Hi Guys,

I have a question. I picked up a 72 Cota 123 this past summer for my wife; she loves everything about the bike except the shifting. Trying to get it into 2^nd or 3^rd takes multiple attempts and each time I change the oil, it looks like I struck gold, lots and lots of shiny flecks of metal mixed with the oil. So I figured with winter here I would tear it down and go through it. I suspect over the next few months I will have lots of questions. And my first is; what is the correct way to split the cases on this engine? I don’t want to just open in up and have everything spill out, I know on other bikes I have worked on you should keep one side stationary and lift off the other, to keep the gears and shafts intact. So with this bike do I keep the mag side stationary and lift off the clutch side or keep the clutch side stationary and lift off the mag side?

Thanks,

Kevin Donovan

Foster, RI USA

Clutch oil or gear oil bad ?

Most of the shifting mechanism can be had by just the clutch cover.

Split the cases a few times on my 123 in the 70's but don't remember having to remove one half and leave the other stationary. If you do split the cases though I would recommend replacing all of the circlips on the gear shafts as I had a similar problem. These gearboxes (I was told at the time) were notoriously brittle, however once I changed the circlips no more selection problems or trouble at all.

also bear in mind there is a wrong and right way round for circlips you may need a magnyfying glass to work this out ,gettint it wrong will cause them to pop off

I must have been a very lucky 14 year old. I hadn't been told that one!

nor has plenty 50plus yr olds