If you’re new to riding your bike, you probably have a limited understanding of the motorcycle clutch.
Therefore, you might be looking into how you can safely pop the clutch. Getting used to popping the clutch can easily help you shift gears without putting too much pressure on your bike.
What is a clutch lever and how does it work?
A clutch is an integral part of the motorcycle, which helps disengage and engage the transmission from the engine. And when a rider is able to pop a clutch perfectly, they can easily change gears without letting the engine stall.
The different types of transmission systems
But the transmission system can come in two varieties: automatic and manual. An automatic clutch is controlled electronically, whereas a manual one uses a clutch lever to manually shift the gears.
Regardless of the type of transmission a bike uses, it will be using friction plates to effectively change gears.
The role a pressure plate plays in the clutch
A pressure plates are an integral part of the clutch mechanism, since it helps creates the friction necessary to help change gears with the transmission.
The engine turns the clutch plates, which are spinning plates that attach directly to clutch housing.
As the clutch is engaged, the clutch plate will eventually stop spinning, which allows the transmission to start moving the rear wheel.
Continuous spinning of the clutch plates and sending power to the rear wheel
When the clutch is disengaged, the steel plates will start spinning at the same speed as the engine.
Therefore, every time you hold on to the clutch lever, the steel plates will stop spinning and disconnect from the engine, and when you switch gears, you can disengage the clutch to let the plates connect again and let the engine run interrupted.
Different mechanisms in new bikes
The first gear is also part of the overall clutch basket, which includes the clutch cable and the clutch springs. Some modern bikes will even have a hydraulic clutch, that makes shifting gears much easier.
How to safely pop the clutch
Popping your clutch is not a difficult process, and all it takes to get used to it is just a little bit of practice.
While it can be hard to get your bike into gear for the first few times, you can eventually get the hang of how the throw out bearing works and how you can keep the bike rolling when you’re riding your bike.
Finding a safe place to practice
The first step to really getting the hang of popping the clutch is to find a place where you can practice. You obviously want to practice on the road, but you don’t want to have to worry about traffic or other people coming in the way.
You could try riding your bike at a time when there is less traffic, or go with a friend to a less crowded part of the city.
Starting your motorcycle and putting it into gear
Once you find the right place to practice riding your bike, the actual process of putting a bike into gear is actually pretty easy.
When working with clutches, you want to pay more attention to the clutches and the throttle.
Once you consider all of these other factors, you can start the motorcycle and easily put it into second gear. This will move the clutch cover into place and you will move away from the first gear.
Slowly releasing the clutch
After kicking the bike into second gear, you can slowly start releasing the clutch lever on your bike.
Make sure you’re careful when releasing the lever, as releasing it too quickly will lead to the bike lurching forward.
So only when the bike starts to move forward do you want to release the lever. And when you do release the clutch lever, you should give the throttle a slight squeeze, which can stop the engine from bogging down.
Squeeze the throttle further
While don’t want to let the throttle open instantly, you want to slowly give the bike more gas until you are at a speed that you can comfortably manage.
Before you can even go to the higher gears, you want to become more comfortable with riding your bike in the first two gears.
As you become more comfortable popping the clutch, you can then star increasing your speed.
How you can pop start your bike
Chances are that your bike won’t start the regular way. So if you can’t start your bike the regular way, then you want to try and pop start it.
Pop starting, or as many refer to it as push starting, is when you first put your bike into gear and then you try to start it.
This is a very important technique to learn, since it can help you when you’re stuck somewhere.
Select the right gear
When asking people how to push start a bike, you will get a range of opinions. Some will recommend that you push the bike in second gear, while others will recommend that you push the bike in neutral.
Both of these options will often provide very similar results, but pushing in neutral can be good for beginners since they don’t have to worry about extra drag from the gear box.
Start pushing
Push starting can be little difficult to pull off, since you need the right amount of speed and you need to pop the clutch at the right time.
So you can either run with your bike or ask someone to push your bike. You don’t need to worry about the inner hub of your bike when you push start, even when you shop manual.
Pop the Clutch
Once you get the bike rolling and get some speed, you want to to either let go of the lever or first change gears.
If you were in neutral, you need to first shift bike into second gear and then pop the clutch. But if you already started moving the bike in second gear, all you have to do is let go of the clutch.