Why is My Yamaha ATV Clunking?

If you bought a used Yamaha ATV that’s clunking and you know it hasn’t received proper maintenance, get it up to par first to rule that out so you can then identify the problem. 

Partzilla’s Yamaha ATV expert John Talley hosts live Q&A sessions on our YouTube channel every Friday at 3pm Eastern. In this session, John was asked why a used 2007 Yamaha Grizzly 700 behind on basic maintenance is clunking from the back end at slow speeds.

Yamaha Grizzly 700 Clunking Q&A

I recently picked up a 2007 Yamaha Grizzly 700. There’s a lot of deferred maintenance, and it has a clunk from the backend at slow speeds. Thoughts on where to start looking? Suspension or drive train?

John Talley: Well, if it’s the suspension, just start bouncing up and down on the machine. If it’s the drivetrain, I mean that should be very apparent on flat land. I’d start by changing out every fluid that it has. The front and rear differentials, the engine oil. Get all that out of the way, and that’s also going to tell you a lot about what’s going on. Especially on the differentials. If you’re hearing a clunking sound, worse case it could be one of those teeth that are cracked or wearing out on the front or the back. You said back, but if it looks like chocolate milk when you drain out the fluid, well then you know you’ve got water intrusion. And then you’re also going to need to do seals and whatnot. So start with going through all of the different fluids. Of course go through, in a machine that old, I’d go ahead and replace the air filter as well. Because it’s probably starting to break down by now if it’s on its original one. But yeah, just go fluid by fluid and then start evaluating. Because like I said, when you change the fluids, it’s going to tell you a big story of what’s going on on the inside. Then you start picking it apart. We did a lot of videos on that particular unit, and they’ll walk you through each of the maintenance items, because I’m sure we did all the basics on it. I think we even went through the clutching system on that one, both the sheave clutch and the internal clutch, or centrifugal clutch. 

Watch the video below to see how to change the engine oil in a Yamaha Grizzly 700.

Watch the video below to see how to change the differential oil in a Yamaha Grizzly 700.

Watch the video below to see how to change the air filter in a Yamaha Grizzly 700.

Want to see more live repair questions answered? See more motorcycle and ATV repair questions answered here.