The BSA A7-A10 Forum

Technical (Descriptive Topic Titles - Stay on Topic) => Gearbox, Clutch, Primary => Topic started by: Viking on 25.08. 2015 12:04

Title: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: Viking on 25.08. 2015 12:04

The gearbox on MY A10 SR/RGS 1958 works in general quit well. It is oil tight and with no sounds or problems, except, one issue:

In accelerating hard, it can jump out of 3rd gear and find neutral between 3rd and 4th gear.

Not ideal when overtaking a car etc.
If I only give it ½ throttle, it is ok. But working hard in 3rd gear results in jumping out of gear.

The gearbox was first rebuild in Laceby Lincolnshire in 1995 and later by SRM in 1998/1999
It worked with a side car for 15 years. Heavy load., and the issue of jumping out of 3rd I getting more and more often.

The cam plunger housing is adjusted to “1 ½ threat”

Cam plate, plunger and plunger housing, spring, bearings, all new bush bearings, seals etc. was renewed doing rebuild.
What can cause the issue of jumping out of 3rd gear ?
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: beezermacc on 25.08. 2015 13:47
This is usually because the dogs on the sides of the gears are becoming rounded. The pressure on the gears forces them apart. The dogs are usually cut square so that the pressure cannot force them apart. Lots of gearchanges over the years causes the corners of the dogs to become worn away so the dogs get rounded and are no longer lying flat against each other so the rounded edges are no longer capable of withstanding lateral thrust forcing them apart. You will have to strip the gearbox, identify and replace the worn gears. At the same time make sure there is no endfloat in the shafts which can also contribute to this problem, but, from what you describe, the dogs are already worn. Sidecar work won't have helped!
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: Viking on 25.08. 2015 14:31
It sounds like a compleate rebuild job for the winter....

I can imagine that fresh / new gears are not that easy to get hold of..

It is a STD box.

Hmm. sound like I well send it to SRM in Wales. 
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: Viking on 22.02. 2016 07:31
A little update.

Gear box is removed from the frame, washes and cleaned with Swarfega Jizer and ready to ship to SRM Wales.
Getting fresh gears, is not the most easy thing in this world.

Getting a 5 speed box is extreme expensive (Would be nice, but it is the same price as a 1/3 of the bikes value !)  *eek*

http://www.novaracing.com/ProductBSAGoldStar.html
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: Beeza on 22.02. 2016 10:09
Hi Viking, as a temp fix I have used a slightly heavier spring in the plunger detent unit. You will have to use the thumb and finger pressure tester to compare tensions, and it should get you by for a while, but a worn gear set is a worn gear set. Also the play between gears and shafts combined with worn dogs will add to gears jumping out. I have swapped 3rd gear sets (it's always 3rd) with varying success. Sometimes they don't jump out of gear any more but HELLO 3rd gear whine. Good luck, and after a few goes the gear box is quite a simple unit.
Always wondered why no one brought out a nice bottle of red named "BSA 3rd GEAR WINE".

Cheers Thomas
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: Viking on 23.02. 2016 06:58
 "BSA 3rd GEAR WINE".     *smile*  good one...

I´m really tempted to swap the internals to 5 speed parts.

The one thing stopping it is a hefty price tag of 1675£+VAT  uhhh   

But new 3rd gears, bushes, fresh main shaft and sims should cure the matter
For the next 20-30 years.   
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: duTch on 23.02. 2016 09:36

 My Plunger Flash/Rocket jumps out of third under 'extreme' load, and I've been meaning to shed my theory... in addition to previously mentioned worn dogs/shafts, it's also worth considering the play in the selectors themselves, and more likely , the fact that as far as I can determine, when in second or third gear the selector fork 'roller' is held in place on a very small surface area on the lobes on the camplate , and if that/they is/are worn, or there is a maladjustment in the scheme of things, it's extremely possible it'll jump...as per pic
 I hope that makes sense... *conf*




Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: Viking on 24.02. 2016 13:47
Nice Picture, Worth investigating

The box has not been used a lot. Approx. 5-8000 miles.
Cam plate, bearings, bushes, spring/plunger/holder, to forks changes, but not pinions.
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: nimrod650 on 25.02. 2016 18:50
owens uk have gearbox complete with sprocket as it came out of the bike £180??
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: BSA_54A10 on 26.02. 2016 11:29
Find some one who actually works on motorcycle gears and get your dogs & gears undercut
I had this done to an A 65 many years ago and it works a treat.
Modern riceburners use this technique as do most race boxes.
Being slightly undercut  the doges "dovetail" into the gear so the more pressure put on them the harder they lock together.
The gear change becomes a lot more stiff and a lot more posative and well worht the $ 120 I paid to have it done.
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: duTch on 03.03. 2016 12:34


Quote
"BSA 3rd GEAR WINE".
; yep I agree, go tune the local Whinoery... *beer*

..anyways,
 For what it's worth, the other day I pulled the guts out of the box I'm running to replace a kick-return spring and investigate other stuff that will eventually surface elsewhere, and as it turns out my camplate is as good as or better than I'd expected, so I think I've blown my theory (
Quote
.....when in second or third gear the selector fork 'roller' is held in place on a very small surface area on the lobes on the camplate , and if that/they is/are worn, or there is a maladjustment in the scheme of things.....
) up the $hitter...

 but I've I think confirmed as I've suspected that it's an early box, and some of the dogs are a bit different too, but while a bit worn, don't seem to be too bad, so now it's research time, but for now 'vocational pleasure' is interfering with my life....

 Trev, I thought of this, as the Gutzzi has this, but I can't figure how it can be done to (some/our)Beeza gears due to the dog configuraton....
 
Quote
Find some one who actually works on motorcycle gears and get your dogs & gears undercut
I had this done to an A 65 many years ago and it works a treat.
Modern riceburners use this technique as do most race boxes.
Being slightly undercut  the doges "dovetail" into the gear so the more pressure put on them the harder they lock together.
The gear change becomes a lot more stiff and a lot more posative and well worht the $ 120 I paid to have it done.
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: BSA_54A10 on 05.03. 2016 11:33
With a small diameter dove tail cutter on a mill.
Mine were done by Balmain Motorcycles but unfortunately Bob's shop got compulsorly acquired for the never to be built political bull dust diverson called the West Sydney Metro, so he called it quits and retired. Got stiffed big time by the then Labour government and the site has since ben sold for 8 times what he got for a housing deveopement, Smells real funny.
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: Butch (cb) on 07.03. 2016 17:50
Find some one who actually works on motorcycle gears and get your dogs & gears undercut
I had this done to an A 65 many years ago and it works a treat.
Modern riceburners use this technique as do most race boxes.
Being slightly undercut  the doges "dovetail" into the gear so the more pressure put on them the harder they lock together.
The gear change becomes a lot more stiff and a lot more posative and well worht the $ 120 I paid to have it done.

So can you take your old gears with worn dogs out of the box and turn them down and bung them back in with some 'undercut'? As in obviously they will now be smaller, but presumably work OK? Could I do this on a lathe? (as in is it latheable, rather than do I have the skills required - ahem)
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: chaterlea25 on 07.03. 2016 20:49
Hi,
Quote
So can you take your old gears with worn dogs out of the box and turn them down and bung them back in with some 'undercut'? As in obviously they will now be smaller, but presumably work OK? Could I do this on a lathe? (as in is it latheable, rather than do I have the skills required - ahem)

In a word, No!!
John
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: duTch on 07.03. 2016 22:17

 I think under-cutting these gears is a wee intricate, especially the early ones, maybe left for later *work*....

Quote
.... as a temp fix I have used a slightly heavier spring in the plunger detent unit. ....

