86 400 Enduro resurrection-help needed....Initial evaluation

Transmission problems sorted!!

Well the wheels on the bus go round and round, and my transmission seems to want to now shift.
Hopefully that will work with an actual running engine, won't pop out of gear etc, but from what I can see of it, it's good enough to put Humpty back together again and proceed with attempted engine starting issues.
Carefully scraping the old gasket silicon off, clean with acetone and scotchbrite pad and brake cleaner.....
As this will be a short term use just to see if and how well the motor is, I am going to clean and reuse the still intact old gasket. for now.

..............................

The other parts in the shifting mechanism are pretty interesting so I'll post some pikkies of them here for edumacation purposes only.

.............................

The double hook/lever that rotates the shift drum is cranked by the slotted end shifter axle and from the shift lever. Here is a picture of it, I can see some shiny wear marks, anybody have an opinion about the wear seen in these pictures? The hook is shoved to the left in I think an upshift and hasn't yet returned to the center neutral position.
The lower hook has grabbed the drum and rotated it, the upper right hook is (maybe) stopping the completed upshift rotation. I think.
The lever will return to neutral and the double hook will be centered. The Y-piece has dropped into the space between the pins






It is cranked left and right by the shift lever/slotted axle at the right.The hooks at the bottom rotate the drum end, the hooks at the top seem to stop the rotation and the y-piece drops in to lock it. I think. When the lever pressure is released it returns to neutral, the hooks disengage to the position shown here.above...^^^ Yeah, I sorta said that twice, sorry. :>

Here's a pikkie of the hook pulled out of the drum end and both lower hooks and both upper hooks exposed:



..................

In the first picture the slotted shifter axle end and the double leg/cross legged spring can be clearly seen in the correct configuration.
The axle is in it's axle hole, the spring legs are hooked up correctly, crossed like that...again, more about that is in the 'trans problem' thread. The search function here works pretty well I find.

The shifter axle fell out with all that vise grip/mole grip grabbery..it's not very long and just gets put back in...however, after looking at this picture I have to go look closer, it looks like a giant burr sticking oput there...or some plastic bushing...dunno, I will go see it if the sun ever comes up. If that's an actual metal burr I will remove and clean it up and give a think about a better bushing there..we'll see...but, no panic, I just stuck it back in the right spot.

But I was afraid there might be one of those 'Oh Jebus moments.'



.............

All righty then, I spun the rear wheel and after a fashion ran it up and down thru the gears, the stuck mechanisms are loosening up...however now that leaves me with the stuck shift lever itself, still in the case.
When I got the bike it actually would move up and down but the stuck parts prevented any shifting. When I removed the case I muscled the lever around to access the screw head and it is now very solidly stuck. I have it soaking in PB Blaster and will try to rotate it back to the neutral position this am...and it that doesn't free it, I have the BodgerPress ready to go....:>




haha, I hope it doesn't come to that..I would tap on a soft piece of aluminum against the shaft end, the thin brittle case supported by the wood...but I am trying for rotation to free it first.

Well, again, thanks for reading, this thread is helping me sort this out as a Certified Noob, maybe other closet Noobs out there can learn something, and some of you may have never been inside this case yet.

Forward into the future, and good luck, Bodger

keep spraying and tapping gently with a nylon mallet and drive the level out. it will be seriously gummed up in there

It almost sounds if the gear lever shaft is bent slightly ! Are there any tell tale signs that the gear lever or case have taken a whack ?

surprize...thanks, yes, gummed up and getting worse since the PB Blaster which may have worsened the broken o-rings..it was at least moveable when I got it.

grouty..yes indeed, the gear lever and the case met and the scar is visible, the case protector is also bent and touched the water pump, the cover of which is cracked at the bolt hole, and the pipe has a matching crease...so yes indeed it could be bent slightly, good idea, thanks. I would have thought/assumed the case would shatter before the short high strength steel gear lever axle would bend...but it sure could happen. It was quite a crash to bend the case protector against the engine like it did. The frame did not bend however, so yay for that.

I am going to have another go at the lever axle now and we will see.

The jap riders hate it when you snick the big girl into sixth.

my brother back in the day on his Husky CR500 was told it was not the fastest bike as his friend had the newer CR500 you know the copy, the one made by the Jap company, well they take off and it's a fairly close race my 210 pound brother on his Husky was about a bike length in front of the Jap CR500 with the 145 pound rider both in 5th, then my brother looks over and waves, points at his foot as he pulled it into 6th and rode away

haha, thanks for the good story!

I see that the gear ratios are the same for most if not all the Husky engines from perhaps late 70's thru the 80's. Some of those engines are 60hp so it's a pretty tough transmission, and sure looks well designed and built as far as I have seen so far.

