Clutch plate resurrection possible?

[joeyhaupt]

Hi,

I am new to clutches and need some advice. Can I resurrect some
clutch plates from a Honda 160 that have a decent amount of wear left
in them which came out of a motor that was very old and had super
sticky oil residue inside? Some of clutch plates were kinda stuck
together onaccountabecause of the thick, sticky oil and all. I began
by separating them and soaking them in kerosene.

Also, what can I safely use on the metal clutch plates aside from
kerosene? Got any advice on anything mildly abrasive?

Thanks,

JoeyHaupt

[jds-MothSteward]

I would avoid using any abrasive material on the clutch plates (the steels, or the frictions).  The last thing you want is to have abrasive material floating around in there loose.  Bad karma.

When I cleaned out the carb of my CL100 I used Ethyl Acetate (EA) and an ultrasonic cleaner.  I tested MEK and EA, and possibly some other solvents on the orange gunk I scraped from the float bowl to find the best candidate. 

Other aggressive solvents you can use include Brake Cleaner, and/or Carb Cleaner.  Essentially various fast drying small molecule solvents that are really good for cleaning gunk. The chlorinated ones are particularly nasty in the atmosphere, but do the job very well.  Spray sparingly, scrub with a nylon bristle brush (toothbrushes are great).

Joe, I have an old 1970 CL100 clutch basket I bought from Ebay.  Let me know if this can be of any help for your cause.

CL-100 John

[RickL]

Joey, I worked at the Borg-Warner plant in Bellwood Il. It is the largest
producer of friction plates for automatic transmissions. AutoTrans cluch plates
are very like motorcycle friction discs. Here is what I learned from working
with 100 engineers there:

First clean the plates. Soak them in mild solvent, like mineral spirits,
kerosene is fine too.

If the steel plates are dirty clean them with scotch brite. You can also bead
blast them. Clean then REAL well to remove all blasting media.

Next measure the thickness of the friction plates. If they are below the wear
limit they still might work. If the surface of the friction material is glazed
you can rough it up with a file. Don't use anything abrasive like sand paper or
god forbid the 'rub them on the sidewalk' trick. What ever you use will get
imbedded in the material and then it will go swimming in your motor. So get a
nice long wood file and put the plate on something flat and gently run the file
over them.

FWIW, new plates for the 160s sometimes are cheap.

HTH
Rick

Hi,

Thanks,

JoeyHaupt

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[joec...@aol.com]

Hi Rick,

 

Not wanting to get too agressive, I have them soaking in kerosene and used only a kerosene soaked shop towel on the steel plates so far. 

Thanks for the tips.  Yes, I know they're cheap.  I have to avoid spending any more $ since the BUILD bike tapped into the fund for extra motorcycles - the one whose balance is always $0.  The clutch plates are for my current primary 160 racer, and I gotta tap into parts from salvage engines rather than buy.

 

Joey

[joec...@aol.com]

Thanks John,

 

I will try the Scotchbrite and brake cleaner.  Great ideas.

 

JoeyHaupt

[hond...@comcast.net]

A couple of things to add, any signs of heat or bluing and I would replace them. Also check the pressure plate and inner basket where the plates ride for wear. Too much wear and the inner and pressure plate can bottom out on each other before clamping on the plates.

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