1100 Sport Clutch Issues

[Karl Von]

Hi All

My father has a 95 1100 Sport, which is having trouble disengaging the clutch. The adjuster on the arm is all the way in and there is no more adjustment on the cable. When you pull the clutch in 1st the bike tries to pull. The bike has apx 40,000 miles on it.

 

Well today I was on my 95 sport with 14,000 miles and as I was down shifting coming off the interstate, I noticed it was hard to down shift and then realized I had quite a bit of cable play in the handle. I got to a stop light and adjusted the cable out. The adjuster was almost out to the last threads. I made it home and took a look under the bike at the clutch arm and with no tension on the cable the arm was just sitting off the flange where the arm hits the plunger. It is as if the clutch rod it not pushing out enough and something has collapsed.

 

My first step is to pull the plunger and cage bearings to see what shape they are in. if the swing arm is not in the way, I am going to try and pull the clutch rod.

 

Does anyone have any ideas on this ?

 

thanks

[Guest Nigelstephens]

If the clutch arm is fully adjusted in so that the arm is hitting the box/frame it suggests to me that the end bearing has become stuck and the rod has worn.

 

The bearing I mean is just behind the clutch lever. If this bearing is damaged, the rod will may stop turning and this means that the clutch centre will rotate against the stationary rod. Its not lubricated and will get hot, soften and wear.

 

You can take this bearing out for examination by removing the rear wheel and swing arm. You can then remove the clutch cable and pull back the arm. With a pair of pliars you should be able to get a grip on the metal pin sticking out (round rod about 6-8mm across). Pull this out and the flat roller bearing is behind.

If you see damage on this you can be sure that the rod has been affected by wear. It then remains crab the frame and to remove the gearbox. The rod should then be easy to pull out and replace. Dont forget the two oil seals that go around the rod! You should not need to open the gearbox, unless you want to anyhow.

[guzzijack]

Hi All

My father has a 95 1100 Sport, which is having trouble disengaging the clutch. The adjuster on the arm is all the way in and there is no more adjustment on the cable. When you pull the clutch in 1st the bike tries to pull. The bike has apx 40,000 miles on it.

 

Well today I was on my 95 sport with 14,000 miles and as I was down shifting coming off the interstate, I noticed it was hard to down shift and then realized I had quite a bit of cable play in the handle. I got to a stop light and adjusted the cable out. The adjuster was almost out to the last threads. I made it home and took a look under the bike at the clutch arm and with no tension on the cable the arm was just sitting off the flange where the arm hits the plunger. It is as if the clutch rod it not pushing out enough and something has collapsed.

 

My first step is to pull the plunger and cage bearings to see what shape they are in. if the swing arm is not in the way, I am going to try and pull the clutch rod.

 

Does anyone have any ideas on this ?

 

thanks

 

I'll ditto what Nigel has said. Although when the thrust bearing started to go out on my Centauro, (both clutch plates still had enough meat on them), it was progressive with adjustment required at both levers until none was left and getting worse as the motor heated up. Pulling the rod and bearing is the best (and cheapest!) place to start. After that, if you have to go further in then you may want to prepare for the crabbing by having a look see at the technical section on Jen's Website .

 

Whether you decide to go the whole hog and shim the gearbox and change out the suspect input and output bearings is up to you for your own bike - personally, if it were mine I would - (full instructions on Jen's site as well). With the mileage your father's bike has I think it would be worth doing both the clutch and the gearbox for peace of mind.

 

GJ

[pete roper]

OK, just to expand a bit on what others have said.

 

The clutch thrust bearing is a small, flat, 'Torrington' type bearing that sits between two parts reffered to as the Inner and Outer 'Bodies'in the endcase of the gearbox. The clutch actuating arm pushes on the outer body which in turn pushes onthe thrust bearing which pushes on the inner body which pushes on the clutch pushrod which finally pushes on the thrust cup in the middle of the pressure plate withing the clutch itslf which lives in the engine's flywheel. Clear as mud so far?

 

Now, when the clutch is properly adjusted there should always be a couple of mm of free play in the clutch cable. If there isn't, (And some people like to have none as it makes the clutch lever feel *firm* and not rattle about because it is under tension from the cable.) this free play then the thrust bearing and the entire assembley forward to the thrust cup are forced to spin at crank speed. Not only is the bearing not designed to take this at higher RPM for anything but a moment as you whip in the clutch to change gears due to it's rather marginal lubriction but as Graham said the tendency will be for the push rod to start to spin in the thrust cup in the centre of the pressure plate. When this happens it will get hot and will eventually ither deform or, in the most extreme cases, friction weld itself to the centre of the thust cup. Once this happens rapid failure of the pushrod and usually the thrust bearing soon follows.

 

Having said all that another likely cause for your Dad's problem is the friction material un-riveting on one or both of the friction plates. Carb sports were producd at a time when Guzzi did use a batch of inadeqate plates. Not nly are these *early* plates prone to de-riveting but they also has thinner metal centres that wer prone to cracking between the webs in the plate the friction material is bonded too. There have been at least two upgrades to the original plate design that involved both thickening the metal plate the friction material is affixed to and also both riveting and laminating the friction material to the metal centre.

 

If the friction material de-rivets, or the centre rips out of one of the plates, the problem usually manifests itself as wonky clutch take up and/or too much or too little free play in the cable that once adjusted out then returns quickly as the friction material or loose bit of friction plate moves about within the clutch assembley.

