Oiless Primary Chaincase?

Dick Hobart · Post by **Dick Hobart** » Wed Apr 02, 2008 8:46 am

Possibly - but scramblers and road racers have always done it.

jim501 · Post by **jim501** » Wed Apr 02, 2008 6:44 pm

No oil and the cork inserts shrink and will burn if abused. It's designed to have oil flying round it so that's what you do.

cheers
jim

TommoT · Post by **TommoT** » Thu Apr 03, 2008 9:41 am

You can go dry if you want but at least the following issues must be addressed:

1. Chain lube: the closed chaincase will cause the chain to run very hot. Lubricant will be sweated off, chain will overheat and selfdestruct.
2. Oil mist from the chain dipping into the oil pool lubricates other moving parts, one being the clutch. Lube finds it's way into the clutch roller bearing and actuating parts. These parts will suffer.
3. If you have the spring/cam shock absorber it will suffer from the lack of oil mist.

I am not sure how the friction plates will react, but certainly the original cork material will easily overheat.

To sum up, above issues and possibly a few more must be adressed to successfully run a dry primary chaincase. Whether this is worth the effort is up to you, but as others have said it will not solve the problem at hand, clutch slip. Edited by - TommoT on 03 Apr 2008 08:44:18 AM

mgatherer · Post by **mgatherer** » Thu Apr 03, 2008 11:43 am

I have got the message. I have measured the spings, they ar ewithin 'working' tolerance but I have tightenend them a little. Will go to Kettering and buy new gasket on Saturday. No one onjects to ATF instead of oil?

GSAX1 · Post by **GSAX1** » Thu Apr 03, 2008 11:58 am

There is an interesting discussion about primary oil here:

http://www.britbike.com/ubb/noncgi/ulti ... 07334.html

Michael

itma · Post by **itma** » Thu Apr 03, 2008 2:40 pm

nothing wrong with ATF, its what my LDV manual gearbox runs in.

56G80S · Post by **56G80S** » Sun Apr 06, 2008 12:30 am

I've gone back to the " put engine oil into the chaincase" approach, which I think is as per the manual. My diversion into ATF led to the stuf going everywhere. Admittedly, I also get oil everywhere, particularly out of the engine itself. Next winter I will fix the cylinder base, but I'm not stripping it down while this nice warm weather's ''here. With engine oil in the chaincase it all emerges much more slowly. It's worked for me all this time, but I didn't want to be stuck in a rut, hence tried the ATF.

Johnny B

lawrence · Post by **lawrence** » Sun Apr 06, 2008 8:00 am

Hi John
If it is splashing out that badly do you have the sliding guard fitted in the rear of the chaincase that the gearbox mainshaft passes through.

the first AMC bike I rebuilt didn't have one and boy did it splash oil out through the gap. My twin has one and is much more civilised, in that area anyway I run it with ATF in the chaincase. It's about the only part of the bike that doesn't leak Edited by - lawrence on 06 Apr 2008 07:03:23 AM

Biscuit · Post by **Biscuit** » Sun Apr 06, 2008 12:11 pm

Lawrence - '56 - steel chaincase - no sliding guard

I enjoyed that!

lawrence · Post by **lawrence** » Sun Apr 06, 2008 6:16 pm

Stupid tin chaincases