It's probably a worn or sticking decomp cable, i have had that before. If you can get it a cable luber on it try and get it lubed up and make sure its moving freely back and forth. Beyond that its just clean clean clean, clean everything, lubricate everything, i prefer to use a white lithium grease on the parts in the recoil, then put it back together and check it again. If the cable is sticking you can get a replacement for it, not terribly expensive, Motion Pro cables and Volar both make one for it, like $9 for that part so if its not cooperating don't waste your time trying to fix the cable.
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1984 Honda ATC200ES "Big Red"
1982 ATC200E "Hondie"
1988 TRX300FW "Project Quad" Still in progress....