This page was created to document and share the progress of resurrecting my buddy Robert's 1996 Harley-Davidson FHLR Road King.
To say that Robert likes to ride is sort of like saying that Michael Jordan dabbled in basketball. Robert is one of those guys who puts everything he is into everything he does...his family, his career, his art, and his riding. Not all that long ago, it was nothing for him to hop on his sled and head halfway across the country on nearly no notice, with his head in the wind and not a care in the world. He would ride to events and conventions across the country, with no iPod, no stereo...nothing but the music of the road in his ears and the wide-open panorama of America filling his eyes.
Nearly three years ago, in October of 2005, all of that came to a jarring halt. After 38,000 miles of faithful service, his Harley Road King finally gave up the ghost with a loud "pop" and a grinding of the engine to a sad, final, halt. The initial diagnosis from his local dealer (based only on his story, not a tear-down) was a thrown rod, which meant major engine surgery before his steed would be roadworthy again.
At the time, Robert was hip-deep in projects that would set the stage for the second phase of his career, projects that took all of his time and most of his budget. Regretfully, he realized that he just couldn't take the time nor divert the funds to attend to the repairs at that juncture, but vowed to get his ride roadworthy again at the first opportunity.
Fast-forward to June, 2008. Over the past year, knowing how it pains him not to ride, I have been bugging Robert to turn his bike over to me to tear down and determine the extent of the damage. This past few months, Robert has been wrapping up some of his major projects and is setting the stage for an even bigger leap forward. It seemed to be the perfect time to attend to the bike, and so he agreed to turn it over to me to try and get her roadworthy again. The following short narratives and photographs will document the process of bringing Robert's old flame back to life.
I depart my home in the Washington, D.C. area bright and early, with my faithful traveling companion and confidante, Nemo the Yorkie, at my side. I arrive at Robert's New York home just four hours later, having made excellent time. I haven't seen Robert's sled since months before the engine blew, and wasn't sure what to expect. As he opens the garage door, I can see the sled hasn't been moved since the day it was parked, which was to be expected. What I didn't expect was how poorly those three years had treated the bike. Robert's garage (and house) is built-in to the side of a hill overlooking a pond, and it's clear that the air in the garage remains comparitively moist as a result; The seat, saddlebags, leather accessories and fuel tank are covered in a film of mildew. The chrome parts, including the exhaust and engine/primary covers, are showing pitting and rust. At first look, the amount of deterioration seemed daunting.
Once we rolled the bike into the daylight, however, I began to perk up. Upon closer inspection, the frame was in great shape (very little rust), and the paint (under the mildew) was actually fine. This was good news, as it confirmed that once the engine was taken care of, replacing a little chrome would have this baby looking sharp once again. With the help of Robert's neighbor, we managed to push the bike onto a rise where we could roll it straight in to the back of my truck. Both of us had anticipated more trouble getting an unpowered, 750-pound motorcycle into the truck, but with three men on the job it worked out much better than we had thought. The good news is that left more time for lunch! Robert treated me to a delicious lunch of paninis at a local favorite authentic Italian eatery...good stuff. After some time well-spent catching up over a great meal, I set out for home, eager to get started.
Here is the bike just after she rolled off of the truck on June 7th:
|
|
|
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
The engine tear-down isn't scheduled to officially begin until Wednesday June 11th, when my friend Jeff arrives from Chicago. Jeff and I have helped each other tear down, modify, and re-build the engines in our own Harleys, and we really enjoy the chance to spend time together doing something we both love. Accordingly, I had decided to wait until Jeff arrived to begin the engine work.
While I had intended to spend Sunday taking care of some of my own projects, the lure of the Road King in the garage was impossible to resist...especially since my lovely bride was visiting her family and I had no adult supervision. Folding like a cheap hand of cards, I gave in to temptation and spent a couple of hours doing "prep work." I removed the stock header pipes and aftermarket mufflers, a job made all the more challenging by the fact that all of the joints were rusted together at the clamps. After applying equal parts Liquid Wrench, elbow grease and swear words, the mufflers came free and the headers succumbed to my will. I even found a bonus...three nuts that had apparently been stored in the right muffler by visiting squirrels!
With the grunt work of exhaust removal complete, draining the fuel tank was a snap by comparison, though I did find an unwelcome, if not unexpected, complication. A solid layer of tar-like substance coated the bottom of the tank. Gasoline left in a container over time breaks down, and the components form a "varnish" that settles to the bottom of the tank. Since this is a carbureted model, there is no large port on top of the tank to go in and remove the varnish manually...only the small hole at the filler cap. Making a mental note to buy solvent to attack the varnish, I put the tank aside.
