The Covid Norton ES2 Part two
TWO WEEKS LATER I WAS BACK IN the garage fitting a recently delivered set of clutch plates and associated springs from Norvil. Surprising, but this simple job turned out to be quite a slog. First problem was there appeared to be too many plates; that is, if I attempted to fit five fibre and five plain as per the manual’s instructions. Unfortunately, adding a fifth fibre plate prevented the clutch drum’s securing circlip to be fitted. So I had to make do with four, otherwise the clutch might fall apart! I could only assume that new fibre plates use a thicker material than their original counterparts, thus packing out the assembled clutch.
Second hassle was that the clutch lever arm inside the gearbox’s end cover refused to ‘adjust’. So I removed the lever (worm) mechanism for inspection. It was soon apparent that the clamping bolt had seized and was preventing the lever from actuating against the clutch pushrod. Once sorted, I then treated the clutch cable to a bath in light machine oil and ended up with a beautifully operating clutch!
I could now turn my attention to timing the ignition. The magneto points gap was checked at 12thou, then the piston set to 5/8ths BTC with both valves fully-closed (on the inlet stroke). The advance and retard lever is then set in the full advance position, with correct ‘ignition’ achieved by checking the (clockwise) rotating points are
