Imploded clutch.

[RSparky]

Well, today sucked. The best part was relieving anger by splitting wood with my brother.

Anywho, last night, the clutch felt funny. The bike didn't grab up well when I was starting moving. I wouldn't have explained it like that then, but it makes sense now. Plates were worn. And this morning, literally, a block away from work, I go to accelerate from an intersection, and "Kerclunk, clack."

That was an ugly stall. Oh right, it doesn't have juice to start anyway, because I drained the battery last night... (Left my grip heaters on.)

Wheeled it over to the side of the road, and all the while rolling, there was a nice click click noise. Clutch lever had no tension, but the armature itself, going into the side of the engine would only move past a certain point. Even with the spring off, and cable disconnected.

My brother eventually came to pick me up, and brought me and the bike to my dad's, where all the tools are.

We got the cover off, and upon immediate inspection saw a good amount of metal inbetween the cranking gear(?), and the clutch drive gear. It looked shinier, and softer like aluminum. Where those teeth are hardened steel for sure, so they may still be in good shape.

Got the plates out, or most of them at least. A couple snapped or shattered or whatever, and fell into the oil pan. they were well under the "limit". Pic:

Springs. They were 47 mm. Spec is 50mm:

Then, we saw where the metal caught in the gears came from: The clutch basket! A tooth of the basked just broke off. It looks like it was broke, not sheared. I didn't think to take a pic of it without the plates in, but here is the aluminum in the gears:

I've tried to be nice to the bike, but at 32k miles, and 25k of them being drag raced by a douchenozzle, this should be expected.

So, a clutch basket is on order from ebay. And Middletown Cycle has plates, springs, a cover gasket, and a new spline gear just in case, all in an invoice for me to assumably pay for tomorrow. 3-5 days for all of it...

My car is still down with a crank bearing too. So, I'm riding one of my dad's bikes. A sportster. With Screamin Eagle pipes... Not my style at all. I mean, it's ok for what it is. But, it's not even comfy. Pseudo ape hangers hurt my wrists, and my butt feels like it just got off one of those tummy shaker exercise machines.

Cliffnotes:

Broken clutch plates

Tooth broke off basket, and squished all up in the drive gears

Waiting for parts

Car is broke, too. Compromising.

I need a beer.

Edited October 5, 2012 by RSparky
pics. hopefully.

[natedogg624]

make sure those are OEM plates and fibers. the r6 doesn't like anything else.

[RSparky]

yep. 159 for plates, fibers and springs sound reasonable?

hey nate. actually, you may have some good advice for getting that basket out. the guy at middletown cycle said they use a 5 or 6 mm bolt to go into the holes in the spline bearing, and they wiggle the bearing out. that gives room to pull the chain off from behind...?

sound like anything you've done before? any tips?

first i have to get all that material out from between those gears. well, it would actually all fall out if i got that bearing out, but we'll see.

Edited October 5, 2012 by RSparky

[serpentracer]

yes.

[mello dude]

Holy shit!

[natedogg624]

yep. 159 for plates, fibers and springs sound reasonable?

hey nate. actually, you may have some good advice for getting that basket out. the guy at middletown cycle said they use a 5 or 6 mm bolt to go into the holes in the spline bearing, and they wiggle the bearing out. that gives room to pull the chain off from behind...?

sound like anything you've done before? any tips?

first i have to get all that material out from between those gears. well, it would actually all fall out if i got that bearing out, but we'll see.

sounds about right.

i've never gone through that way, when i removed the basket it was through the oil pan when i was changing the transmission.

[blue03636]

I have always used a magnet on the basket bearing.

[RSparky]

I have always used a magnet on the basket bearing.

i will try this. gotta find a strong magnet.

and i do have to take the oil pan off anyway. it's probably filled with metal...

[blue03636]

Any magnet from a auto parts store will work. Just pull the bearing out and then the basket will come out.

[TSB67]

Count your blessings that happened from a stop.

[r1crusher]

The fibers don't look horribly worn, but I'm with IP. Never seen a fiber just break like that before. Even the steels don't look like they've been heated like the bike was dragged or stunted.

[ReconRat]

I'd think something got jammed in the gears, for a tooth to break off like that.

And that one friction plate looks like it hit a chunk of something also.

Which is odd, I didn't know a friction plate would do that.

So be on the lookout for yet another piece of metal. Probably steel.

[RSparky]

Well' date=' that's a first for me. I've never seen a clutch plate do that. [/quote']

That's not good. You do this for a living...

Like I said, I didn't take a picture of the basket, but a whole tooth broke off. That's a good size chunk of metal, the width of all the clutch plates.

Going out on a limb, here's my thought. As can be seen in the pic, the drive gears mesh on the right side, from where we are looking. The basket, currently jammed in its position, broke the tooth off the right top side. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the engine spins backward, spinning the transmission forward, or clockwise from our perspective. Breaking where it did, it threw the tooth, it would have gotten caught in that gear pretty much instantaneously. Also explaining the kerclunk clack.

My newb diagnosis. Then, the instant stop would have snapped those clutch plates?

[ReconRat]

Yes, the sudden stop could have easily broken the friction plates.

That sudden removal of motion would have to translate to other forces,

which would probably be trying to sling/throw it outward.

It can also bend shafts, so check them for run out.

[natedogg624]

there are two shafts in the transmission, each spinning opposite the other. the clutch basket in question, connected to the input shaft, spins ccw. It meshes to the output shaft (ie front sprocket) which spins cw.

qed, crankshaft spins cw.

(when looked at from the right side of the engine)

Edited October 6, 2012 by natedogg624

[RSparky]

Well, two days of banging, and that basket is stuck... The spline bearing is supposed to slide out, but it won't budge at all. I also tried loosening up the oil pump from underneath, to get the chain off the sprocket underneath the basket. Not enough play to do that either. I'm kind of stuck.

I think the material inbetween those teeth is enough to push up on the main gear so that it wedges the bearing in there..? I got some of it out by carefully hammering punches, awls and small flatheads until I broke about five screwdrivers.

I need some inspiration. And a car.

[Gixxus Christ!]

The crankshaft rotates towards the front of the bike. You wouldn't want gyroscopic forces working against the bike staying upright' date=' which would probably occur if the engine rotated backwards.

I'm curious to know what's jammin' up the pipes.[/quote']

No phycicist here but pretty positive gyroscopic forces act the same regardless of direction of rotation.

My guess is that the friction plates broke because the finger broke out of the basket resulting in uneven pressure on the fingers adjacent to the missing one. +1 on this not happening at speed, would surely have grenades your motor and locked up the back wheel possibly bringing you to a painful halt several hundred feet down the pavement.

Inspect your steels for flatness and thickness and for wear on the id, could be ok to use again, would save you $50.

[Gixxus Christ!]

Could have some more bits of friction plate lodged places. Reconstruct the broken pieces, see if anything significant is missing, could be binding something in there.