Navigation animation doesn't always animate and other issues

Please see my example Plunker here: http://plnkr.co/edit/orC6VBG2oKNOzKUnWJtM?p=preview

My project uses a side menu. Each view uses slide-left-right animations when navigating from page to page. Links from the menu have animations disabled (using nav-clear). Each view defines its own set of buttons that change as navigation occurs.

The problem I’m experiencing is when the page is first loaded and a link is clicked, no animation occurs in the body. However the title bar does animate. Any consecutive navigation the animation does occur as normal.

The second issue is when I consecutively click the links, black bars occur on the left / right hand side of the screen as the animation happens. When the animation finishes, the black disappears.

What am I doing wrong? Is the problems occurring because I am structuring my views incorrectly?