Hello, John Talley here with partzilla.com. Today we're going to be looking at the clutching
system on our 2011 Polaris Sportsman 850 XP. I showed you in a previous video how to replace
the belt, but today we're going to look at the symptoms and causes if your machine isn't
running right as far as the engagement of the clutching system.
Basically what you have are just two main pieces. You've got the drive clutch here and
you have the driven clutch on the backside, and that's all under a cover on the backside
of the machine. So, give me a few minutes to get the machine up in the air, the tire
pulled off, get that cover out of the way, and I'll show you how to pull these two pieces
and evaluate them. Let's get started.
Alright guys, before we get started, let's go over some of the tools we're going to need
to get this job done. I'll start off with a couple of specialty tools-- the brand I
recommend is EPI, and the two that we're going to need from them are this primary drive removal
tool. With it, you're going to need just a standard 22mm socket to drive it in there.
The other one I like is the EPI spring compressor. What that'll do is it'll hold your primary
driven sheave in place while you're working on it.
And the only thing you'll need to operate that is a 3/4 inch boxing wrench.
You also want to locate your clutch/shock adjustment tool, it should have come in your
tool kit when you purchased your unit. The other thing you might want to have handy is
the service manual that is required for your unit just in case you need to look up a specification
or something like that. As far as our standard tools, you need a couple
of different 10mm sockets: a 15mm, a 17mm, and an 18mm. Most of those are in 3/8th drive
except for this one 10mm which is a quarter-inch drive.
I use the quarter inch to remove those cover bolts because it's smaller and it's easier
to get that one in there. Other than that, you need a 2mm Allen and the associated drives
for those is either a 3/8th ratchet or a quarter-inch ratchet with a couple of extensions. Make
sure you have one of these longer 3/8th extensions, since I'll be using that pretty much as a
pry bar to hold certain pieces of the clutch in place.
A couple more things you're going to need are just a good pair of pliers, a marker, a
small pick tool, and a medium-sized hammer. That should cover all the tools you'll need
to get this project done. Alright guys, so we've got her up in the air,
I've pulled both tires because you actually have eleven of these 10mm bolts that hold
this cover on. Before we do that, we need to go ahead and pull this frame strut-- it's
actually removable, and it will allow us to get that cover off. It's only held in by four
15mm bolts, so let's get those broken loose so we can get it out of the way.
Lay those to the side, and then we'll start getting those 10mms off the cover.
A couple of them are a little bit tricky to get to on the top side and the bottom side,
and actually I went ahead and pulled the rear lower panel on the frame to make it a little
bit easier to get to. Alright, with all those 10 mms out of the
way, we just need wrangle off this cover. There's your drive clutch, your driven clutch,
and of course the belt we had put on in a previous video.
Alright, to remove the belt, what we need to do is release tension on this clutch where
we can open up the sheave, then we can wrangle the belt off of there.
So if you need further instruction in removing the drive belt, please refer to our drive
belt removal video. Now that the belt's off, we can go ahead and
remove that 15mm bolt all the way. Be careful you don't lose your washers here. You've got
your smaller one on the inside and you've got this larger one that rides right here.
Just make sure you want to keep up with those. Next, we should be able to just slide that
driven clutch right off the shaft. Alright, for your drive clutch, it's actually
a reverse-thread. Find something to hold it still-- I'm just using a 3/8th extension to
do this, and that was actually an 18mm socket. This is when you will need the primary drive
clutch puller tool that I talked about in the beginning to break it loose from that
shaft. All you have to do is insert it, get it bottomed out, and there we go.
As you can tell by the amount of force I had to use, you're just not going to pull this
off by hand. You have to have that tool. Go ahead and remove the extraction tool, and
she should just slide straight off. Yep. Alright, now we're going to take this over
to the teardown bench and pull that spring out, and get a feel for how much wear is actually
on it. So give me a couple of minutes, we'll reset over at the teardown bench, and get
this thing pulled apart. Alright guys, welcome to the teardown bench.
We've got our drive clutch as well as our driven clutch laid out on the table.
How do these things work? Well, of course there's the belt that's going
in between these two, and what you're going to see when it's just sitting there idling
is the belt is just kinda more or less sitting still. But as the RPMs increase, what happens
is there are weights-- three of them actually-- on the drive clutch, and then there's a spring
inside of here. When this thing starts spinning faster and faster, what'll happen it overcomes
the spring by those weights starting to get pushed out. What that does is it actually
causes this to clamp down. When it clamps down, it forces the belt from the inside of
the sheave to the outside of the sheave and that effectively changes your ratio going
back to your driven clutch. It's sitting there closed, as it increases
it starts to push it outward making the belt go inside. That also increases your ratio
or changes your gearing ratio. It's a pretty seamless system, so instead of going through
your standard gearbox of five gears this one does it for you in one.
Alright, first thing we need to do is go ahead and pull this spring out of here. Now to do
that we want to keep a constant pressure on it. To do this there's a little kit made by
EPI, really not that complicated. What it's going to do is just hold pressure on the springs
so we can remove that outer plate. Just a little bit of tension on it.
Alright, the reason we're removing the spring is when you're ordering a new drive clutch
it doesn't come with the spring or the weights. The reason for that is vehicle specific. There
may be two or three machines that you can actually use this particular drive clutch
on, but each one is going to be set up differently as to the spring requirements and what type
of weights they're actually using. So, we need to pull that apart.
