Remove Front Forks

Pretty straight forward - just remove the front wheel, take the nut off the neck, take the cap nuts off the tubes and remove the top triple tree bracket. Disconnect the brake, clutch and throttle cables. Now the fork bearing shaft can be lowered out of the neck.

Notice the strap holding the bike on the stand. It's so heavy in the front that I can't get the front wheel off the ground unless it's strapped down in the rear.

Remove Rear Drum

Disconnect the brake linkage, remove the chain guard, find the master link on the chain and remove the chain. The drum will come off the brake shoes now. Then remove the brake backing plate with shoes.

After removing the drum I discovered that most of the rivets holding the rear sprocket on the drum were missing and the remaining ones were loose. (One more thing to fix.)

Jam Front Sprocket

In order to remove the compensating sprocket from the engine you need to keep the engine from turning over while you apply lots of torque to the nut. The nut turns counter-clockwise to loosen.

My research on the web revealed that I needed to make a "Jam Tool" that fits between the teeth on the engine sprocket and the teeth on the clutch hub sprocket. You can see it here in this shot. My first attempt to loosen the compensator resulted in bending the jam tool. I guess it should be made of 1/4" stock instead of the 3/16" stock I used. So I also jammed a piece of oak flooring in between the compensator sprocket teeth and the primary chain.

You can see in this shot here that the compensating sprocket assy has been removed.

Remove Compensator

This shot shows the four foot pipe that I used to remove the compensating sprocket nut.

Remove Clutch Adj. Nut

It's the nut right in the center of the clutch. Actually, it is called the push rod adjusting- screw nut. It's a standard thread (counter-clockwise to remove). Nothing will fly apart as long as you don't remove the three spring pressure adjusting nuts (clutch drive hub stud nuts).

Compress Clutch Springs

Now use a 2" dia washer with a 3/8" hole in the center as shown in this picture and put the push rod adjusting screw nut back on. Tighten it down until the springs are compressed enough to relieve the pressure on the three outer adjusting nuts. These three nuts can now be removed.

Remove Pressure Plate

With the three drive hub stud nuts removed you can remove the entire pressure plate assy. Now you can remove the clutch pack.

Remove Hub Nut

We need to keep the hub from turning as the clutch hub lock nut is removed. This nut is 1-3/16" and turns clockwise to remove it. I used a piece of 2x6 with a hole big enough for the socket to fit thru and 10 holes for the clutch hub drive studs. The 2x6 keeps the hub from turning while the hub lock nut is loosened.

Remove Clutch Hub

A special puller is required to remove the clutch hub. I have already removed the lock nut but the hub is keyed to a tapered shaft on the transmission. Because there are 10 hub drive studs and only three of them are longer with nuts on them for adjusting the pressure plate, it's obvious that the pattern is not symmetrical which is why you can't use a standard puller.

I made this one from an aluminum disk 4" dia. x 3/4" thick and a piece of 1/2" threaded rod - it did the job.

Remove Inner Primary Cover

Now the inner primary cover can be removed - it's held on by the three bolts around the crankshaft.

Remove Transmission

Now the transmission can be removed by removing the four nuts and one bolt on the bottom of the trans.

Actually, it would be possible to remove the transmission without removing the clutch hub. You would just leave the inner primary cover trapped between the hub and the transmission case. This would save a lot of hassle, but I wanted to replace the seals on the transmission which would require removing the hub anyway.

Remove Foot Controls

Next we remove the foot controls (rear brake pedal and shifter and kickstand), the dash backing plate and the wiring.

Remove Engine

Now the engine can be removed - one mount point at the top and four bolts thru the engine case holding it to the mounting pads on the frame. It's kind of heavy and awkward but I managed to get it out by myself but I think I'll get someone to help me when it comes time to put it back in.

Bare Frame

And there you have it - a completely stripped down '57 straight-legged frame.

Remove the Rear Wheel

No Explaination necessary