primary drive

HI
i am experimenting with various oil grades and am having difficulty with clutch drag and difficulty in engaging 1st gear and neutral when the engine is running , does any one have any experience using different grades of oil and what results did they have

Use ATF, a thin oil for auto gearboxes with lots of clutches. There are two main ones a Fard and a GM, one is preferred over the other but both work well in the primary of pre 850 Mk3 bikes.

In a Mk3 that it is I've found not all oil grades suit the automatic chain tensioner. I've found the factory recommended 20w/50 (same as the engine oil) to work best. ATF that others use in the pre-Mk3 primary didn't work very well at all.

paul greggo said:

HI
i am experimenting with various oil grades and am having difficulty with clutch drag and difficulty in engaging 1st gear and neutral when the engine is running , does any one have any experience using different grades of oil and what results did they have

Click to expand...

Read and understand, then implement this.


Or spend a lot of wasted effort mucking about.

The first thing I would do (were it my clutch) is to be sure that it is not a clutch mechanical disengagement problem. So I would clean the clutch plates, reassemble, adjust and then immediately test (knowing that it takes a while for the plates to oil up and drag.) And keep testing until the bike and fluids are all very warm. In my opinion, the plates won't oil up on the first ride and you want all to get warm in case mechanical geometry changing due to heat is a problem.

If the test above shows no problem engaging first gear then the problem is isolated to being oil that will eventually work its way onto the clutch plates.

Dennis