Leave Cali day 30

I kept making notes to myself at work, to focus myself on what had to get done in order to move in Florida. I hoped to list the house in July, which meant moving the contents to Florida six months before I quit my job and moved myself there too. It's already late May.

So this day I saw I had three big items. I now have three motorcycles to fix, since the shifter stopped working on this bike. Another bike was the 1977 Sportster, which needed a new transmission bearing race pressed into the case. The third bike was my 1979 Sportster, which needed a top-end rebuild. The real estate agent wanted me to ship the broken bikes to Florida so he could get his commission sooner. The other tasks were to keep transcribing all my audio tape into the computer using my Fireface 800. Then I had to take down all the plywood and foam boards I had put up over every window to keep the noise down from the strip club across the street.

I leaned the bike over on a milk crate at the rear shock. I would not have to drain the tranny.

I makes things underneath easier to get to as well.

At least the '96 still had a few English fasteners, though I hate Allen wrenches.

First off is the foot peg.

Then the bolt comes out of the shifter lever.

Then get the primary bolts. The watch and Oxford shirt tells me I was still in my work clothes, I was too pressed for time to even change clothes.

A 3/16 Allen does the job.

This puller is meant for those old battery post terminals, but it works great on a lot of other stuff, like stuck-on shifter levers.

I've got a bin ready for the parts, and I have that Torx bit set ready to go.

I clean the shaft off to get less dirt into the primary cover. This has to be a quick fix.

This is the tensioner nut and bolt for the primary chain. Back it way out.

A Torx T27 for the derby cover. I hate Torx even more than Allen heads.

The clutch mechanism is revealed. It is a really nice pressed-metal piece, not like an Iron Sport.

Back out the screw and that lets the captivated nut come out of the mechanism.

Now you can get the nut out of the pocket that captivates it.

The mechanism flops out, pivoting around the clutch cable.

Duh, I could have taken the primary off without removing the clutch mechanism. Read the book

I use a mirror to peak behind the clutch basket. I could see the plate that provided detents for the shifter had slipped off, and that meant the bike could no longer shift. I think it was stuck in 3rd or 4th. Being a high-torque Harley, I managed to limp it to work the rest of the way, and to limp it home after. It was only 7 miles or so.

Big mistake, I thought I had to take the clutch apart to get behind the basket. Not on a 1996. I waited five days for a clutch compressor tool. when I could have just used an impact to take off the engine sprocket nut, and the whole primary slips out without the taking the clutch apart.

This is how being in a hurry wastes time,. If I had read the service manual I would have known I could have kept the clutch together. It was a huge mistake that cost me the price of the compressor tool, but worse yet, took five more days delay.

I was able to sell the tool on eBay for nearly what I paid. I can't remember if I also saw the shifter part that I needed, but I do remember going to the Harley dealer in San Jose to pick it up. It was a 5-dollar part with a 10-cent clip that popped off. This might have been because I dropped the bike on 101 at 60 mph. Ouch.