So this happened recently

I went down recently. Got away with a scraped knee. My bike however:
Bent Handlebar
Busted Turn Signal
Broken Brake Lever
And the woobly bent wheel in the pics.

I fixed her up except the wheel. Honestly not sure how to go about it at first I thought it was the fender, then from the pics and spinning the wheel is obvious it's going in more directions than straight forward, I have to wrestle the steering. Any ideas, bent axle, wheel? I thought loosing the forks would straighten them out, but no luck.

 

can you wiggle the wheel back and forth?

if the wheel wobbles back and forth when spun it could very well be a bent rim

the fender has a built in brace which could have bent.

if you remove the wheel look at the wheel bearings and make sure that they are in flush.

roll the axle across a flat surface see if it wobbles .
put axle in wheel and then on jack stands and spin see if it still wobbles.

also remove fork tubes roll across flat surface to see if they wobble.

did the wheel hit something when you went down?

 

from this thread to see if forks are lined up
putting forks back in...

 

A side on view? One fork bent ?
Stand facing rear of bike with wheel between your legs and give the handlebars a twist and see if you can get it straight?

 

+1 on the fender brace. Try removing that first and see if it is kitty wompus.

 

My bet is that the lower riple clamp and the upper triple clamp are no long aligned.
Do that thing that XJ550H linked.

 

Yup, do the fork thing I recommended in the link above. it takes a real hard whack to bend a. Fork, but it doesn't take much of a sideways hit to twist the triple trees out of alignment.

I picked up a gorgeous 750 Maxim with only 5000 mi on it because the guy was convinced he wrecked his bike and the forks were bent, etc........he hit the garage door when he tried to pop the clutch and went about 15 ft straight into the door. i replaced the broken headlight mount, replaced the bent fender, straightened the triple tree, and it's ready to go.

If you need help, ask.

Dave

 

I did roll, the axle and it seemed alright. And I did try the fork alignment method ,using a tutorial from youtube, but it wasn't as detailed as the link above. I'll let you guys know when I find the culprit, Thanks for the suggestions.

 

In that case you need to pull the wheel off and inspect it. Any sign of the hub no longer running in the same plane as the rim, and you should consider it to be scrap/lawn decoration.

 

I highly recommend removing your fender first. If that has been twisted, you'll have a real tough time trying to straighten things out.......the fender had a heavy fork-race on the inside of it. If the fender is twisted, so is the brace. Don't be surprised if your fender doesn't fit once the forks are straight......you'll need to get a new fender, or take it to a machine shop to have them straighten it. Or, if you're clever, figure out a way to bolt one side of it down, and twist the other side back into place via leverage. It'll need to be exact, for it to be true.

 

I think i know what your trying to do but if im wrong im sorry. Try this, tape a long string to the front of your front tire, run the string down the side of the front tire under the axle all the way back to the back tire around the back (tape) then all the way back up to the front under the axle and tape it on top of the other tape. Check the spacing of the string, to the tire make sure that its the same from front to back, then look at your handle bars check to see if straight. If not then try the wheel between the knees trick.

 

Ended taking the wheel to the machine shop. It's twisted from the center out. They said it'll cost $150 to repair; I'll be buying a used one on flea-bay probably.

 

Good call. I would not trust an aluminum wheel that's beeen straightened (excpt for a rim ding).

 

What the heck did you hit hard enough to bend the rim? Better check for other damage, too-----

 

I'll sell you a front rim for $30 US plus shipping. Ships from Point Roberts WA