Intermittent moments of no shifting?

[alfredo]

So. I've got a strange problem. I ride the bike and it shifts fine for about 5-10 minutes. Then ill downshift at a stop light and sometimes it won't go into first again. It will go to neutral and second, sometimes to third from second. But never back to first of forth and fifth. When I try and shift to the unreachable gears the foot shifter feels like its welded to something. This happens sometimes when I down shift from fifth to forth when going into turns or something. It won't ever go back to fifth.

Now the funny thing. The second I kill the motor, the gears shift like butter. It's so weird to me. It immediately fixes it. Then I go another distance hoping I don't have to down shift or else I've got to pull over, stop it and kick it over again.

New clutch discs, springs, clutch adjusted and triple checked. Never had this problem before so it's a new bug. Sooooooo strange.

Thoughts anyone?

 

[Curtis P]

Bent or warn shift forks and dogs?

 

[CDNTX650]

what did your clutch basket look like? notchy basket will cause plates to jam up and warped plates can cause it.

 

[alfredo]

Going to drain the oil in a few minutes and see what all that looks like. I just did the bottom end and all that looked good so I'm hoping its not the dogs.

It's just weird how it magically works perfectly as soon as I cut the motor and restart it.

 

[XSLeo]

Clutch adjustment. It can change as the engine warms up.
Clutch drag increases as it warms up because the aluminum case expands faster than the steel push rods. This acts like the rods gets shorter, this increases the amount of drag you get when the lever is pulled.
Shutting the engine off eliminates any clutch drag.
Try adjusting the clutch a bit tighter. In the book it says to screw in the worm adjuster till you feel resistance and back out 1/4 turn, I thiunk this is a bit much, I use about 1/8 turn. Then ad just the lever to the same preeplay, 1/8 inch. This minimizes the cold to hot difference. Another thing after you ride for a bit, you can adjust the lever a bit tighter to compensate for the cold to hot difference. With a bit of playing with adjustment you can find the sweet spot where you won't get slippage when cold yet still shaft good when hot.
As CDNTX650 mentioned, On the clutch basket the edges where the clutch plates touch the hub and basket gets grooves worn in them. Care ful filing can remove the ridges between the grooves, just don't go to far as this leads to a jerky clutch. On the steel plate they are made by stamping them out of sheet steel. This leaves on side slightly curved toward the plate and the other edge curves slightly our from the plate. Leaving a sharp edge that cuts into the basket causing the plates to bind a bit and create the grooves in the basket.
Using sand paper to remove this sharp edge lets the plates slide better as well as diminish the cutting effect to help prevent the grooving. The better sliding cuts down a bit on clutch drag.
I used a medium grit paper to remove the sharp edge and a coarser paper to remove any discoloration from the steels and rough them up a bit. This improves the grip of the fiber to steel.
I have done this as well as new fiber plates, Forodo are the plates I used, A new worm from Mike's, set the cable holder in the hole closest to the worm, opens the clutch father, A set of 70lb Kibble White springs. Well lubed cable and worm. I get no slip, even with the 750 kit. Easy to find neutral, easy to shift. No cold to hot change. I can pull the lever with two fingers.
Leo

 

[alfredo]

One thing I completely forgot is that I took the clutch lever and perch off the bars to swap them with another set I got in the mail. The new set didn't work out and I put the others back on, but I had messed with the adjustment. Long story short, I tightened up the lever and adjusted the clutch worm gear a little and it was better. The problem is still there in mostly fifth gear now (when hot), but I can usually shift down to first and all the way back up to fifth without having to shut the engine down completely.

I didn't take the cover off and check the basket as I think I am pretty close. I am going to continue to adjust it until I hopefully find the sweet spot where it shifts like it used to. I took it on a 200+ mile trip sunday and I didn't want to play around too much and get stuck. So I just left it at working better for the time being.

Leo and everyone else, thanks for the quick help!

 

[alfredo]

Ok. So, update here.

I have adjusted the clutch more and it shifts beautifully most of the time. They only time I have problems now is if I really ramp on the throttle. If I just gas the hell out of it it will typically stick in whatever gear I am in and will not go up. To fix it I simply shift all the way down to first then I can go all the way back up to wherever I need to be. Not too big of a deal, but I have to roll with the clutch in for a few seconds to do it.

Occasionally it will stick and require me to not be moving, ie: stop on the side of the road (but keep the motor running), in order for it to free itself from any gear.

Its very weird and while as long as I drive normally its just fine all the time, I do like to get on it every once in a while. Any more tips would be great!

 

[XSLeo]

Have you checked the shift shaft adjustment? While in there you need to check the springs on the shift shaft. There is also a spring on the arm that has the roller that rides on the pins of the shift drum.
If any of these are broken that can have a detrimental effect on shifting, especially when shifting hard. As in hard accelleration.
These are all under the right side cover behind the clutch.
Leo

 

[TwoManyXS1Bs]

Hey alfredo, this sounds familiar, especially after replacing clutch plates. Long ago we had some clutches that would stick and make shifting difficult. Problems went away when swapping out to barnett plates, must've been sub-par material on suspect plates. We tried lightly sanding plates, both fibre and steel, mixed results. Different oil, mixed results. Opened-up oil orifices that feed oil to plates from countershaft center oiler (not on xs's), mixed results.

At this point, all I could recommend is different oil.

You can check your stickyness by kickstarting with clutch held in...