Bonneville America Forums Forums Technical Forums General Tech Help with little bearing things in clutch cover

Tech Advice: inside the clutch cover are three bearings, or races. One where the shift lever passes and two surrounding the clutch actuation lever. I would like to know if these are actually needle bearings, or more like a type of bushing. In all three, I cannot see any actual bearings, but there is what appears to similar to the cage portion of a needle bearing. The actuator lever doesn't have any excess play that would give the impression anything is missing.

I could be very wrong but I thought they were just oil seals.

I am not aware of any bearings there.

Edit...I should have read more closely, as I was thinking only of the clutch cable actuation lever at the top of the case...

Yep.. needle bearings in there. Two on the clutch shaft and one on the shifter shaft. Reference Bike Bandit.

I ordered them. I had seen them listed on the schematic, but mine don't have any bearings in them. Looks like they came out when I put them in the dechroming tank.

Next question, of course, how to remove what's left of them???

Ah, wrong again. It's good to be wrong, now I've learned something.

I literally just went through this. You are going to need a blind hole bearing puller. It maybe worth while to take the cover to a mechanic to see if he can pull them. As blind hole bearing puller kits start at around $75 and up. The one that you are going to have problems with is the lower clutch actuator bearing. There is almost no access to it. I ended up having a guy in our polish department at work who has over 30+ years experience polishing, grinding, and cutting small precise parts under a magnifying glass cut the race out of that lower bearing after I pulled the cage and rollers out. I want to emphasize that pulling these bearings is a monumental pain in the a$$! I cannot think of any mechanical job that I have done that is as frustrating as pulling these bearings.

As an addendum I would caution others to try their best to avoid having to remove these bearings. If you have a clutch cover that you want powder coated make some wooden plugs for the bearings. I would then find a quality powder coat operation and specify to them that those holes need plugged and taped off and to try to avoid getting any media and powder in them. I have read that others on Triumphrat.net had success plugging them and powder coating the cover. That is the approach that I tried on the chrome cover for my 2001 Bonneville. Here is what I believe went wrong. After I pulled the engine covers the insides were obviously covered in oil. So in an attempt to remove the oil without having to do a bunch of work I filled my bath tub with Dawn dish washing liquid and water and threw all the parts in there for about 12 hours. After I removed them I noticed that the chrome had bubbled in a few spots on the clutch cover. I think sitting in there for so long moisture/water somehow worked its way in causing the chrome to separate. I then took my covers to the powder coater. As they were media blasting the clutch cover the chrome started to peel so I had to have the chrome stripped. I believe the chrome stripping process is what damaged the bearings. The other chrome covers that I had powder coated had no peeling and turned out great. It was just that dang clutch cover.

I didn't look, but is there a part number specific factory puller mentioned in the fat blue manual? At least in the old days, vehicle manuals occasionally showed a purchasable factory tool or even a drawing on how to fabricate the tool needed. For instance, I have the Triumph cam disassembly tool, you don't absolutely need it, but it does make the task straight forward and somewhat easier.

There are many kinds of blind hole bearing and bushing pullers. Here is one example. BLIND HOLE BEARING PULLER

Sheeeit, I've got a puller set like that, Proto I think, somewhere out in my shop. But for a once in a blue moon task, Harbor Freight rocks.