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.
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.
I’ve ordered another run of the 3mm offset clutch washers. Gonna have to charge for these as I gave away the last batch and it’s expensive to give away custom parts.I figure $35 for a set should cover my cost and postage in the US. I’ll have to figure out a payment scheme. Not gonna give them to a dealer to sell this time. Tried that last time and he just gave them away and everyone said what a great guy he was for giving them free parts. 😬
Ooooh the 2020 Factory has a light-switch clutch and a bit of delay when trying to release the clutch. Also the pull is heavy. I wanted to try before I modify and I'm not surprised. Needs the carbon reeds too as it's easier to stall. Let the fettling begin!
To be honest my 2018 has an old clutch pack. I just bought a 2020 factory that looks like it was never ridden so I’ll have to see what it looks like inside.
I should probably clarify I mean a hydraulic issue as in the clutch plates dragging around the gearbox oil like a torque converter. I know from experience the drag is much worse with colder or thicker fluid which would seem to prove the idea. Having just said that I'm wondering if there is some fluid flow trickery that could improve the situation? Hmmm, gotta think about that. I admit I've kinda moved on from the clutch thing believing Beta would have changed the design by now. Silly me.
There is less separation but I’m not sure the drag will be greatly affected as the drag seems to be a hydraulic issue rather than a partial contact issue. But I could be wrong. That’s how I learn. I’ve learned a lot.😁
S3 make a low compression head that tames the hit while keeping the grunt of displacement. Carbon reeds (I have Moto Tassinari VForce3 V351B with medium reeds) add to the bottom end and smooth the transition through the rev range. I can pull a gear higher with the carbon reeds.
I don’t know the material but my guess would be some kind of high density polyethelene. Did the box take an impact and break or just wear through? How big is the hole? Is it a flat surface or a shaped part? Pics would help. You could fiberglass it or buy sheet plastic from a place like ePlastics and JBWeld and rivet into place.
The carb model is a Keihin PWK-28. Jitsie and S3 make aluminum adjusters to replace the plastic screw that has no place on an otherwise excellent carb. For the S3 and Jitsie replacements for the carb and levers I find it helps to run them through a die to clean up their threads before installing them. If you don’t they bind. I think the anodizing after the screws are machined is a bit too thick.
S3 do make a blue head cover but that's just the water jacket. The actual compression is set by the insert and they only come in low (yellow) stock (silver) and high (red). You can see the color of the insert as the color of the metal ring the spark plug goes into. A 300 is rideable for a new rider but it can be a handful as in when it goes wrong it can go wrong very quickly. It is also more tiring than a smaller bike.
