Pulling the right side cover without removing water pump cover?
 

Is this possible? I've had it off before and I'm having a major brain fart trying to remember if I need to pull the water pump cover off.

I just want to check things out in there.. have a rattly clutch that goes away when the lever is pulled in, so figured I'd check the basket out.

Several off the bolts holding the h2o cover on go through the side cover into the cases. Once all those bolts are out the the r side cover will come off.

I never take the water pump cover off when I am taking off my right side case, I believe it's one bolt going through the cover that goes into the case that you have to loosen same as the 2 in the clutch cover.

Remove the coolant drain plug and let out about half of the coolant.

Lay the bike on the floor on the shifter side.

Pull the clutch cover.

Do whatever work you need to do, reassemble and refill coolant.

This will save oil, coolant and time. If you have the new metal shim gasket you can reuse it.

I ended up just pulling the small cover.. Nut is tight, basket doesn't wobble. I wonder why the clutch is so noisy until I pull the lever in? Basket looks like new. Granted, I don't really know if this just developed or not.. but I'd only noticed it in the last few months.

I'm no expert here, but our Ducati used to do that and being a dry clutch it was insanely loud. Forums suggested for that bike that the clutch stack height could be to blame. The dealers told us it was just "Ducati music" so we just ground our teeth and went on with our lives. You might look into the stack height thing, though, and make sure your plates are all within tolerance.

If the noise stops when you pull the clutch, would sound to me like. Gearbox!

I wouldn't worry about that noise. Honestly, my EC300 does it, and so does the majority of everyone else's. The noise goes away when u pull the clutch lever in, right? There's some threads on here that talk about it and it's never caused any issues (if it is in fact the same noise that I here). I also had a 2002 Honda CR125R that did the same thing. Ran it for years like that. The noise never got any better, or worse. It didn't effect performance at all.

Yes it is common to the GG bikes.