dan williams

2021 should be significantly better.

‘93 Beta Gara. White rear with grey front. Orange fender is probably off a ‘96. 80:1 is fine with synthetic oil. Gearbox oil is not super critical as people run everything from gearbox oil to ATF to 10W30 motor oil without a problem. Clutch might be sticky when cold. Fix is noted above. Mikuni may piddle fuel. Fix is noted above. Don’t be too obsessed about oils. It’s an old bike. Take it out and have fun.😁

Probably the same place as my Color Computer and Amiga.😃

I remember working on the clutch in my ‘77 AW400 and it was miserable. My buddy used to work on his by jacking up his truck, sliding the bike under, and lowering the truck using the frame to compress the clutch pack. 😁 There is a difference I think with the Maico disc springs vs the diaphragm. With the stacked discs the spring rate is unaffected by the radial stress on the center of the hole in the disc. On the diaphragm spring compressing the spring should reduce the size of the center hole. Since there is a ring preventing that compression the compression in line with the fingers provides another torsion. I think that’s how the reduction in rate occurs as the diaphragm passes through flat. I never said the diaphragm clutch was new. Just that I never saw it explained in a way that made sense to me. I’m still learning.

Hi Billy, Yeah opening up the cockpit was what I had in mind. Haven’t moved footpegs. It’s a thought but just haven’t got that far into it. Moving the bars was cheap and easy to start with. I remember Ryan used to sell platform pegs that I liked because it forced me to foot back further but I haven’t seen them for many years. But you know me. I do enjoy tinkering.

Rode some today with the clamps forward and it felt pretty good. Took a little while to get the turning recalibrated.👍

Ok probably an odd question but… There’s three offset positions for the factory bar clamps. Mine have been set in the middle but I’m finding my weight is getting too far forward. Rolling the stock bars forward helps (yes it’s counter intuitive) but the sweep of the bars puts my wrists in a slightly strained position. Do any of you use the forward offset position and if so how do you like it?

I was thinking that bike looked familiar. Then I noticed I managed to sneak into the background of some of your photos.😁 Thanks to you and Warren there's some serious drooling over metal work going on at events now.

Makes the bike grunt. I swear it'll pull a gear higher in any situation and stalls very rarely even crawling. The logic is the reeds weigh less so they have less inertia and can open and close faster storing more charge in the crankcase at low rpm. At higher rpm reeds of any type will just stay open so there is no difference in the engine assuming there is no significant difference in the reed cage and how it affects airflow.

I admit the graphs are exaggerated but I think this analysis gets to the core of the thing. I'll have to do more research and do some math on actual diaphragm springs and friction coefficients to see if I can refine the description. But like always, I could be barking mad and have no idea what I'm talking about. Certainly wouldn't be the first time. Probably won't be the last either. But isn't it fun that life is full of mysteries to figure out. 😁

OK so I got to thinking again. Dangerous I know but I'm bored with circuit theory at the moment so I figured I'd try to understand what the big whoop is with a diaphragm clutch since I haven't seen anyone explain the difference. This is my take on it. Feel free to shoot it full of holes and call me an idiot. The diaphragm clutch.pdf

I've had several EVO 300s but just bought a low mile 2020 Factory 300 that I've been taming or at least trying to tame. There is definately something to the Factory engine that is different. Looking at the parts lists the standard and Factory have the same cylinder and piston but a different ignition module so more aggressive timing I would guess. On my 2020 I've added Moto Tassinari carbon reeds V351B block with 3P412M reed petals, S3 long header pipe, S3 low compression head, clutch mod and gear shifter mod and 9 tooth countershaft sprocket. It's just now getting to where I want it but every once in a while it remembers it's a Factory and tries to kill me.😁

And knowledgable. About what I’m not sure but speaking with that much confidence is surly a sign of expertise.😁 Yes it looks like a typo, but is it really?🤔

Seller is delusional. Stay away from this one.

Welcome to the family.

Wow that's pretty.

I'm inclined to think the Hipple part is the way to go. George's stuff looks well thought out and well made. As to the matter of more drag as the clutch plates have less maximum separation with less clutch throw I don't think that will be a big deal if the washers that take up the slack in the mechanism are adjusted properly.

Trialman is most likely correct. It's common for bikes to shear the woodruff key if the engine has a sudden stop. Especially if the flywheel nut isn't properly tightened as the flywheel is an interference fit to the crankshaft. The woodruff key is just for alignment. It is possible to have a bad stator as well and still have spark. What usually goes out of these older stators is the trigger coil that tells the CDI where to fire. If the trigger signal is weak the CDI could be firing in the wrong location so you have spark but in the wrong part of the cycle.

Carb is probably due for a disassemble and cleaning. The Keihin can get water trapped in the bleed passages for the pilot system that can make it feel soft off the bottom. Is this a new behavior or something it's always done? Also as the weather changed you can expect the jetting to shift slightly with air density.

Now THAT’s funny!😀

Last Sunday was the shakedown for the new to me 2020 EVO factory. Popped out of gear several times just tooling around and once on a slab entrance in a section. Just put my cam and indexer in. Couple of interesting finds though. The factory cam now has pointy lobes and they put a spacer in to offset the indexer to better align with the cam just like my design. Beta still uses the worst bearing though and the neutral detent is still pretty shallow. Not my problem anymore.

On the 2018 I added two teeth to the rear and liked it very much. 10/44 I think but I’ll have to look. The 2020 is still stock. Messing up my already dodgy timing but I’ll try to get used to it. I might go for the lower gearing later.

Fettling done for now. Six thin (2.7mm) plates with the fix, 3mm offset washers and blasted the steels with fine aluminum oxide. Tried the bike and had massive clutch slip. Reduced the spacer washers on the throwout bearing about half a mm and all is well. Behaves pretty much like every other clutch I’ve done the fix to.

Yeah bolts are cheap.😁

Possible but postage is around $30