Been a bit distracted for the past few days so apologies to the owner and my loyal reader.
I did manage to drop off all the panels that need repairs and re-painting at the place they are to be restored to better than new yesterday first thing. The two new twin pinstripes were also delivered as they are applied before the final lacquer. The timescale is about two weeks as I need to finish the rest of the bike so as to avoid having the panels laying about in danger of getting damaged.
Anyway, before the milkman had even left my pints of full-jism on the doorstep, I was back down in the garage je-je-jiggling the recalcitrant clutch cover.
In between bouts of jiggling and to maintain an even temper, I found other little things to sort out.
The rear seat-cover (hump thingy) has a plastic bracket lined with rubber that locates the hump on the passenger grab-rail. The rubber had become detached at some stage early in the life of the bike and a previous owner had just taped it to the grab-rail.
After scraping away the old adhesive on both parts;
I cleaned both with meths and then gave them a squirt of new glue:
Before encouragement to bond was applied:
Back to the clutch cover and after another hour of repetitive jiggling and cursing, the bloody thing finally gave-in to my ministrations:
So now the clutch carrier is exposed:
I can undo that retaining nut, remove it and the spacer:
To expose the next awkward little sod of a job, getting at and removing the O-Ring on the output shaft that's buried inside the clutch carrier:
Haynes says to pick it out and helpfully shows the O-Ring being very nice and co-operative by apparently leaping onto the proffered jewellers screwdriver of its own volition. The BMW manual says to cut it out.
Having learned from my K75 journey of discovery and after a panic-stricken call to the god-of-all-things-BMW-bikes, I found that the output shaft, once freed from the clutch-carrier retaining nut, has an alarming (if you didn't know it was designed that way) amount of end-play.
After being reassured by Neil "that sounds about right"
, I carried on with the K75 O-Ring change by using this end-play to my advantage (if you are going to do a similar job, this may help as it isn't mentioned in the 'helpful' manuals):
By pulling the clutch-carrier away from the output-shaft, the O-Ring comes with it up the shaft a little. Now because the O-Ring's job is as an oil seal, things are a bit slippery and when you push the clutch-carrier back towards the engine it may take the O-Ring back down the "pipe". Persevere and you should be rewarded by it sticking at the top of the shaft near the threaded section - eventually.
Forget cutting it, there isn't enough room really and forget popping it out with a jewellers screwdriver because the shaft of the screwdriver doesn't flex. Either use a craft knife with a flexible blade or an old feeler gauge (from the thicker end of the assorted blades) and gently prise the O-Ring out enough to get something more robust hooked under it.
I'll bet a pound to a pinch of shit that it will slip back before you can get to this stage:
Many times too.
Don't lose heart, just swear a great deal, kick something (preferably inanimate as kicking the cat, dog or wife and kids is still frowned upon among the unenlightened who have never attempted to remove one of these O-Rings) and gird your loins for another stoical attempt. It's what chaps do.
You will be rewarded (eventually) with a pile of redundant bits (seen here with the new bits and the tools I find work for me plus some that don't):
Now it's off with the clutch-carrier:
And have a butchers at the output-shaft seal:
That small amount of engine oil on the bottom of the seal came from the splines of the clutch-carrier as I yanked it off. You can have a butchers at the clutch-carrier splines if you're interested at this point:
Then with the bell-housing cleaned and the clutch-carrier cleaned, I popped it back and slipped the new O-Ring over the shaft:
Before chucking them away, I used the old spacer and lock nut to seat the O-Ring:
With them whipped off and before using the new ones, I had a peer at the O-Ring to make certain that its nice and snug in its new home.
Right that's the state of play so far today. I stopped for a coffee and to check the torque setting of the lock nut so thought I'd update this before getting back down to it.
Oh yes, it's 140 Nm plus or minus 5 Nm, slacken off and re-torque to 100 Nm (for this model, others vary so check if you are doing the job yourself).
stop all this bitching and let the man get on with the job.
tears) and with much, as Arkwright would have said to G-G-Granville, je-je-jiggling, it is starting to come free. 