When you pull this top plate, you need to make sure that you mark it just somewhere
in between this outer plate and the clutch itself. The reason being that it needs to
go back in the same place. We can go ahead and pull these six 10mm bolts.
Alright, there's the spring we're talking about. What we want to do is get it out of the way and then I want
to remount this outer plate because I want to feel what kind of wear is on this inner
bushing-- because that's typically where they wear out.
Alright, let's see what we have on this one. Guys, this one is actually in pretty good
condition. So you can see what I'm actually doing a little better, I want to go ahead
and tighten this down so I can show you the lack of play that I'm seeing.
Alright. See that? It'll rock just a little bit. What I'm going to do is remove this one
and down on my bench I actually have another one off a different machine, and we're going
to clamp it down and I'm going to show you what a worn one looks like.
When this came off the unit it was making all kinds of noise. It sounded like there
were a bunch of ball bearings flying around behind the cover. It wasn't engaging very
smoothly, when you'd go to accelerate the unit would just jerk, the top speed was limited
because the sheaves weren't opening and closing fully. Just basically a mess.
Alright, let's see if this part will even push up, and plus you can sit there and just
rock it back and forth. Now, if you look inside here on the sheaves, the surfaces actually
have grooves cut in them and they're actually rough. So this one obviously had some dirt
and contaminants in there and it just chewed it apart. So this is an example of one you
need to replace. Alright, first we're going to remount our
old one. We've already gotten the spring out of it, but what I need to go after now are
these weights. The surfaces on these weights actually look
really good. What'll happen is these things will get worn down over time, won't be smooth,
they'll be loose inside there and won't push out like they're supposed to.
The weights are just held in by this one little pivot pin. You've got a 2mm Allen on one side
and a 10mm locking bolt on the other. What we're going to be looking for is to make
sure that the actual pivot point on the weight itself isn't worn out. If it gets stuck as
you're trying to pull it through because it's got some maybe corrosion or rust on it, put
pressure on it with a pick tool and just turn it. Doesn't take a lot of pressure and that'll
get it on out of there. If you do have to replace these you want to
make sure that you order the exact same ones because for this particular assembly, you've
got four different types that can be used depending on how you want to use the machine
and how you want the clutch to respond. So, my advice: don't tread over there. You want
to go back with what Polaris sent it out with. Alright, your new assembly actually comes
with new bolts already in it with those new locking nuts on the end. If you are rebuilding
your existing one, and you're looking at the weights, Polaris and I would recommend to
at least replace the locking nut as well as that pivot point because it'll start to wear
in there and the weights won't go through their full range of motion like they should.
Alright, with our weights in place we need to go ahead and get that spring back in. Like
we did on the original one, we need to go ahead and mark where this is positioned because
it is balanced and it needs to go back in that same position.
Alright, at this point, get your spring and make sure it is seated flat. Put on your upper
plate and we'll start cranking it down, making sure your "X's" are aligned.
I'm a big fan of these little impact tools when it comes to taking them apart or anything
apart but I'm also a big fan of putting it back together using your arms because some
of these little boogers can produce too much torque and strip out your threads, and in
my book that's not worth it. Just release the tension.
Now, she's going to be ready to go. So, let me get this teardown bench out of
the way, grab our driven clutch, and let's get it put back together.
So, basically assembly is just the reverse of what we did to take it apart. We'll start
by getting the drive clutch on, and that's a tapered fit.
You want to make sure that you've got that outer lock washer, that washer, and most importantly
this little piece right here which is basically just a shim. Make sure it didn't get left
in that old clutch assembly. Remember it is reverse thread, and the torque
it's going to want is 47 ft-lbs., and that is 18mm.
There you go. The brace that I'm just using is a 3/8th extension.
Alright the bolt for our driven clutch is going to be a 37 ft-lbs. I'm going to go ahead
and set that up, and it's going to be a 15mm. Alright, next we just need to get on our driven
clutch. There we go. Next, get on your drive belt. Make sure you
can read Polaris going this direction, left to right.
Next, the retaining bolt. Make sure you've got this large washer and you've got a couple of adjustment
shim washers in here, that larger one and that smaller one on the inside-- make sure
all of that is together when you go to put it in there.
If you want to see how to set the torque on the driven clutch bolt, please reference our
drive belt replacement video. Alright guys, just for fun before I put this
cover on, how about I go ahead and start it up and watch it actually go through its motions
as far as riding out on the drive pulley and going on the inside of the driven one. It's
kind of cool to watch. I want to caution you though: if you do this, definitely wear some
type of eye protection because those are going to be spinning very fast. You don't want anything
flying out and lodging in your eyeball. So let's get this started up and run it through
its paces. Alright, so that's what it looks like when
these clutch systems are actually operating. Kinda cool, huh?
Alright, from this point the rest of it is just the reversal of what I did at the beginning.
I'm just going to reinstall this cover and put on this frame strut.
Alright guys and gals, I've got our cover reinstalled, all those 10mm bolts back in
there, got our frame strut back in place, and other than putting the tires back on this
it's ready to roll. If there's something I did that you couldn't
see just leave that in the comments section below and I'll do my best to explain whatever
I may have missed or not explained correctly. If you need any of these parts, come see us
at partzilla.com and until next time we just want to say thanks for watching.