400ex newbie with some questions.

[Firemedic552]

Hello all. I am new to the atv world and I recently bought an 06 honda 400ex. First off I love it. I am super impressed by the speed. I have a couple of questions.
1. How hot does everyones motor get? I have race plastics on my bike and I tell you what the motor gets extremly hot after a 5 minute light ride.
2. Is it hard to find neutral on every honda? I can find it about 1-20 tries. But If I turn the bike off I can find it every time.
3. Does the motor tick alot? It is a definate tick coming from hte motor when idling and riding.
I will post pics of the bike shortly. Im at the firehoude and left my camera at home. Thank you all. I am not very mechanically inclined. I asked the local dealer about a valve adjustment and he said it was $150.

[Firemedic552]

Heres a pic I had on my phone. It has alot of upgrades.

[Shawthy33]

Neutral is not that tough to find, I usually find it when I'm still coasting into my garage....


Your chain looks pretty loose too,

Tick is not normal

[Firemedic552]

I am taking it into the honda dealer next week.

[Snipe]

The tick is the compression mechanisim. In idol and low speeds it has to manually move its self out of the way, at full throttle it holds its self open and you wont hear it.

The valves are really easy to adjust and having them do it but watch them on how they do it so you will feel more secure on doing it saving you lots of money down the road that can be used for parts or whatever els. Holy hell no periods lmao.

Motor's on the air cooled bikes get VERY hot try using a spal fan or air scoops or as in some cases such as myself, use both with thte scoops and fan my bike never gets hot enough to tick when its cooling off.

You will love your bike there a good all around quad I know I love mine.

[bigd's ex]

A fresh oil change might help out the finding neutral problem. Do you know if it has been changed lately ?

[Firemedic552]

He said he did all the maitnence on it. The oil levels are good and the oil looks clean.

[Shawthy33]

I just bought a new to me 400ex as well, first thing I did was order a new oil filter, oil, spark plugs, air filter and chain lube to make sure the maintenance schedule starts for me on my calender. I just never can trust someone else, of course they are going to say the maintenance is up to date, they want to sell a "well-taken-care of quad"

And all those total is less than $70 with enough plugs, oil, oil filter for the next couple of changes too.