I spent 5 hours in the garage today, the intent was to get the left hand side engine cover off so I could work out whether or not I needed a new kick starter spring.
The tool I purchased from Ebay got two of the clutch spring retaining nuts off before it succumbed, the material was just not up to the job and the tangs bent irrevocably.
Next, I spent an hour or so grinding up a sacrificial socket to match the slots in the head of the retaining nut. The first one broke as I obviously did not want to grind up a good quality socket as the material was too brittle. The second, ground-up from a good brand socket faired little better. By this time the slots in the nut were becoming a bit frayed so I decided to weld on some nuts and see if this would work.
key test
Alas, when a spanner was applied to the welded-on nuts they simply sheered off the clutch retaining nuts.
I retired at this point without any real clue how I will manage to remove these 3 obstinate bastards.