I took my 2018 ZX14R to a local mechanic after I found the clutch was biting in different spots on the lever and would sometimes not bite enough and lugged the bike from a stop but didn't seem to slip anywhere else. After he completed the work, I was told that he found the judder-spring in the wrong location on the clutch stack and a return spring with a broken locating tab. He put the clutch stack back into the right order and put everything back and added Brocks clutch shims set at .040". He measured the plates and stated that they were all within spec.

The only mechanic that had the clutch out before claims that he never would have stacked the clutch wrong and that it's almost impossible to miss. That I would have noticed a difference in clutch play the moment I left his shop and not 1000 miles later when clutch issues occurred. He said he would take half blame and pay for the labor and parts to get the spring-leaf replaced.

1. Is it good to continue riding the motorcycle with a broken locating tab on a spring-leaf (Tab was found and removed from the engine)?
2. Could it be possible that the clutch could only show problems after 1000 miles of riding and not immediately?
3. Could it be that the clutch shims are merely masking an issue that I don't know about yet?

* Last updated by: Severedninja on 8/31/2020 @ 7:11 PM *

My opinions from my thorough yet novice study of the clutch:

1. The spring leaf (you mean the anti-judder ring right?) chunk would fall harmlessly into the oil pan if it had any way of getting out of the basket. The anti-judder ring is enclosed in the basket so I don't see how it would get out. The basket is literally a basket. It has a cover called the spring plate or the pressure plate is a more common name. I guess the clutch basket has big openings all around but I would think the clutch plates would block all of those openings. Well, somehow the anti judder ring got out and there's probably nowhere it went but down to the pan. Yes there is a planetary gear in there and a oil pump gear but those are situated to the backside of the basket. I don't think you would run that chunk of anti-judder ring through those and if you did, it is a very thin metal like sheet metal. It's a cone shaped ring that acts as a spring against the clutch plates.

I have heard of people putting the anti-judder ring in there backwards. It is a cone. It has a small diameter and a large diameter. Check the SM for correct placement of small and large diameters. I have a Gen1 clutch tutorial that tells about it but the Gen2 clutch is different. Yours was probably put in the wrong way. The way the first guy is paying half tells me he thinks so too.

2. There was a debate about the anti-judder ring (remember you and Kruz, Hub?) I believe old Kruz might have had his in backwards for years. No problem. So I'd say yeah, you could go a thousand miles with no trouble and all the sudden it slips out of place.

3. I don't know anything about location tabs on the clutch springs. That may be a Gen2 thing. You have your springs shimmed now so they are tighter. It will hold the clutch pack HARDER. When you pull the clutch lever, it doesn't matter how tight the springs are shimmed or not because you are releasing spring tension on the clutch pack. Tight springs or looser, the same thing's going to happen with the clutch partially and full disengaged. It's when it is engaged that the shims do their thing, hold the clutch tight. I'd doubt the shims would mask anything. Just pull and release the lever slow. Is it smooth? If so everything A-ok.

I think it's fixed. This is why I will never bring my bike to a shop. I don't care if it's out of service all summer. I'll just figure out how to do it myself.

* Last updated by: Rook on 9/1/2020 @ 5:19 PM *

The return spring might be the spring on the shift shaft. It returns the shift pedal to normal position after making a shift. If the tab for that was broke, that was a pin that screws in to the engine case. That is not a tab. Might have been the tab for the detwnt arm that engages the shift star? That tab is molded into the engine case. If it was that tab, that was major blow. You would have felt that to crack a chunk off the detent arm return spring tab. Maybe talk to the second mech again to get the exact parts that he found if you have something misconstrued.

Anyway, he sounds like a good guy so you must have it fixed.

This is all Gen1 stuff but you might want to have a look. It's similar but not the same as the Gen2 clutch.

http://zx14ninjaforum.com/messages.cfm?threadid=196E8D8B-1B78-59F6-02E2E04BAE8D0B59

http://zx14ninjaforum.com/messages.cfm?threadid=1ED37321-1B78-59F6-02205C92920CCBA6&page=1

http://zx14ninjaforum.com/messages.cfm?threadid=4BC9EB32-1B78-59F6-02AFCD8AE5137566

http://zx14ninjaforum.com/messages.cfm?threadid=B3FBA250-1B78-59F6-02AB75C8507D10E9