Clutchless shifting: am i going to kill my tranny?

[Anonymous]

I just figured out that i can upshift by blipping the throttle (woohoo!) but i'm wondering if this is going to do some damage later. It seems to shift really smoothly almost smoother than with the clutch. Should i only do it when i want to go flat out or is it ok to do it all the time? I just want to know what the long term effects could be, and hopefully prevent me from destroyng my tranny.
Thanks All

[Anonymous]

I was wondering the exact same thing. I used to race motocross bikes about ten years ago, and I NEVER used my clutch for upshifting, I did it for years and nothing ever happened to my trannies, I had around three bikes and I raced for about 4 years, I never had a problem. But those were 125cc and 250cc bikes, my current bike is a 1980 GS750, it is a little different than those small motocross bikes, so I dont know, but I have been shifting without the clutch and it seems to be ok. Sorry I may not be much help.

Best regards - Jamie

[Anonymous]

Me too,
I was doing that yesterday cause I got to work, loose clutch, I checked and was down to 5 strands on my clutch cable. was hoping to make it home by hot shifting and SNAP there it went, I never made the highway.

I was hoping is this hoe shifting normal or is it a symptom of a almost gone clutch. When I figured out I could do that too a few weeks ago I made sure I won the clutch spring auction on E-bay..

Stimpy

[Jeff Tate]

Occasional non-use of the clutch probably won't do much harm. But it does tend to round off the gear engagement dogs in your tranny which eventually will cause missed shifts and the bike slipping out of gear. This process is sped up by the frequency and the amount of power the tranny is subjected to. Replacing tranny gears is not cheap. Use the clutch.

[earlfor]

You can upshift or downshift any bike without using the clutch.
On a bike transmission, you must go through every gear. (you cant shift from 1st directly to 5th as in a car. The reason being a bike has a rotating shift drum and the dogs must track through grooves. It is much harder on the transmission if the moving parts must traverse the shift drum under load as opposed to being able to move freely as when the clutch is disengaging power. It is not a good idea to make a habit of shifting without using the clutch.
Besides accelerated wear, you can easily bend a fork if you miss synchronize a shift badly. If you can accept frequent engine removal, and transmission rebuilding. no problem. :-) There is a sound engineering reason why bikes have clutches. :-) :-)

Earl

[lecroy]

Crap, what's a clutch? I never use that lever except when I pull it in and hit the breaks (yea, I use the breaks for breaking, not the engine), or during takeoff. I play with it when I am trying to keep my feet of the ground at lights.

Anyway, if you can feel the engine, no problem. To shift, you need to unload the transmission. One way is to cut the throttle and then shift. Never force it. Let it just flow together. Of course, you have to know when to unload. Let the motor spin too fast and you won't get it to switch, or worse, grind up your dogs. It's the feel. I have always driven like this, and it seems to be the easiest on the parts. I saw a JD tractor about five years ago with a manual that would shift without a clutch thanks to modern electronics. Of course the human brain can do the same thing.

The down side is if you cut the throttle, then you lost engine motion. If you use the clutch, you can keep the engine speed up, change the gear then let the clutch out, putting more power to the rear. Or, after a while you just set the engine speed to match the gear and travel speed. No force on the clutch. A better approach is to get a rev limiter. Set it to what ever your old engine can take. Then during a high speed shift, just hold the throttle wide open, pull in the clutch, let the engine run againt the limiter, change the gear and then let the clutch out. Now we added even more power to the tire. Maybe even got the front to bounce a little. Of course, this will cause the most force on the parts and surly lead to a quick block split.

Next comes the air shifter with a 3 speed and lockup clutch. Cut away all that crap metel under the bottom case so you can change the forks without splitting the block..... Ah, how quickly I begin to bable on.......

[Anonymous]

lecroy wrote
"Next comes the air shifter with a 3 speed and lockup clutch. Cut away all that crap metel under the bottom case so you can change the forks without splitting the block..... Ah, how quickly I begin to bable on......."

You better tell me about how to change the forks without splitting the cases. PLEASE

[HiSPL]

Removing this cast webing from the bottom of GS 16 valve cases allows bent shift forks to be changed between rounds, it eliminates removing motors and splitting cases. It is called a "Trap Door" modification.

