Oil Drain

Hey Guys,

Stupid question time. The last Commando I had was a Combat so it was a bit different than the 1971 I've got now. Should there be 2 oil drain plugs at the bottom of the cases? I seem to only have the one big sump filter plug. I thought this model should have that and a smaller drain plug a bit further towards the front.

Early bikes just had the large drain and filter. For 72/73 the Combat came in with only the 3/8" front drain plug and from 74 the 850 was introduced with both drains, the best of both worlds really.

Cool. I remember my Combat having just that little drain plug. Good to know I'm not blind at least.

Thanks.

Yep Combat's got a tiny plug which makes it a bit dangerous to nip up oil tight and stable then to take off again w/o buggering the plug. I gave up on sump oil draining and just start up and keep rpm low for a few seconds then rev up 2000 ish to keep oil wedge on cam till ready to ride. I slice a oil jug up to fit under the oil tank drain with a section cut out to reach tank plug when catch can under the funny funnel.
Nice to have a magnet version to monitor the ferric metal decay rate.

Hi Keith, mine is an April 1973 850 with both small and large plugs, also as Jim has pointed out in his breather threads some have a totally open hole for the large plug, and some have an internal baffle partially blocking the hole by at least a 1/4. My twin plug is the latter.
Regards Mike