1980 Midnight Special Shifting Issues

I sorta stumbled into buying this bike the other day. It's a 1980 XS850 Midnight Special. 50 bucks, so I couldn't say no to the price. The problem with the bike is that it would not shift at all. So, I pulled the left cover off, removed the alternator, clutch, kickstart, and shift selector. In the bottom of the oil pan, lodged under the shift selector, I found the nut and thick washer the screws into the middle gear. I was able to put the screw back in and tighten it down. I can move the bike forward or backwards by turning the bolt with a wrench now, so I'm guessing it's not seized up. The next problem I noticed, is the shift drum for the forward part of the shift selector is turned almost 180 degrees from where it should be to line up with the mark on the shift selector for second gear. I'm not sure what gear the bike is stuck in, but it will not shift out. I should be able to shift gears on the bike using the shift selector with the clutch removed right? Anyhow, I cannot turn the shift drum no matter what tool or technique I try. I have not torn apart the transmission yet, but I will probably try to tackle that tomorrow. I just wanted to see if anyone had any suggestions for what I might try first. I am also wondering if anyone has an idea of why I am not able to rotate the shift drum, and why it is nowhere near the correct position. Thanks in advance for any advice, I really appreciate it.

 

My guess is that you have arrived at this Party a few minutes too late.

From the way you found it and the condition it's in at the moment ... I'd guess someone has already tried to do something with the Transmission.
Gave up.
Put all the parts back IN ... but, not necessarily in the right order.

You have the Shift Drum "180-Out" ... and two Gears needing too move to places that they can't.
The Forks are likely to be found in the wrong position on the Drum.

One wanting to shift everything to the Left.
The other end wanting to shift everything to the Right.

I just hope that when you get in there and lay-out the whole Transmission right; you don't find that there's something missing!

 

Someone has definitely been in there before me. The bolt holding the middle gear in place was not the original allen head. It has been replaced by a 13 mm hex head bolt. I don't know the length of the original bolt, but the one that I pulled out of the bottom of the pan didn't seem to be longer than the threads going into the middle gear. The guy who sold me the bike said he had ridden it for about a year, but the title has only been in his name for a year, so that's obviously not true. I'll have to tear into it and see what I can figure out with the transmission tomorrow. Hopefully the local motorcycle scrap yard will have one or two of these bikes in the yard. Any ideas where to get parts for these? Hopefully Chacal can get them, he's always so quick with deliveries and has everything I've needed for my other bike in stock when I needed it. I mostly bought this bike to learn how to tear the whole thing down on, so this is exactly the type of thing I'm looking forward to. It's nice to have one bike to ride, and another to work on. It really takes the annoying edge off when you aren't trying to get it to run properly to get to work or around town.

 

The only thing worse than following an incompetent mechanic is following an incompetent mechanic who was fond of improper fastener substitution. You might wanna invest in a cheap metric tap set, you may have some "thread chasing" (cleanup) to do...

 

I got the transmission and shift selector all sorted out. I put the bike back together today and cleaned the carbs out. The day I got the bike it started right up and ran just fine. Now the bike won't start at all, so it looks like some more troubleshooting is in store for tomorrow. I put new handlebars, new turn signals, and a new rear tire on it today as well. It's a fun project bike. Much less frustrating for me than working on my Seca for some reason. I'm ready to bang my head into a wall with that XJ, lol.

 

Well, I've got fuel, spark, and air. Wet compression is just over 150psi on all three cylinders. I'd think the bike would start. The only multimeters I have have access to are the "needle" type and not the "clamp that surrounds the wire" type. I'd like to test the coils, but I'm not exactly sure what to check on them. I know they are giving spark, maybe just not enough. The battery has been charged a few times now, but I manage to kill it pretty quickly. I've been hooking up a jump box to it when trying to start it lately tho, so I'm pretty sure it's not a battery issue. i also checked all the fuses, which were fine. I'll be upgrading the fuse box to blade style quite soon. My plugs were thick and sooty when I pulled them out, so I put in new clean ones. I'm pretty sure the inside of my cylinders are pretty dirty. I'll clean those out when I do a top half rebuild over the winter. I don't know how it started and ran just fine after sitting for a year the day I bought it, but won't even spit or sputter now.

 

I bet your plugs are fouled

 

Put the Bike in Neutral.

UnPlug the Safety Circuit Relay.
Use a bit of Starting Fluid
See if she'll fire with the Relay unplugged.

 

I'll do that tomorrow while I'm at work. Hopefully that will do it.