Lifted straight from Bob Bertaut's website

[Anonymous]

OK we don't need a clutch to shift, so why do the bike manufacturers give us one? Think of the millions they would save if they even thought they could get away with it!

Yes you can upshift, and I had to the other week when my clutch cable went. I could also down shift by kicking the clutch lever on top of the clutch case on my GS650GL. Don't know about other GS models. Nice to know that in an emergency it can be done, but in normal circumstances why? Just to boast to others that you are so good you don't need a clutch, OK.

As for braking, I use both brakes and engine. mainly engine except for hard braking.

[Anonymous]

Removing this cast webing from the bottom of GS 16 valve cases allows bent shift forks to be changed between rounds, it eliminates removing motors and splitting cases. It is called a "Trap Door" modification.

Lifted straight from Bob Bertaut's website

THANKS VERY MUCH

[Anonymous]

Any manual transmission can be shifted without a clutch. Even non-synchro trannies. The reason for the clutch is for taking off and because you can't exactly match up the revs of your motor with the proper rpms of each gear.

I once made $20 off a friend who said I couldn't shift his truck without a clutch. So I went from first up to fifth and all the way back down to first again without a clutch and without a single complaint (re:grind) from the tranny. Of course that was a synchro tranny so you can ride on them for a few rpm's difference, which is rather nice.


-=Whittey=-

[lecroy]

"Just to boast to others that you are so good you don't need a clutch, OK. "

Yea, that about sums it up. I don't think there would be a cost savings to drop the clutch and put in some kind of a torque converter. Does a new car cost more with an automatic or a manual? Just learn to shift.


HiSPL, thanks for posting the cuts. That's the only way to go. SLOWPOKE, another thing you may want to do while your down there cutting away is add a trap door for the oil and move the pickup to the rear of the block instead of the front. It's hard to keep the crank and pistons lubed when all the oil is in the back of the engine.

[Anonymous]

"Just to boast to others that you are so good you don't need a clutch, OK. "

Yea, that about sums it up. I don't think there would be a cost savings to drop the clutch and put in some kind of a torque converter. Does a new car cost more with an automatic or a manual? Just learn to shift.


HiSPL, thanks for posting the cuts. That's the only way to go. SLOWPOKE, another thing you may want to do while your down there cutting away is add a trap door for the oil and move the pickup to the rear of the block instead of the front. It's hard to keep the crank and pistons lubed when all the oil is in the back of the engine.

CAN I DO THE CUTTING WITHOUT TAKING THE ENGINE APART(SPLITTING THE CASES) I MEAN JUST BY DROPPING THE OIL PAN))

[argonsagas]

Crap, what's a clutch? I never use that lever except when I pull it in and hit the breaks (yea, I use the breaks for breaking, not the engine), or during takeoff. I play with it when I am trying to keep my feet of the ground at lights.

Anyway, if you can feel the engine, no problem. To shift, you need to unload the transmission. One way is to cut the throttle and then shift. Never force it. Let it just flow together. Of course, you have to know when to unload. Let the motor spin too fast and you won't get it to switch, or worse, grind up your dogs. It's the feel. I have always driven like this, and it seems to be the easiest on the parts. I saw a JD tractor about five years ago with a manual that would shift without a clutch thanks to modern electronics. Of course the human brain can do the same thing.

.......

That's an excellent description of how to shift without a clutch.

When I first learned to drive I was in a pre-synchromesh International and occasionally an even older FWD. Double clutching (depress clutch, shift to neutral, release clutch, rev engine, depress clutch, shift into next gear, release clutch) was the only way to drive them, and crunching of gears was very common. Not only was the shift very slow, but the vehicle usually slowed as well, especially on hills, so you learned to feel the transmission and listen to the engine for the RPM 's needed, up or down. The oldtimer who taught me would do this all day, every day. He never missed a shift and never got a complaint from the gearbox. Come to think of it, the "oldtimer" was probably younger then than I am now

[Anonymous]

When I first learned to drive I was in a pre-synchromesh International...........

Ron:
Of course horse-drawn chariots were "pre-syncromesh".................what on earth were you thinking about?!
Simon