR on the back and though it was intended to be dogged out every single ride.

 

not necessarily.. A blown headgasket could allow coolant to enter the combustion chamber where it would be burned off...

aka the sweet smelling exhaust..