Clutch basket play

[silver_ride]

Last weekend I went on a mission to diagnose some odd rattling I've been getting from the crankcase area of the bike. My knowledge of working on bikes is limited, so I took it to a local shop and asked a guy to listen to it, right away he noticed that the clamp for the #4 pipe (the ring with allen bolts that connects the pipe to the engine) was loose and rattling around, and he also suspected a broken baffle...took the bike home, tightened the clamp and the rattle quieted down significantly.

Went for a test ride and was still hearing the strange sound from the crankcase. Sort of a dull, hollow ticking rattle, very tough to describe. I drained the oil and pulled the clutch cover. I did not see anything obviously wrong with the clutch (and was not prepared to pull it to inspect) or anything else in there but I noticed that I was able to jiggle the basket back and forth about 1/2".

So to get to the point...is that normal or will I need to tighten it up? And how? Could a loose basket be making the type of sounds I'm describing? The clutch seems to be working fine although it has been slipping a bit at high RPM. Time for a new clutch perhaps? Thanks for reading

[TopCatGr58]

Hey there Silver,

You said you could move(Jiggle) the basket back and forth... ?
Do you mean sliding in and out on the shaft left to right as you would sit on the bike, or do you mean rotational jiggle, that it would rotate a little clockwise and then counterclockwise??

It should NOT slide/wiggle in/out/left/right on the shaft at all. However, rotational wiggle is possible due to both primary chain and final gear drivetrain SLOP!

As for high speed slipping, there is an adjustment that you do at the engine to set the proper throwout rod contact depth, if it's too far inwards, can prevent the clutch from fully engaging=slipping! Other factors can contribute to slipping, the most common is just worn out springs! Many folks have found that their frictions are still well within specs....replace the springs with the recommended BARNETT set, and no more slipping. But while replacing the springs it's a good idea to both measure/micrometer the frictions, and also to freshen up the surfaces of the steels, along with cleaning the regreasing the throwout mechanism, 3 bearings in the cage, etc.!

There's a decent photo illustration of the teardown and reassembly of the clutch with special warnings and techniques for the star plate, just IGNORE the part about the extra steel! See tech tips, repairs or mods, engine, Extra Steel clutch plate tip.

T.C.

[bikerphil]

You might just be hearing the Hy-Vo chain from the crankshaft to the transmission main shaft rattling around, pretty common to hear on these bikes, especially on an engine with more than 30K miles. No need to worry, the chain won't break/fall off.

[trbig]

There is a bearing the clutch shaft rides on. It is pressed onto the shaft, but sometimes comes loose from it and you can get a bit of in and out movement (One side of the bike to the other) but if you are getting movement forward and backward at all, that bearing is going to be junk. It is fixable, but requires splitting the cases to fix.

Oh.. and no need to drain the oil to pull the clutch cover. Just set it on the sidestand.

[mmaddix]

I had a similar problem with my clutch basket moving in and out causing slipping and it was causing the clutch basket to acctually hit the clutch cover. I took off my star plate off and knoticed the two locking tabs for the locking washer for the basket were broken off, as you can see in the below picture. the one on the left is the one with the broken tabs and the one on the right is the good one.