My 1985 Yamaha 750 Maxim shift lever is extremely stiff or hard to shift. When I pull off the casing that it passes thru or even loosen the bolts to the case it shifts normally.
What can the issue be?
Why does it shift normally when I loosen the bolts on the case?
There could be a couple culprits here.
First of all the clutch might not be adjusted correctly so when you pull the clutch in, there is still a load/pressure on the gears so when you go to kick up or down you essentially forcing the gear to slip from one to another. To fix this, lube the clutch cable and the lever then play try different adjustments on the clutch to see if the issue still occurs when up/down shifting.
It could also be a really worn out clutch, I had a KZ550 and it had the same issue I found out that my clutch was so old and worn out that instead of the clutch disks slipping they where sticking instead. The fix here is get a new set of clutch discs, might as well get a new clutch basket and springs.
I don't think it applies to your bike but on older bike where there's a chain from the engine to the clutch (primary chain) and it's too tight it will make the bike hard to shift into gear.
