Yamaha 1300 Tourer - Yamaha 1300 Tourer Fansite

My local dealer is by all accounts quite a good one. Very helpful, couldn't fault them so far. Bike is an 09 so not had cause to use the workshop yet apart from the 600 miler.

So I reckoned my belt needed tightening, and seeing as how I didn't have a big enough torque wrench and the man at the desk said "£16 to you mate" I thought why not.

So I got the bike back, and the first thing I noticed was a very slight whine coming from the belt, especially noticable on the over-run. Got home and thought, sod it, put it up on the jacks, borrowed the wife's digital kitchen scales and checked the tension at the stated 10 lb load and it was about 6mm so it seemed right.

Question then is...should the belt whine slightly?

Next, having done that, I got the bike back down, pressed the starter...bang...backfire, then started running normally. Never done that before, and it did it later on again. He'd had the exhaust off (its a Roadhouse slip on) so I checked it. It was about 1/3 inch off being pushed fully home. So I slackened the clamp, undid the mounting bolts (noticing that he'd omitted to replace the 4mm spacer on one of the mounting bolts despite me mentioning it to him) and pushed the exhaust fully home and tightened it all up again. No more backfire - must have been air getting in at the joint. This was the chief mechanic too.

So this last part is just a rant (I feel better already), but would appreciate any comments on slight belt whine :)

Jim