LOUD clunking problem

Yamaha Raptor 350 & Warrior Forum

Help Support Yamaha Raptor 350 & Warrior Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

jack5tor

Member
Joined
Feb 28, 2012
Messages
16
Reaction score
0
Location
Vermont
Today I was riding my '02 warrior with a friend and it was riding fine for a while.. then he said he stalled it in first and from that point on it clunked realllly loud and would start but would not idle right and sounded bad. For a while it would clunk sometimes when starting and almost always one clunk when shutting off. I read somewhere online though that that was the starter clutch and it was fine and could last a long time like that and was nothing to worry about. Now the clunking noise is way worse and hard to listen to it sounds so bad. I was planning on replacing the piston and rings and top end gaskets this week. Now I'm hoping it is a problem in the top end so I can fix it while I'm in there and I don't even want to touch the transmission. any help is appreciated, Thanks
 
quick and easy way to see if your starter clutch is bad is pull stator cover so the fly wheel is visible and if you remove the 2 sets of smaller gears between the starter gear and the flywheel then try spinning the big gear behind the magneto on the crank shaft it should spin freely one way only if it doesn't spin freely at all then it is shot
 
usually a clunk when shutting it off is normal but if it clunks while trying to start it then the starter clutch most likely is shot and eventually could mess up the starter
 
Just before my starter clutch **** the bed it made that snap, or clunk sound when I shut it off. I never did figure out why it was doing that? But when I replaced it, I noticed that the idler gear was all chewed up from the oneway bearing. The bearing itself was missing a few of the little titties in it. Luckily they were just under the mag, and never got into anything..

But to make a long story short this is what I think happened?
When that bearing starts to wear out, it gets some play in it. So when the motor get's under a certain RPM (Like as it deceles from being shut down) The bearings fall back onto the idler gear, and stop the the motor.. Hence the clunk, or snap as I called it.. It would also explain some of the chew marks on the idler gear, and the missing titties..

That's my theory anyway... lmao
 
To take the flywheel off before replacing the one way bearing will a normal gear puller work? I found a cheap 4 in. gear puller at my local store will that work the same way?
 
To take the flywheel off before replacing the one way bearing will a normal gear puller work? I found a cheap 4 in. gear puller at my local store will that work the same way?

No you need the actual puller, or you could risk damaging your magneto.
You should also replace your idler gear as well, cause it could be damaged? If its chewed up it's just fail again.
 
OK new question, today I tried to start it to show my brother how broken it sounded so he could give me some input but it sounded normal.. normal by the way means it still clunks when trying to start it but it will start and run well. Then when it shuts off it clunks once. Why would it have sounded so awful a few days ago then seemingly fixed itself overnight? The noise sounds like something heavy and metal slaps inside kind of, thats my idea of a clunk in case that wasn't clear.. need help! thanks
 
It also sometimes randomly runs for a few minutes very weird where it misfires and stalls immediately once it reaches idle. It always goes back to normal eventually though... I dont know if this is a different problem I am just trying to help someone to diagnose this, its really confusing me. Thanks for the help!
 
Alot of yamahas do this, just how things are. I had a raptor 660 which sounded horrible when it shut off. It was fully rebuild inside and out and still did it. I say it just yamahas stater design.
 
Back
Top