What Causes a Motorcycle Gear to Get Stuck and Unable to Shift?
2 Answers
Motorcycle gear getting stuck and unable to shift can be caused by the following reasons: Clutch failure in the motorcycle: Requires forceful stepping; the clutch pedal feels soft, as if stepping on air, and needs to be pressed repeatedly. Break-in period: For new motorcycles, the transmission sleeve and gears need a break-in period, which may cause slight stiffness; if the manual clutch is not fully engaged, the gears on the primary shaft of the transmission are rotating at high speed and cannot mesh with the internal teeth of the sleeve; severe wear on the transmission gears or internal teeth of the sleeve can make shifting difficult. Composition: The automatic centrifugal clutch controls the engagement and disengagement of the clutch based on the engine speed. The clutch consists of driving, driven, and engagement mechanisms. The driving part includes the clutch cover, thrust plate, and clutch plates. The driven part includes friction plates and the center sleeve.
I've been repairing motorcycles for over a decade, and these are the most common situations when gears get stuck: Feel the gear shift lever - if it's completely immovable, there's an 80% chance the shift drum fork is broken; if it can still move but won't engage, the shift star wheel teeth might be damaged. Last time a fellow rider had this issue after washing his bike - upon disassembly, we found a completely rusted shift drum jamming the fork. The most troublesome cases are old bikes with insufficient oil causing gear sintering and adhesion, requiring complete engine disassembly for overhaul. In emergencies, you can rock the bike back and forth to release gear engagement points, but never forcefully kick the gear lever - last year someone bent their shift drum doing that and had to spend an extra 2,000 yuan.
