A buddy and I are working on my 73 CB500. It starts great. Engine is fine. The clutch has been giving us trouble. It was very tight and there was not much adjustment room. If I adjusted a little too much the bike would no longer start, adjust it back a bit and it would start right up. We unscrewed the adjuster piece #6 to see if we could adjust the clutch adjuster #5 and we pulled the bolt out entirely and the adjuster piece fell to the bottom of the case. We then cracked the case and got new bolts (long process with easy out and a manual impact wrench. (all the screws were stripped badly)
We replaced the clutch cable and I cleaned out the Left Crank case and all the parts inside. I ordered a new ball bearing and made sure I put that inside the Clutch lifter and I greased it up. When we put the case back on and just hold it on with out hands the clutch engages, the bike will start and we can shift gears after adjusting the clutch cable a bit. The clutch lever pull is fine, similar to his 1978 cb750. When we start to bolt the crackcase on the clutch starts to get very hard to pull. Once we get the case completely on the clutch gets harder to pull every time you pull it. It then gets to the point where you can barely move it. The bike will still start, and you can shift gears but the clutch lever is very hard to move. The more your bolt it on the harder it gets to pull, once it is completely bolted on every pull gets progressively harder.
I was hoping someone had an idea what was going on. The clutch lifter rod looks ok , I can pull it out very easily, it moves back and forth freely, I think that is good?
Before we took the case of we tried to adjust the clutch and unscrewed the adjuster piece completely by mistake. We have put it back on but it not very tightly. Could this be a factor? I am not sure how the adjuster piece works or its purpose. I have not opened the right side crankcase yet to mess with the clutch parts. I was looking for some guidance before doing that. I can take some pictures if you think that would be useful.
Not sure what to do next but I really want to get it on the road.
Thanks
