Working on a 2007 TRX400FA for a friend. His complaint was that the machine acts like it has a slipping clutch. Ive never worked on one this these hondamatics before. I have found many threads on the centrifugal clutch glazing up. So far my finding upon driving it was that it will make a strange grinding sound(similar to a drill clutch breaking free from to much torque) in both auto and esp modes when you start to move and it will act like the clutch is slipping then suddenly grab and go but as soon as you shift or slow down and hit the gas again it slips. Nothing else of significance was noted. I can manual shift up and down with the esp mode. Mechanical things I noted are...1. The machine has aftermarket large wheels and tires on it 2. Battery was currently pretty low( I have it on the trickle charger now). 3. The oil is not on the dipstick(does have oil on it if you run it and shut it off before wiping so there is some amount of oil in there. I don't know what was last used for oil in the oil change?(Could have been oil with friction modifiers) So I am leaning toward a bad clutch but I have seen people replace the clutch on other forums and not had similar issues go away. What do you think? Thank you for your input!

 

The Hondamatic uses the oil to operate so if the oil is low you will have some lag. Change the oil and filter and see how it operates.

 

papa,

Looks like you hit the nail on the head. I went to dig into it today and found that is was done 2 quarts of oil! After filling it up I test drove it for about 15 minutes pretty hard and everything worked as it should. I contacted the owner and he said that recently it had gotten worse(low oil). But before it had only done it one steep hills after it had gotten very hot. Does that mean that the centrifugal clutch is tired and needs to be replaced?

 

It all depends, if the oil level was low when he was climbing the hill and the angle of the machine was such that the tranny did not have enough oil to pump it will have trouble. I always use ESP mode for steep climbs and deep mud. This puts less pressure on the Hondamatic tranny. Just makes sense.

 

Also want to make sure there the factory washer is on the oil filter..between the spring and filter,,If washer is gone this could cause spring to cut or get into filter which could cause low pressure which could cause transmission problems under an hard accell or heavy pull. Alot of time this washer will get stuck on old oil filter then gets discarded with filter.

 

Fiche Parts photo part number 11.

 

I will take a look at the washer when I pull the motor apart to do the top end. The machine smokes like CRAZY and burns oil very quickly. I topped off the crank case the other day and drove it around for about an hour today. It finnally started to slip again after an hour, I checked the oil level and it was off of the dip stick again. I believe that the low oil is what is causing the issue, it needs a top end really bad though so I will do that first and see what happens with the slipping after that. Any chance the centrifugal clutch is slipping when the oil gets real hot?