 Is there any info on the standard free length of the original spring? My housing is wound almost full in (-1/2 turn), so I'm thinking the spring has sagged, I'll compare it and use the best.

 Mine jumps only sometimes, gears aren't perfect but not too bad.
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: BSA_54A10 on 08.03. 2016 10:23
So can you take your old gears with worn dogs out of the box and turn them down and bung them back in with some 'undercut'? As in obviously they will now be smaller, but presumably work OK? Could I do this on a lathe? (as in is it latheable, rather than do I have the skills required - ahem)

Firstly the gears & dogs are cased so it is not a job for the ametur.
next the undercut needs to be strait sided so you could only do it in a lathe with the tool mounted in the chuck and job fed in.
Relatively strait foreward on a mill with indexing table but a bit tricky with the dog mounted on the cross slide.
I have no idea how the undercut was done to the gear and Bob was not inclined to show me.
As he was a worls acknowledged Honda 4 expert ( Honda Japan sent their brightest mechanics to do 6 months under Bob ) and was doing this as a favour to me I was not about to push my luck as I have several other boxes I wanted done, but he got shafted intoretirement so they never happened.
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: duTch on 08.03. 2016 14:39

 The longest detent spring I have is 2.605" (2.549" with light caliper friction preload), so I've used it, may or may not make a difference.
  That's only about .070" longer than the ~4.480"/2.525" spring I've been using. For the record, all springs are 0.038 wire by~0.315" dia. which appears to be metric specs. (1mm x 8mm)

 *idea* To determine how much engagement I have in third gear, I put the mainshaft with its two sliding gears and selector fork in place in the sleeve gear and in situ, and measured the sliding gear float best I could (between sel. fork cheeks) @ ~ 0.034".
 I also calculated that when the mainshaft is pulled snug to the bearing in inner case, is a difference of ~0.045" from being hard up against the sleeve gear. This added together gives 0.079" less possible engagement (~2mm).
 I forgot to measure how much the third sliding gear (E) engages with gear (G), will check in the morning if not working.

Question;- to reduce all this slop and reduced meshing, I wonder if adding a shim between the sliding gears, and between (G) and bearing would have any ill effect, other than moving the clutch out some...?

 Hope that makes sense, I had planned on doing a drawing, but.....maybe later



Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: bikerboy on 15.06. 2016 17:43
I had both 3rd gear whine and jumping out of gear.

I replaced two bushes (constant gear mesh it says in manual) 67-3073 and 67-3080. Once the gearbox was out it only took just over an hour and cured both problems. One needed drilling which was a p.i.t.a and they both needed reaming but it was not a difficult job.

Better than paying SRM prices anyway :)
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: duTch on 24.06. 2016 09:23

 I determined that my box is an earlier version (pre '50?), the dogs being different so I swapped out some gears -probably most of the cluster in fact, and it's working fine but still whining. I renewed the bushes three years ago.
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: Viking on 07.07. 2017 11:07
Update:
The gearbox was send to SRM for an complete overhaul.

Returned in June 2016.

Worked with by Moto Guzzi 1000 ccm for long distance cruising, so the BSA was not in use before late 2016.

Summer came late to Denmark this year and I am back on the BSA again.

More precise, more tight and no jumping out of gears…..

The following work was carried out:

M/shaft ground u/size sleeve gear bush fitted & honed,. Lay shaft ground 3. undersize bushes fitted and honed
New bearings, oil seals and bushes. Kickstarter ratchet changed, new push rod, etc.


“Stirling job”  , Wow the gearbox is working like clockwork now.
I recommend SRM for engineering jobs.
(The engine has the SRM bearing conversion done in 1995. Still works like at treat…..)
Title: Re: A10 SR/RGS Jumps out of 3rd gear
Post by: duTch on 07.07. 2017 14:31

 I love my Gutzzi and I love My Bettza- but which do I loveda most ???