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T500 Clutch Basket - No. of fingers, when did they change?

Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2018 4:52 pm
by Zunspec4
Hi all,

I was aware that there were two types of basket pertaining to the number of fingers. Can anyone tell be when they changed and the number of fingers on each basket.

Many thanks

Geoff

Re: T500 Clutch Basket - No. of fingers, when did they chang

Posted: Sun Mar 17, 2019 12:53 pm
by dbc105
Geoff, I just saw this because I'm trying to find out the same thing. My plan was to use the CRF450 frictions like you are doing in my stock basket only to find out my basket is 18 finger. Not sure of the year of the part but best I can tell the change from 18 to 12 is documented at '71 to '72 but in reading seems that is not the case and I am going to go thru my spare engine to see if I can find a 12 finger basket. If I can't I may try to install the existing drive gear onto a basket from something else. this is a common process with Super Stock motorcycle drag racers.

I'll let you know what I find out.

DC

Re: T500 Clutch Basket - No. of fingers, when did they chang

Posted: Sun Mar 17, 2019 5:22 pm
by Zunspec4
Hi DC,

Good luck, it will be interesting to see how you get on.

Cheers Geoff

Re: T500 Clutch Basket - No. of fingers, when did they chang

Posted: Sun Mar 17, 2019 8:17 pm
by dbc105
Well, I pulled the covers off my spare engines and everything I have is 18 finger. I'm wondering if the bikes sent here in the States all hot the 18. The 12 tab plates fit a lot of other bikes so I should be able to find something

Re: T500 Clutch Basket - No. of fingers, when did they chang

Posted: Mon Mar 18, 2019 11:02 am
by tricky1962
Mine's a '72 from the US - 18 fingers. The plates are hard to come by and not cheap. CMSNL have them, Robinsons Foundry don't

Re: T500 Clutch Basket - No. of fingers, when did they chang

Posted: Mon Mar 18, 2019 5:01 pm
by jabcb
Doesn’t EBC have plates for both the 12 & 18 tab clutches?

Re: T500 Clutch Basket - No. of fingers, when did they chang

Posted: Tue Mar 19, 2019 9:19 am
by desmocat
Clutch baskets changed with the GT500 '76-'77.

Re: T500 Clutch Basket - No. of fingers, when did they change?

Posted: Sun Nov 21, 2021 9:51 am
by jabcb
Why did Suzuki change the T500 clutch from 18 fingers to 12?

Working on the T500 cafe build.
The GT500 motor has a 12-finger clutch with a fair amount of wear on the fingers.

So I just checked out the 18-finger clutch on the spare 73 T500 motor & the wear is probably best described as a little bit of polishing.