I have lusted after the spercially built 5 and 6 speed transmissions used on G50's and Norton Manx road racing engines...the Husky 6 speed ratios are be not the most optimized for road racing but it still would be pretty cool to use it in a Brit rr special I have been building and running over the years. Slipping the clutch in first gear after bump starting it sidesaddle to 50mph is fun and all but a good hole shot is good compensation. I ain't as spry as I useter be so maybe I should stick to the four speed...I need longer to get my leg over now....:>

Maybe I will just use a whole Husky TC510 bike and be done with it..haha.....

zoom....6 speeds...drool...can't wait to get this 400 smoker running!

...................


Shifter freed!!

Today was scraping a couple of layers of silicone off the cases and gasket, digging out dirt pockets both inside and out, reassembled the clutch, and freed the gear shift lever...it was rusted between the O-rings, drifted it out, cleaned out the rust and dusty gumbo around O-rings and in the grooves, scraped off the rusty bits, greased and back in, NOT BENT!....cases not broken!!!

Nicely designed with the sleeve bushing....well, except for the rust..from sitting or maybe when I washed it.

booo-yahhh!

................

some corner was turned thp as now parts are actually going back together!...a big moment!

Mate who was a very very good enduro rider tells a story of him and a sponsored honda rider out practicing pre season.
The honda guy is on a brand new XR500 and my mate is on a WR400.
Ripping down a straight firetrail flat out neck in neck the husky struggling and the honda rider smiling next to him ,then my mate snicks her into 6th and slips away.
Mate has a interesting, some say cruel sense of humor.

cruel is the new good

I saw an old dyno test on all the 1984 500 mx bikes and the Husqvarna 500CR put out just over 50 hp. Not the highest (Honda CR500 at 52hp) but rated the best powerband of the test group

you got that 50 hp as soon as the pilot jet came into play!

Latest slow progress:

Spark plug finally out!

it was pretty stuck, but I soaked grandad's very rusty 1/2"rachet in PBBlaster (gdad got old and kept leaving his tools out in the yard for the foxes to steal, but I nicked it before they could after he tipped over.)....the rachet, now working with the sparky socket, then a couple of taps on the end of it (1/2" breaker bar it is) and the voila!, plug unscrews like, 'oh, hello, you rang?

threads inside the head are all perfect!

Yay!

..................

Clutch reassembled:...haha, several times, I thought I need the practice, haha, so I assy'd it and took it apart a few times..best time, maybe a half hour
('aw gesuss, where did that spring clip go NOW!!!'
It works, may need better adjustment after use, counting on it.

Transmission shifts: a lot easier oncet I soaked the transmission in the oil,ATF and ran it thru the gears 10 times, on the stand, engine off of course, heh.
Then I drained the oil because I have to put her away for a few months., but it got a good soaking. NO leaks!

Clutch cover on: reused gasket, greased like grouty suggested...ta grouty! no leaks when I left the oil in for a few days..

NO SPARK!!!

..oh wait..no spark from both my olde carcase as well as my new old Husky.



Now that the dangnabbit plug is out I can give it some spin...and there still!!! is no spark!...and, hah, not likely considering the cracked Motoplat red plug wire and the sitting for 10 years and the sketchy splices..

I posted pictures earlier where I showed the spark plug lead had been shorting to the frame, and running long enough ('it was running when I shut it off 10 years ago'...P.O. friend)...so amazing, running long enough with that much shorting to melt the wire, and still, he says: 'it was running...'

Can I put a new plug wire on the red Motoplat coil?

or do I (and here's where my skilz at Bodgery come in, haha) splice a new wire right up near the coil?
I think it was potted/molded in place.

Do I cut the coil cover off and repot it after replacing the wire?

and really, why bother because:

NO SPARK AT ALL!...even with her finger on the plug 'I feel nothing' (she says)..'honey, can you just help me out here for a minute, hold this while I kick it over...'
(what are girlfriends for?....nah, I didn't do that, but I felt nothing when I held the plug, saw nothing...didn't try it with any electronic measurements.

And I was giving it my mighty kicks with the plug OUT so the speed was mighty

New cheap chinese coil like dukkman has linked to and suggested?

Motoplat Mini6 is down in the engine...with a sketchy looking taped splice above the flywheel case and again up under the tank. I haven't torn it apart, so I am assuming since 'it ran when I stopped it' it was at least functional at some last time..

Can I test the stator and coil unit independently for output before the coil wiring to isolate the problem?
I saw on a previous thread and in pdf's the testing values, so I suppose I should do that since I am not going to drive the engine or set up some mechanism to measure output

..but I know I will probably need a new coil..and doesn't the Motoplat Mini6 coil setup have the CDI in the coil chunk?
..and if I understand the setup dukkman was referring to, the cheap Chinese set also does, no advance curve, etc.
I do not have 300-600$ for a spiffy PVL/Electrowhiz setup, sniff.

How are the magnets in the flywheel tested and verified?
...and as Andy said a few years ago, his magnets were loose! and he fixed them.

Can the flywheel be tested and remagnetized, and who does it if anybody, as a service?

Should I ship the stator, coil, and flywheel to a specialist?

and who?

and how much?
and we are quickly back to new PVL/Eletrowhatsits prices for 30 year old electrics

questions, I gots the questions...