Hey everyone!

First let me say that I am sorry for the cross post!!! I put this in the Sportster section too; I really want to try to help my husband with his bike!!

Anyway - I am brand new around here - just introduced myself in the New Member forum. As I said there, I found this board searching for info to cure (I hope!!) a problem with my husband's Sporty. I'm hoping I'm not asking for help too soon in my membership, but this problem has reached emergency proportions!

OK - Here's the scenario and I'll try to keep this as short as possible. My husband has an '86 - Evo motor, 4 speed trans, chain drive. It was an 883, it's had the 1200 conversion. Buell pistons, heads etc... (Dirty, loud and fast as he puts it). The original transmission literally broke last year; the counter shaft snapped and took teeth off two gears in the process.

After much looking, we found another 4 speed out of a parted out bike, I believe it was also an '86. *Supposedly*, the trans had around 15K miles on it. Who knows, though. We put it in and the bike ran fine for about two months. The other day, however, he went to move the bike, put it in first, and it never came out. It's stuck there. No neutral, no nothing, just first.

He's spent the last two nights pulling the trans out and trying to figure out what's wrong. At first, he thought it was the shifter spline. OK, replaced that. No such luck, as soon as he put it in first, in first it stayed. Then he thought it was the pawl (?) fixed that. With that, it ran for around 20 minutes shifting up and back through 4th, but then when he slowed to a stop... Put it in first... Now it's stuck again.

I REALLY hate to see him without his bike. He loves the thing to bits and misses riding already. I'm hoping someone here has heard of such a problem before, dealt with it... Anything? I wish we could afford a brand new trans, but right now, we just can't. Anybody have any ideas?

Thank you SO MUCH for reading this!!!
~ Chrissy

 

Was the tranny assembled and tolerances checked as per the factory service manual? Something could be shimmed wrong, shifter fork binding, or maybe a bent shaft. There could also be a burr on something that's catching on another part.

You can shift it through the gears several times before you install it. If it works fine while it's out, and gets stuck when it's installed, then there might be an alignment problem with the case bearings/bushings.

 

Thank you for your reply! We're thinking it is the bearings/bushings - it will shift through all 4 gears while out. The problem seems to come after it's been ridden for a little while. I wonder if this is an issue caused by the trans warming up somehow too.

It's back to the ole drawing board today - we'll see what happens. Hopefully it will be back to running by the end of the weekend!
~ Chrissy

 

If your tolerances are too tight, then heat could be a factor. What oil are you running in it?

 

Heat it up while it is out on the bench.