Two gears at once

[Mike Arman <armanmik@n-jcenter.com>]

And what *would* happen if you engaged the clutch while in two gears at the
same time?

Probabaly stall the engine, but the vehicle would NOT move!

Some years back, I used to work on old style (1955 > 1969) BMW motorcycles.
The shift forks pivots were retained by a pair of allen bolts,
unfortunately accessable from outside the transmission. What would happen
was the happy owner would remove the air filter (which sat atop the
tranny), and loosen one or both of these bolts, thinking that the tranny
oil was refilled here (despite the existence of an easily visible 19mm fill
plug on the side . . . ).

Then they would get re-tightened, but not torqued correctly, and a few
hundred or a few thousand miles later, the bolt would loosen sufficiently
to let the shifter fork pivot drop out, and the shift fork would then slide
around, allowing two gears to engage simultaneously, usually at 70 mph.

Whereupon there would be a huge, loud, expensive BANG!!! and then some
horribly nasty grinding and crunching noises as the bike coasted to a stop.
Everything inside the transmission would be junk, and sometimes the case
itself would be broken. This on a motorcycle of 26 to 42 HP total, and a
*very* well made one, at that!

Best Regards,

Mike Arman