CHAPTER THREE
Getting my Webber carb setup to run well turned out to be another matter of lucking out and being at the right place at the right time. I found out about a VW hotrod shop in Novato, Ca. called Viking Auto. The owner is a guy named Sven, and is a pretty helpful man when it comes to tuning info. He also happens to be a biker and at the time I was putting together my induction system, he had a ZX 10. He made me aware of a service that Webber has avialable. The dealer sends the company a fax with your engine specs., and the carburetor you want to use. The factory does a computer jetting profile for your engine and they send back a fax with the recommended venturi, emullsion tube, idle, and main jet sizes. This was done for my bike and the jet set they recommended is exactly what I'm running in the bike right now. Even though I bought some extra sets to play around with, the best all around setup has proven to be the one they quoted at the start. Obviously some of the factors involved could be finer tuned with the use of a flow bench and dyno, but for a seat of the pants approach, I'm very happy with the perfomance of the bike. Unfortunately the clutch did not feel as happy with it.
The clutch started making some funny noises and I was changing my oil when I caught a glint of yellow metalic in the draining oil. I started looking closer and found brass powder in the oil. Not having an intimate understanding yet of the GL engine innards, I was not aware that the brass had come from the clutch pack. I pulled the thing apart and found the half destroyed clutch damper as well as a cracked rear oil pump casting and some damaged plain bearings on the crank. It seems the damper rivets were coming apart and getting chewed up in the clutch and then pumped throughout the engine by the scavenge pump in the clutch housing. This also allowed the dampers spring steel inserts to cut into the clutch basket and grind steel out of it. The center main bearings receive the main oil pump feed and hence the first and greatest exposure to the metal in the oil sump. These showed the greatest damage, while the adjacent bearings displayed slightly less damage. I decided to order rings as well as replacement bearings and went about thoroughly cleaning out the engine. It was actually not dirty other than the metal powder and some slightly brown oil residue. I also discovered that the rear oil pump had swallowed a chuck of brass rivet and was cracked in two. I found one at the salvage shop and before long had all the parts together to reassemble the engine. The Honda dealers in the area had quoted me outrageous prices for the bearings and rings and so I called some mail order houses and ended up getting genuine Honda parts for between 1/3 and 1/2 the price that the dealers wanted. Really makes you want to buy from these guys "not".
Upon re-installing the motor, I made the decision to dump the clutch damper all together. It looked like the weak link in the chain to me. It's built from what is esentially a steel drive plate with some spring steel pieces riveted to it and to another steel ring which rides against the adjacent friction disc. It is supposed to take some of the harshness out of engagement. There is a large spring/recoil cush-drive on the output shaft to also relieve this kind of thing. The clutch damper seemed to be a redundant part and the brass rivets through spring steel were a bad idea in the first place. I bought a couple extra drive plates and measured their thickness compared to the damper plate. It looked like they would take up the slack left by omitting the damper. I also bought a heavy duty EBC clutch pack and some heavier Red Line springs. The results were a revelation. Much better first gear engagement and cleaner shifting. It's the way to go for my money.I need to stop here for now. I'm working on more chapters as well as additional editing to the existing ones. This must be done as time allows and hopefully will be ready soon. Please come back for more if you've found this interesting.
Here's a view of the Webber carb setup.