Many Goldwing 1500 owners have experienced what has been referred to as a bent shifting fork.   You know when you have it.  It can be manifest through a few different symptoms or all of the following.  At times while riding along and you shift into 4th (either from 5th down or 3rd up) you let your clutch out and give it the gas only to have the bike pop right back out of gear.  Some have stated that they cannot even get it to go into 4th.  Or...  You are slowing down and downshifting as you prepare to  stop.  While decelerating in 3rd, 2nd and 1st you hear the unmistakable sound of gravel in a Pepsi can coming from your gearbox.  Its a sad sound indeed because you got it and there is no way around it. 

There are 3 ways to handle this problem.  The first is to sell your bike immediately and get a new 1800 Goldwing.  That solution is not that practical for some so you have to look at numbers 2 and 3.  The second solution is to start shopping and find a good used 1500 engine from a bike that has been salvaged.  You can either do the work yourself or hire it done by a local shop.  I have seen engines on the internet for anywhere from $500 for older engines to $2500 for the later model engines.  Now once you make that purchase remember, unless you are going to install it yourself you will probably be paying between $300 to $500 for someone to install it for you.   The third option is to take the engine out and tear it down and do the work yourself.  That means splitting the case and saying hi to your pistons and transmission personally.  I cannot stress this part enough...  Unless you are a mechanic or an EXTREMELY competent shade tree mechanic I would advise that you go the used engine route or pay someone to do the engine work for you.  Cost:  I spent about $600 on parts.   Those who have decided to keep their engine and have the work done spent between $2500 and $3500 for parts and labor. 

The purpose of this article is to provide some insight, pictures and inside information for those who are trying to decide how to approach their transmission issues and also give some tips that might make the job go easier and perhaps avoid some "gotcha's". 

Getting right into the nuts and bolts of the problem...  The left arrow points to 5th gear, the right arrow points to 4th.  The center white arrow is pointing at the shift fork and the red arrow points to the problem.  That gap between the shift fork and the sidewall of that groove that the fork rides in allows that shifter to bounce back and forth between 4th and 5th and those big cogs (sometimes called "dogs") bump the inner dogs of the 4th and 5th gears.  This only occurs while in the first 3 gears because if you are in 4th or 5th that shifter will be fully engaged inside the 4th or 5th gear. 

This is the new shift fork and shift collar installed.  Notice how the shift fork fills the collar gap fully allowing no play of the collar while the transmission is in this configuration.  Also notice that the dogs are larger on the shift collar on the 4th gear side then they were on the old collar.  That means when you order your parts you will be replacing your 4th gear for sure and 5th gear if it looks worn on the dogs as well as your shift collar and shift fork.  I replaced my 5th gear too.  More on that later.    

Old fork new fork.  I hope I don't have to explain the problem here.

Its time to pull the engine.  My Craftsman bike jack worked great for this job.  It provided a nice large solid base to support the engine while it was being lowered and moved around and eventually reinstalled. 

The Honda Service Manual suggests pulling the right intake manifold and right cam pulley cover to provide more room to manuever the engine out of the frame but I have heard that some have removed it with both manifolds in place. 

Get a digital camera and take lots of pictures of the job in progress.  Start before you pull your engine with pics of how your wires are routed and hooked up, cables attached, hoses hooked up, vacuum lines attached etc.  The pictures on these pages are resized in the interest of saving space but when you load all your pics on the computer they will be quite large and you can zoom in and see great detail which will be valuable while reinstalling and hooking the engine back up.  Also in the service manual in the "Fuel" section there are some really good diagrams of the routing of all the vacuum lines, and breather lines.

I went to walmart and got a cheap bath rug to put the engine on on the floor.  As you get to the point where you are ready to split the case you will be rocking the engine over and resting the right valve cover on the carpet.  The carpet will protect the cover from scratches. 

This is another good example of why you should take many many good pictures with different angles and detail.  This is the back of the engine with the rear cover removed.  Most of the gears in this shot are to support the reverse system on your bike so if you have the "Interstate" model you won't have all of this. 

This is it.  The epicenter of the beast.  The point of no return. 

         When you get here the healing process begins.