richiedan40

hi guys I,m back after a bit of an absence , not absinth ! had to do my test again due to the dvla having lost some of my licence details , ah well , all done and 600 spondulies lighter. any how , my old yam pre divvy xj600 1989 , is playing up , and I,m great at pulling things to bits and stickin em back together but when it comes to intermitant stuff ?????? so can you please help......bike fires up great , 1st time every time I get her out , she rattles a bit from the clutch but basically runs great. pulls like a train and no smoke. shes done 30000 mile but ive restored her to a certain extent. now , heres the difficult bit...if I do roughly 15 mile or so or slightly less if ridden hard she starts miss firing and then runs on 3 cylinders , 2 cylinders if I try to go further. let it cool down for half an hour and shes back on 4. if I really open her up , 7-8,000 revs it seems to briefly hit on four cylinders again but briefly. now , I love the old girl , shes ugly but great fun ....we all know one of them eh ? I just want her running right again , surely cant be much , I was thinking coil , electronic ign box ? any ideas lads I,m desperate here. how do you test these items if it is them , please can you help . cheers Richie. ps , I know this is a yam site but any one needs help with a brit bike. I,m availlable

sorry for the very late reply bud , I had difficulty removing it but when I cleaned it up it was ok , the lincage was stiff , greased it up , all is ok. clutch bearing was replaced and ive got a second hand clutch to go in. 2nd one now. Has any one got a schematic of a pre divvy clutch please ? I,m struggling to find one.

Has anyone got a schematic for the clutch assembly?

thanks for the offer pal , might just be a bit chilly for me this time of year ! did you read my project report ? How you getting on , have you done any more to the bike ?

my project is .... 1989 xj 600 with all the glam of Spandau ballet. complete with pics

Hi pal , ive just finished doing up a free xj 600 , and it looks lovely.....see my pics. Had the same problem with my carbs , leaking like hell , seems when I stripped em , the tank had rusted and the rust and shit was stuck in the float needle , so I cleaned em , blasted em with compressed air and put them back together . I put fuel from a container via some hose into the carbs before fitting to see if they still leaked , they didn't so happy days. They are a bit of a bugger to fit , make sure you lube the rubbers to aid fitment. I also fitted an in line filter . But you have to run the line under the carbs , then that's where the filter sits out the way , and then up to the carb inlet. Gravity feeds the fuel. If you try to fit the filter by the tank it will starve of fuel. I,d disconnect the shock from the swinging arm assembly before ordering a shock cos my swing arm was seized , I freed it off and re greased and now its ok. Let me know if you have any more problems and I,ll try to help.....I,m now a dab hand on yammy xj clutches as well ! The lads on here are great , I got loads of help from here. enjoy the job , and take your time , its worth the wait , they are a great old bike when they are done right. Reasonable handling and great brakes for the year. Richie D

didn't think that bearing noise was normal , I think I asked that question hoping that some one may have replied with " yeh they all do that " well I,m not stripping the engine this year to do that , it can wait till the winter. And I,ll get a dog to blast about on. so where is squires then drewpy ?

Dear all , the clutch basket has still not arrived from the breakers , so little progress has been made. and summer is two thirds of the way through , although I have aquired a 6mm hardened dowel which I will use when the basket arrives , I milled the slot in the drive cog out to 6.05mm and will ream out the basket accordingly , I phoned the Yamaha technical help line last week and they were pretty much clueless , which didn't instill confidence , they said they,d get back to me , which they couldn't be ar$%d to do. Makes you think , doesn't it ? any how whilst my xj is in bits I noticed a little play in the bearing on the drive shaft , the one the clutch sits on , and it is a little noisy when rotated by hand , before I spend any more money , is this normal or not ? many thanks guys....look forward to your replies ps are there any rallies etc in the north west in the coming week ?

as above post , ive got a pre divvy one of a 1990 xj 600 , thanks all the same paul , your help is always appreciated , as always

cheers drewpy , I did read your blog 1st time round , but I,m still not sure whats supposed to be going on cos the pin does not look worn and the receiving hole / slot in the basket and gear respectively don't look worn either , isn there supposed to be play in the gear or should it be an interferrance fit

all sorted , some breakers on tinterweb called " paul woods motorcycles " had a pre divvy one for £20 Happy days eh ?

not sure of the model no. paul , its a second hand one from the heart breakers. sorry for the double post. the old alseimers playing up again and the poor spolling

that's great thanks paul. I,ll order one of them. would you bother replacing the basket for one fork tip snapped off ? ive found one on e bay but its off a 92 divvy , it looks identical , will it fit though ?

nice one paul , ive ordered them ive also found a basket from an early diversion and it looks identical to mine . are they the same ? and ...... would you go to the expense of replacing the basket just for one broken fork tip. ?

that's great thanks airhead. I,m not comfortable calling you airhead though !