 

Unless Your Dad was a 'Tight Clutch' man my guess is that one or both of the friction plates have disintegrated. The thrust bearing may also be at fault but the symptoms, to me, sound more like rooted plates than thrust bearing.

 

Note also that the clutch has three adjustment points, at the lever on the handlebar, at the other end of the cable on the back of the gearbox and also on the arm that presses n the 'Outer Body' there is a screw and locknut adjuster. On Carb Sports, as the clutch wears and the arm on the back of the box moves back t is possible, if the screw and locknut adjuster isn't used to repositin the arm, for the arm to end up jammed against the gearbox mount that goes from the porkchop to the bottom lug on the gearbox casing. If this happens then once again the thrust bearing runs pre-loaded all the time resulting in the thrust bearing and clutch operating system being overloaded as described above so it's important to get it set up *right*.

 

That being said I reckon you'll have to take the box out and do the clutch. Being a Carb Sport I would HIGHLY recommend that you go into he gearbox at this time, check for pinion damage, especially on 5th gear, replace the big input and output shaft bearings with 3205AC3's and shim up the selector drum properly.

 

Pete

[motoguzznix]

Karl

 

Concerning your fathers bike:

If you look at the adjustment arm, there is a flat 13 mm hexnut on it. This is fixing an adjustment screw with either a flat on it or an allan actuation. Loosen all the adjustments on the cable and screw the adjustment screw on the lever arm until the clutch works again.

 

Concerning your bike:

When the axial needle bearing mentioned by nigel is ok, then I suppose the part called "scodellino sul piattello" in the spare parts catalogue has a hole in it. Sometimes the clutch actuation rod will be pressed through the "scodellino" and the clutch can not be actuated anyy more.

This is a minor defect but requieres pulling the gearbox from the engine to get access to the clutch. I would replace the scodellino, the rod and the needle bearing.

Although dismounting of the clutch is not necessary for this repair, you have the opportunity to take a look on the disks and the gearbox sprocket for wear. Especially the steel disk tends to get uneven.

[callison]

While you're into the clutch, get one of Moto Internationals clutch seal upgrade kits. Actually, it's just a set of 5 specially sized o-rings, but they work a lot better than the cone shaped seal that Moto Guzzi uses. Even if you don't go the MI o-ring route you should replace the clutch push-rod seal while you're in there.

[Karl Von]

I figured on my father’s bike, with the mileage, the clutch plates are worn. He has the screw adjuster on the clutch arm turned in all the way, he has not owned the bike long, so the previous owner probably knew it needed a clutch and decided to adjust it to the max and un-load it. We got it cheep, so it is not to bad.

 

On mine, I adjusted the cable at the trans and on the handle and it seemed to work now. I have a little play in the handle and the clutch feels fine. I am still going to pull out the plunger, spacers, and throw out bearing and try to see what it going on. I don’t think the clutch has separated as after I readjusted the clutch cable and took it for a quick ride around the block, the clutch fills ok and there were not any strange noises when I pulled the clutch in. If the clutch material had come loose, I should hear it knocking around when the clutch it pulled in, wouldn’t it ?

[pete roper]

If the clutch material had come loose, I should hear it knocking around when the clutch it pulled in, wouldn’t it ?

 

Nah, usually it's silent.

 

Pete

[guzzijack]

On mine, I adjusted the cable at the trans and on the handle and it seemed to work now. I have a little play in the handle and the clutch feels fine.

 

Fair 'nuff but if you start getting a 'long lever' after the engine warms up and you've covered a few miles then the chances are the thrust bearing has decided to enter itself for the flotation test contest (Guzziology joke ).

 

Keep posting, these ones are always interesting and maybe we can start a sweepstake on what you'll eventually find

 

GJ

[Greg Field]

There are some Guzzi boxes and clutches on which clutch-cable freeplay increases as the bike heats up. On these, if you do not have the clutch cable pre-loaded on a cold engine, there will not be enough travel on the pushrod to disengage the clutch and find neutral reliably. This is rare, but it happens. Almost always on these bikes, you will notice an eccentric wear pattern on the clutch end of the pushrod, if you examine it closely with young eyes or magnification. I do not know what the root cause of this is, but i have noted it on at least three bikes that were under my care. Yours may be similar. If it is, the normal advice will not prove useful. Replacing the pushrod will help for a while. Unfortunately, though, before long you will have to return to the routine of adjusting out freeplay as the engine warms and adding it back in when the engine cools. Again, I do not know why these particular Guzzis behave as they do, but they do.

[mike wilson]

Bent pushrod?

 

Ends not square?

 

Tunnel diameter too large?

[jrt]

Ditto on Carl's advice per MI o-rings. They work.

 

Pete- I've had a clutch come apart and while the clutch itself doesn't make much noise, the transmission sure got banged around every time I took off. That certainly made a fair amount of (unpleasant) noise.

[Karl Von]

Well I removed the clutch arm, plunger & bearing from the sport. It is almost impossible to do with the swing arm in place due to the dowel on the back of the plunger that goes into the clutch arm and you can not remove the screw adjuster because it hits the swing arm as you back it out. Makes me love my eldo even more when it comes to maintenance.

 

Any how, the thrust bearing looked ok. I pulled out the push rod hat but could not get it back far enough to pull if off the rod. One thing I did notice when the rod hat was pulled out past the case was I was able to rotate the rode around in a circle about a 1/2 inch. There was allot of slop in it up and down, side to side.

 

I don’t know if this is normal on the newer bikes, but I remember on my Eldo the clutch rod does not have hardly any movement once it is in the trans case.

 

I guess my next option is to drop the motor and trans and check out things up front.