Clutch won't disengage

[550Katana]

Hi all, f.n.g. here with a problem. As a result of a brain fart, I left the petcock on "prime" (D'oh!) and proceeded to fill the cylinders and crankcase on my '82 550 Katana with gas. This went undetected for a while, as the bike sat for a time. I drained the crankcase and refilled with oil and cleared the cylinders. The bike runs fine however, the clutch will not disengage. We're talkin' direct drive here. I have never done any clutch work. Does anyone have any guess as to what the problem is gonna be, and how difficult of a fix it is?
Thanks for your help.


'82 550 Katana
'85 RZ500

[Redman]

Welcome to GSR.

Where, in general, are you located?

About your clutch; Let me ask some basic things first, just to eliminate a few things:
- there is tension on the cultch lever?
- tension on the lever but Only a little bit of slack on the lever, just a little wiggle before it gets the cable taunt?
- when you pull the cultch lever you can see the lever move down on the clutch case?
- the clutch doesnt disengae at all? Or you just ask because its hard to get into gear? You can stand still, or No, you put it in gear, and whamm ?

How long did it sit with gas in crank? That would have had gas-oil on the clutch plates you know.

I dont know about the Kats but on most GS you can take off the oil fill plug, and look in and see at least some of the clutch plates, well, really just the tabs of the plates sticking up into the slots in the clutch basket. Can then start to get a better idea of how the clutch works.

[Dogma]

Does the lever have ordinary feel, or is the mechanism locked op or dragging?

I've been into my clutch, and it's not bad at all if you don't have to get the basket out. Put the bike on the side stand so you don't have to drain the oil (reportedly), and then take the cover off. Be ready for at least some spillage. The clutch actuation mechanism is right there under the cover and partly in the cover. Hopefully, whatever the problem is should be immediately apparent when you see how the mechanism works. One of the service manuals (Haynes, Clymer, Suzuki) will give you the torque specs and procedures for the internals. If you take the disks out of the basket, I highly recommend using a torques wrench on reassembly. The torque is light, and the springs mess with your feel on the wrench.

Before all that though let us know just what the clutch is doing before you open it. Some of the wiser heads here may make simpler suggestions. You can do this.

I almost forgot: Welcome to the forum! Got any pics?

[tkent02]

Oil thinned with gas may have oozed out from between the plates more than pure oil would, leaving nothing to keep them from sticking together. Just sitting a long time can get them stuck too.

Try this before opening up the case:

Ride it in first gear, fairly slowly. Hold the clutch lever in, start cracking the throttle open and closed, on and off. Use any chain snatch to your advantage, get the thing really jerking back and forth. With the lever held in there is no spring pressure, nothing to keep the plates from moving except the fact that they are stuck, with a little luck they are not that stuck.

Hopefully it will free up the clutch plates and it will be fine after that.

[sloppydawg123]

Chances are the plates are just stuck together. You can either do as the previous posts, and just ride in first gear a bit, and see if that helps, or you can have the bike of, roll, than pop it into gear, but that can wear and tear on your parts. The easiest thing to do is drain the oil, open the case, pop the plates apart, than put them back in, takes like 15 minutes.

[Nessism]

I second tkent's advice, warm up the engine really well first to thin the oil.

[litshoot]

my bike sat for a long long time. i bought it and was stuck. let it get hot. put it up on the center stand and be safe but put it in 1st get some speed and nail the rear brake hard. also i found you can pry the plates apart gently by tapping a few apart. 77 gs750 you can see 2-3 steels and i tapped on them with a screw driver throught the oil fill plug.