Three weeks ago, I sprained my ankle which sadly delayed my first ride of the year.
Prior to that, I checked over the bike, ran it, made sure the clutch and brakes worked, reset the clock and added a new top box.
I also planned on changing the oil & filter before the first ride but life had other plans.
Becoming slowly more mobile, I've graduated to no crutches and climbing up the stairs in under 15 minutes. Today, I was able to go outside to see if I could get myself on the beast, get the sidestand up & down, hold the bike up, roll it backwards and use the shifter. All went reasonably well until I tried to put it into first gear: the clutch snapped back with no resistance.
Needless to say my heart sank as I envisioned a massive repair bill from the local Honda dealer.
I opened the reservoir on the clutch and found it almost empty! It was also filthy as hell. I cleaned it out and topped it up with fresh fluid and then gave it a couple of squeezes: I got normal resistance. Some air bubbled up as I released the clutch so I squeezed slowly (while tapping the hydraulic line) until no more air came back. I know that's not proper procedure but bleeding the clutch was on the agenda after the oil change. It shifted fine after that so I just went back and forth a couple of times and shut her down. I also decided my ankle wasn't ready to ride.
A few hours later, I thought I would try some mounting therapy and noted the sight glass indicated half full.
Am I correct in diagnosing this as clutch slave cylinder failure?
Is a knuckle busting, cuss filled removal and rebuild in my future?
This is not something that I am looking forward to.
I've seen Max Pete's post on this and will be studying it at length.
Prior to that, I checked over the bike, ran it, made sure the clutch and brakes worked, reset the clock and added a new top box.
I also planned on changing the oil & filter before the first ride but life had other plans.
Becoming slowly more mobile, I've graduated to no crutches and climbing up the stairs in under 15 minutes. Today, I was able to go outside to see if I could get myself on the beast, get the sidestand up & down, hold the bike up, roll it backwards and use the shifter. All went reasonably well until I tried to put it into first gear: the clutch snapped back with no resistance.
Needless to say my heart sank as I envisioned a massive repair bill from the local Honda dealer.
I opened the reservoir on the clutch and found it almost empty! It was also filthy as hell. I cleaned it out and topped it up with fresh fluid and then gave it a couple of squeezes: I got normal resistance. Some air bubbled up as I released the clutch so I squeezed slowly (while tapping the hydraulic line) until no more air came back. I know that's not proper procedure but bleeding the clutch was on the agenda after the oil change. It shifted fine after that so I just went back and forth a couple of times and shut her down. I also decided my ankle wasn't ready to ride.
A few hours later, I thought I would try some mounting therapy and noted the sight glass indicated half full.
Am I correct in diagnosing this as clutch slave cylinder failure?
Is a knuckle busting, cuss filled removal and rebuild in my future?
This is not something that I am looking forward to.
I've seen Max Pete's post on this and will be studying it at length.
