Honda Spree and Elite 50 Forums

My wife and I both have 85 Sprees. About 3 years ago mine stopped running. I left it sit. Then 2 years ago my wife's stopped running. Just today I started to work on hers .... finally narrowed it down to the Bystarter and switched it with the one from my non running one. Her's now runs fine again.

I'm going to sell them both I've decided so I need to get mine running again.

A few years back I had "chatter" in the clutch area. I asked here and someone told me to take off the cover and have a look. I did and didn't see anything unusual. The chatter eventually went away. Then it started to get harder to start....as if the timing were off because it would attempt to start then suddenly lock up. I took the cylinder off and found the crankcase was full of oil so I assumed it was hydro lock causing it to suddenly stop turning over and not start. I emptied the oil from the crankcase, bought a new oil pump in case the old one was leaking and put it back together. Same thing happened so I wondered if somehow my timing was off. And I let it sit.

Now as I said I want to sell it.

I read that the timing isn't adjustable....but there is a module that controls it. I also harken back to the clutch chatter wondering if that had something to do with it. Does the clutch (or all that stuff have anything to do with the timing?)

I really don't know where to start to find out if it's the timing. Plus I'll need a new bystarter eventually. Does anyone still sell those ones? I did get one from someone on here years ago.

Thanks for any and all help or suggestions you can give me.

Grandpa.

Take off the transmission cover and look at the splines on the crank, take the drive face off and clutch off and inspent the splines. What your saying matches to what happened to my friend. He had a spree that was hard to start and would lightly chatter at low speed and eventually got worst and worst. Ended up being the crank spline driven face was loose just enough for it to spin a gear every once in a while until it ate it up.

Let me also back track here, you said it would suddently stop, like as in an hydrolock like jumping up lock or as a slow grugging bubbley rev down? If you want to check timing just see if the fan side fly wheel is loose and if it is not if the paint is still on the bolt timing has never been changed.

List of things to try.

ÔÇólook at splines, check for loose drive wheel.
ÔÇócheck fuel flow and carb
ÔÇócheck flywheel for looseness or missing bolt paint.
ÔÇóDont worry about the oil pump for now, I have one if you need it. Free of charge.

Thank you MrJumps.

K...I'll take off the cover as you suggest.

The hydrolock was when it was cranking over and it would suddenly stop cranking....as if hitting a wall. That's why I though of timing. If the spark is too advanced suddenly it would stop the piston in it's track. Dunno if this is the problem but I'll look at the clutch and report back. It must get it's spark trigger from somewhere and it may be the clutch or flywheel if they're not in the correct position relative to the piston going into compression cycle.

Grandpa

Is there an gasket between the cover and case? You may be binding on your starter.

MrJumps wrote:Is there an gasket between the cover and case? You may be binding on your starter.

Dunno...I've been painting all day. Seems like retirement is more work than work...lol.

I'll let you know however it ran for years with whatever was in between the cover and case without me doing anything.