Mark came up on Saturday to fit a new clutch to his DR650, he arrived at 08.00am, a mere 3 hour drive from Birmingham where he lives, the uttered the fateful words 'It'll be done in an hour'!! At 3.30pm he put the last drop of oil in the bike & started it up...
So armed with a laptop that had the workshop manual on it, plenty of tools, the replacement clutch kit & some determination, off he set to change out the broken bits.
It all came apart nice & easy except for one bolt which was holding one of the oil pipes in place, the hex head rounded off inside, so a swift sawing of a groove in the head & a very big flat headed screwdriver saw that bolt pop out... easy life...
Next up was to soak the new plates in oil, information varies on this from the workshop manual saying 'give each plate a wipe with oil to Gaz suggesting it was to be soaked overnight, Mark went for 20 minutes in one of my posh Le Creuset pots, (with a couple of food bags in it to protect it of course!).
Putting these things back together is always interesting when you have never done it before, so after a phone call to Geoff, our ever helpful bike mechanic guru, Mark sorted out dropping the plates back into their holder in the correct way & got the carrier back onto the bike, again all fairly smoothly, albeit with some help!!
The bolts that held the spring plate in place had a couple of issues, some a mistake others just that they are old, they basically snapped off whilst applying the torque settings, in the first instance it turned out Mark has the torque wrench set wrong, at 80lb as opposed to the recommended 8lb... oops read that wrong!! After this though the bolts still snapped even tightening them up just past finger tight. They were a bit delicate to remove but with some gentle persuasion, out they came & Mark replaced them all from my little goody pot of spare bolts.
Next up was to refit the casing & re-attach the clutch cable, the casing went on fine, but the cable is knackered really & needs replacing, so Mark popped it on as best he could so we could run the bike. Topping up the oil is a cinch on the DR650, the oil window makes life so much easier. Both myself & Gaz have to guess each time on ours as on my DR350 it goes into the frame & on Gaz's XT it goes into an oil tank behind the seat. The dipsticks on both are feckless though & you can only tell it's about right because the gears change & the bike doesn't run badly!!
After this it was start her up!! The DR started first time & with a bit of adjustment, the back wheel spun up when in gear & didn't when the clutch was pulled in, so far so good.
By this time it was getting on, so Mark & I planned to meet Lucy up at the Wulfsport shop, so a quick clean up & off we set leaving the DR to soak up more oil into the clutch plates.
On the whole, things went pretty good even though it took most of the day, the engine bolts & a few other bolts could do with replacing, the chain & sprockets & clutch cable are all next on the list, but the bike is starting to act like the good bike it should be... great stuff...
Well done to Mark for the perseverance...
So armed with a laptop that had the workshop manual on it, plenty of tools, the replacement clutch kit & some determination, off he set to change out the broken bits.
It all came apart nice & easy except for one bolt which was holding one of the oil pipes in place, the hex head rounded off inside, so a swift sawing of a groove in the head & a very big flat headed screwdriver saw that bolt pop out... easy life...
Next up was to soak the new plates in oil, information varies on this from the workshop manual saying 'give each plate a wipe with oil to Gaz suggesting it was to be soaked overnight, Mark went for 20 minutes in one of my posh Le Creuset pots, (with a couple of food bags in it to protect it of course!).
Putting these things back together is always interesting when you have never done it before, so after a phone call to Geoff, our ever helpful bike mechanic guru, Mark sorted out dropping the plates back into their holder in the correct way & got the carrier back onto the bike, again all fairly smoothly, albeit with some help!!
The bolts that held the spring plate in place had a couple of issues, some a mistake others just that they are old, they basically snapped off whilst applying the torque settings, in the first instance it turned out Mark has the torque wrench set wrong, at 80lb as opposed to the recommended 8lb... oops read that wrong!! After this though the bolts still snapped even tightening them up just past finger tight. They were a bit delicate to remove but with some gentle persuasion, out they came & Mark replaced them all from my little goody pot of spare bolts.
Next up was to refit the casing & re-attach the clutch cable, the casing went on fine, but the cable is knackered really & needs replacing, so Mark popped it on as best he could so we could run the bike. Topping up the oil is a cinch on the DR650, the oil window makes life so much easier. Both myself & Gaz have to guess each time on ours as on my DR350 it goes into the frame & on Gaz's XT it goes into an oil tank behind the seat. The dipsticks on both are feckless though & you can only tell it's about right because the gears change & the bike doesn't run badly!!
After this it was start her up!! The DR started first time & with a bit of adjustment, the back wheel spun up when in gear & didn't when the clutch was pulled in, so far so good.
By this time it was getting on, so Mark & I planned to meet Lucy up at the Wulfsport shop, so a quick clean up & off we set leaving the DR to soak up more oil into the clutch plates.
On the whole, things went pretty good even though it took most of the day, the engine bolts & a few other bolts could do with replacing, the chain & sprockets & clutch cable are all next on the list, but the bike is starting to act like the good bike it should be... great stuff...
Well done to Mark for the perseverance...