ok lads , I need your help here , I,ll explain 1st , I pulled the left hand cover off yesterday to investigate the clutch problem. first thing I saw was one of the forks on the clutch basket was snapped off , looks like whoever had this bike before me had used a screw driver to lock up the basket whilst undoing the nut , the clutch has been operating fine so I guess this is not a major issue , please advise. after further stripping I noticed there is a small pin which locates the oil pump drive cog on the rear of the clutch basket , this is loose in the basket/drive gear , neither the cog or the basket drillings seem worn or the pin for that matter , the pin appears to be too small because you can rotate the gear 3 to 4mm in both directions, what size should it be , there are no descriptives in the Haynes manual. I,m certain this is the cause of the rumbling noise as I couldn't find any thing untoward anywhere else. your help would be much appreciated lads. if you require pictures I can down load later........I mean upload.........old fart disease rearing its ugly head again !

this is the old girl finished guys, what do you think ?

yep , I,ll get some of that , if there is any more paint on that tank itll look like one of them bmw touring things. I,ll have to get new yam decals too. I,m not really bothered about it too much cos I masked around the decals its going to get done proper in the winter, two pack paint new graphics the lot. but the Halfords juice resistant gear should do for now to tart it up a touch eh ?

Yes you,re dead right , everything starts in a pub , the bible should be re-written..... Genesis , book 1 , verse 1......" and in the beginning there was nothing so God said " let there be a free house selling real ale , I could do with a few jars before I start this job , could be a big un ! , and there was a free house selling real ale "........He probably drunk real ale y know , well he had a beard didn't he ? ok , how did I find the job of getting the carbs off , bloody nightmare pal , there is no means of taking the airbox out with the engine in , so I just had to sort of tilt them and wiggle them as I pulled em out of one side , it was no fun , and they had to come out twice ! that was cos I stripped , cleaned and re built them with new gasgets , screws and fitted them only to discover the new tapered needle valves were still in the bag ! the fuse box was ok , yes those brass holders are very flimsy but they were ok. the only electrical issue I had was indicators would only flash when THEY felt like it. that was cured by soaking the switch in wd40 and operating for 50 cycles , doesn't sound technical but it worked. I painted the tank for the second time yesterday and then wrecked it again by spilling fuel on the bugger. should have left it a week but I,m getting excited now cos its a gnats chuff away from being finished.

my apologies Canadian guy , I failed to see the DT at the top of your post , please accept my apologies. its my age y,know !

cheers for the replies fellas. firstly to the Canadian guy who only has member as his name , I,m glad to see I,m not the only one with mice problems , it sounds like one of yours got stuck in the butterfly/slide , scary stuff if you were cruising along pal.......I,m back in cartoon mode again picturing " dick dastardly " mouse holding your throttle wide open whilst " mutley "mouse sniggers away in the corner of your airbox. we are not sure what we are going to do in Ireland , other than knock the froth of a few ! I was going to take a two man tent in case the weather is nice ( bet theres a few irish lads reading this in the ale house laughing their heads off right now " Jasis , have yer hord this eejit Michael , ......in case there is nice weather......nice weather my feckin arse ! " so in Ireland , the land of eternal drizzle , we may well be paying up to £ 3000 a night for a guest house over there , and £50 a pint for the black stuff. slight exaggeration but it is expensive. they don't have truck stops as such in Ireland , mainly cos they've only got one motorway and that's only from one end of Dublin to some where up north , I think. its ten years since ive been there. Tommy XS , you don't live too far from me , I go past you when I,m working in Halewood. thanks for the info on the paint , but its already painted , did it yesterday , its some ford fiasco colour that's pretty close to the original. I didn't do a top job cos ive painted around the graphics , its going to get done in the winter , new graphics , logo and two pack paint. this is "just for now " but I,ll check that website out ( bloody hell that sounded too American did that ) but thanks for all the help , this is exactly why I joined.

hi everyone , thanks for the comments and advice . after reading all your replies I realised why I joined this club , great helpful people , just like the old guys that offered advice on bsa issues when I was a kid , like you could set the gap on lucas points with the lid of an embassy regal packet , great advice when your on the side of the road , not so good If you didn't smoke ! any how , now you can see the old Girl , you probably think I was talking utter crap when I described the sorry state but those photos were taken at low res. so you cant see too much. Cop for the mice nest made from bits of air filter , wonder what was going through their mind when I opened it up to 10,000 revs , apart from two valves. Imagine the cartoon to that......their little front legs clinging on to the plastic airbox as they slowly lose their grip as they waver about horizontaly and are sucked through the carbs into the cylinders , being squeezed to a third of their size ( cut to the cartoon bit where they continually get squashed by the piston,and pounded on the head by various valves over 40 cycles ) then suddenly the bike splutters and coughs and there is this thud thud , thump , high pitch squeeking noise as the exhaust down pipe bulges with lumps ( that strangely disappear as they make their way down the exhaust system , great cartoons , aren,t they ? ) then there is this ( polystyrene on glass ) type noise as , one by one they get pushed through the tail pipe and land on top of each other ( the one on the bottom of the pile squeezes his eyes shut as each member of the family lands on his head ) when its all over hes just sitting there with a sooty face and that " oliver hardy " look on his face. well today folks I,m balancing the carbs and painting the tank , may I add that this is a temporary painting around the graphics job until I get new graphis . I,m using four sets of kitchen scales and some dope dealers weights to balance the carbs , only joking , I,ll let you know how I got on. ive also decided , whilst writing the mouse story , to strip the clutch down and investigate , I,ll also let you know what I find the mouse story was true , for the record !