• There were many reasons for the change of the site software, the biggest was security. The age of the old software also meant no server updates for certain programs. There are many benefits to the new software, one of the biggest is the mobile functionality. Ill fix up some stuff in the coming days, we'll also try to get some of the old addons back or the data imported back into the site like the garage. To create a thread or to reply with a post is basically the same as it was in the prior software. The default style of the site is light colored, but i temporarily added a darker colored style, to change you can find a link at the bottom of the site.

Do Spyder Drive Belts age or wear out?

You might want to very carefully inspect the bike-side edge, top & bottom of the pulleys, both front & rear; the teeth on both pulleys, including the shape of the top & the bottom of the hole between teeth; and the teeth on the belt itself, not just the top edge. I've seen a couple of belts start showing similar fraying when one of the pulley's involved had picked up something and damaged the cogs - there wasn't anything caught in the belt &/or the pulley teeth by the time I got to see one of these, but a very close inspection of the pulley cogs/teeth revealed damage in there to the edge of the pulley that was tearing/fraying the belt every time it passed over that section of pulley!!

One of those belts was on an almost new F3, with the damage to belt looking very similar to that in your pic, and the damage to the pulley mostly right down in the bottom of the gap between a couple of teeth on the rear pulley. Something hard had obviously been jammed in there for a short while, but it tore the bottom of that gap between pulley teeth and either going in or coming out, it ripped a sharp edged sliver of metal up with a gouge below it in the raised side of the pulley that's meant to stop the belt riding off the bike-side edge, and THAT was what was doing the damage to the belt, both to the top edge and the bottom edge of the teeth on the belt just like that on yours! They'd brought it to me to do for that one, so I had tools on hand and I used a die grinder to smooth out all the raised metal bits on the pulley; checked that the belt wasn't torn anywhere else; trimmed the 'hairs' off the belt with a sharp pair of snips; and that Spyder is now nearing 200,000 km on that belt with no hassles or issues ever since! :thumbup: (Just like me, he still does thousands of kms a year on dirt & gravel roads too, without any additional or forgotten belt guards and has only had this one belt damaging occurrence! ;) )

The other one was due to a chunk of quartz being picked up and jammed tightly into the teeth of the front sprocket... It basically cut the belt very nearly in two right down the middle before anyone noticed anything - it was the growing buzzing noise & vibration that gave it away; and it was a right pain prising the chunk of quartz out of the depths between the cogs. This one was half-way across the country in the middle of nowhere, so I only had a small hand-file (or more correctly, a slightly over-sized nailfile on a multi-tool! :banghead: ) to smooth out the jagged bits on the pulley & a multi-tool knife to cut off the longer of the frayed 'hairs' on the belt before letting him ride on. Still, got the job done, and despite dome discussion about replacing it, I believe that belt is still out there driving its Spyder some years and quite a few kms down track (with a spare coiled up inside the frunk lid!) Last time I saw it was a few months ago, and while the belt still looked awful, it was no worse than it had been on the day the damage happened, and it was still doing the job!! :ohyea:

There's no denying that they're bloody tough belts! nojoke
 
Last edited:
Has anyone had a problem with a frayed edge on their belt? The belt on my 2023 F3-S with about 2500 miles is frayed on the right side. Belt tension and alignment are in spec. The right edge of the belt usually rides about 3-4 mm from the rear pulley flange and sits near the left edge of the front pulley, so I don't see why the right edge would be frayed. I pulled the guards off and verified that nothing was rubbing on the belt. Inspected the full length of the belt and the pulleys, but everything looked fine. Any ideas?

View attachment 209193 View attachment 209194 View attachment 209194

When you took that picture, was it in your garage and by any chance did you back into that spot where you parked? The reason I ask that question is, as you should know, your belt drifts back and forth a lot as you drive, and then when you back up it drifts a lot more and will give you a faulty reading of how your belt really is adjusted. When you really want to check for adjustment is when you come straight into like a parking spot and stop, look down then, and see where it's riding. Your belt has been hitting or riding on something to get that kind of rub. When I adjust my belt, I like to try to get it a little closer to the right than you have it. Have you had any pulley work done on your bike?

Talking about belts, is there a product that could be put on the belt to make it last longer ?

It really doesn't need anything put on it, there was a time when people were having a squeaking problem and BRP was having them put a dab of grease on the inside, but if you don't have a problem with that leave, it alone!! Don't over think an issue that's not there!
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I agree with Peter. Check your pulleys. A small rock lodged between teeth will, over a rather short time, damage the entire length of the belt. The front pulley will do it more quickly than the rear.
 
Back
Top