CA95 Clutch Adjustments and Oil

[Smithers]

Initially we haven't had much time to ride this little Honda around because we had to wait a month for an appointment with the CHP technician as part of the process of getting a new title or the bike. So in the spirit of keeping everything legit and legal the bike has been waiting this past month. The engine hasn't even been ridden for more than 5 miles and the clutch has been slipping and the battery has been dead.

Now we have the registration out of the way and title in hand. Insurance has been paid for and the weather is great. The bike just needs to be ridden badly. I started it up the other day and it took about 10 kicks since the 6v battery just hasn't had a chance to charge up. I just took off for a ride across town to visit my friend at the local dealership who I bought the bike from. I told him that once I got it running the first thing I would do is ride it over to show him. I parked right out front of the bike shop and a few people instantly came over to check it out.

I basically put 12 miles on it and the bike really started running a lot better once things had a chance to stretch out and get some oil through it. I put just regular ol' 10-30 in it because back in the day they just threw regular ol oil in them and they worked great. Todays modern oils are WAY better and much more slippery so I have faith in just about any regular oil out there. These old Hondas do not need any special bike oil at all.

The clutch was slipping a little initially and I was really cursing myself for not roughing up the fiber clutch plates a little. I've been told that you can lightly sand the clutch plates to make them perform a lot better. Both clutches I have looked like they had a lot of life on them so I just put one back in without doing anything to them. I'll post how I adjusted the clutch rod in the near future. This is the most important adjustment there is because the adjuster on the clutch cable on the handlbar really won't do anything useful until the clutch rod is adjusted correctly.

The clutch slipped for about 5 miles and then it worked perfectly! I couldn't be more happy with it. I even tried it out up a couple really steep hills and it didn't slip one bit. I was really worried about the clutch not working so well. After all the clutch plates are probably a couple decades old at least!

More pics and tips on adjustments to come soon.

Don't complain about how difficult it is to resurface the plates and clutch disks in our old Hondas. Here is what the BSA owners have to do!! Make a clutch disk from scratch...

[Smithers]

Wow I guess I need to update this thread here I started about the clutch adjustment.

Here is the main adjustment that makes a huge difference. It's best to study the pictures a little bit to understand just how this clutch adjustment drum works. It takes a very wide screwdriver or maybe a coin of some type to adjust this unit. I'll have to find more pictures but it's the round part next to the number 22 in the illustration below.

[kartgreen]

When you use the main adjuster as shown in the picture, adjust it to contact the pushrod than back the adjustment off a bit . tighten the bolt to hold the adjuster in place . Use the clutch cable adjusters at the clutch lever and at the side cover to fine tune the clutch engagement and lever feel . If the main adjuster is continuously contacting the push rod more than likely your clutch is giong to slip . The pushrod only moves slightly to open the gap between the clutch plates and the steels.