As it was a 96-degree day, at this point I had enough of the heat in the garage. After taking a few moments to clean the gunk off of some of the chrome parts of the engine, I called it a day and headed in to the house for a badly-needed shower.
 |
 |
 |
 |
I picked up Jeff from BWI airport around 9AM, and after a stop for breakfast, we headed back to my house to change clothes and get to work. After some discussion yesterday with a few friends on the Road King Rider's Forum (one of the best set of helpful riders and wrenchers you will find anywhere), Jeff and I decided to focus on the most likely cause of the problem, the failure of the inner cam bearing. I had discussed this as a leading possibility with Robert, based mainly upon a few horror stories from fellow forum members.
We started by draining the oil from the engine, the tranny, and primary, as all would be replaced anyway. The engine oil was very thick, which was to be expected, but I didn't notice any visible debris in the oil, which I took as a good sign. The tranny fluid surprised me, however...when I removed the drain plug my hand was splashed with a few ounces of water prior to the tranny fluid beginning to drain. The fluid itself was a milky color, confirming that a decent amount of water had been sitting in the tranny pan. Hoping that was merely due to condensation from the long storage period, we moved on to drain the primary and begin the tear-down
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Having decided we would save and re-use the existing stock pushrods, we removed the rocker box covers, the rocker bolts and the pins from the rocker arms themselves. After bagging and tagging the rocker assembly pieces, we removed the pushrods, tagged their location, and moved down to the cam "nose cone."
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
After removing the footboard for easier access, the cam nose cone was next. After removing the bolts and a little wiggling, the cone came right off, and we were looking directly at the cam and drive gears...and confirmed our hunch was correct. The cam gear and pinion gear both had extensive tooth damage, while the nylon breather gear had literally melted in place. Jeff removed the lifter block covers and the lifters to give us a better view into the cam chest:
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Clearly, new cam, breather and pinion gears were now on our replacement parts shopping list. With that determined, it was time to take a look at the likely culprit of this carnage, the inner cam bearing. A slight tug on the cam was all it took to remove it, and it was instantly clear why...there wasn't anything left of the inner bearing but slivers of the bearing race. All of the needle bearings were gone, and we found a considerable number of damaged pieces in the bottom of the cam case. This is a common failure point in Evos, to the point where many owners had their bearings replaced pre-emptively with quality aftermarket (Torrington B-138) bearings to ensure they wouldn't have problems.
 |
 |
 |
 |
With the likely cause of our failure determined, our main concern was damage to the case itself...could we replace the bearing and move forward? Close inspection did show some light damage around the bearing race, and some scarring around the cam clearance machining below...apparently the innermost cam lobe had caught an edge on the clearance before the cam ground to a stop. All in all, the damage could have been much worse. While we can't tell until we get the bearing race out, the damage to actual bearing seat may be minimal.
 |
 |
 |
Here are close-ups of the cam, the broken parts of the breather gear, and some of the needle bearing debris from the bottom of the cam case:
 |
 |
 |
 |
Jeff and I got started around 8AM, deciding to forgo breakfast and save our appetites for an afternoon trip to Five Guys Burgers...if you haven't eaten there, you're missing a treat. Picking up where we left off in the cam case, we began removing the trashed pinion gear. After locking the primary drive chain with the stair-step tool, I put the big wrench on the pinion nut. The instructions in my 1998 Evo Service Manual alerted us that the pinion nut has RIGHT-hand threads, so I grunted and strained to no avail...that nut wasn't budging. Deciding to see if that instruction was in error, we reversed the stair-step tool to lock the drive in the other direction, and Eureka! the nut immediately broke free and turned easily. I suppose the RH threads were a mod between the 1996 and 1998 model years.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
With the cam case clean, we turned our attention to the oil pump. With very little clearance between the oil pump and the transmission housing, we were forced to use manual hex keys...and by the time the bolts were halfway out, there wasn't even clearance for those! I ended up going to a much shorter key, and after some finger cramping finally got a clue and clamped the tip of the key with a pair of vise-grips. After much too long, we had the oil pump off for inspection. While the outside gears seemed fine, turning the pump over told a different story. There was a significant amount of cam bearing debris in the bottom of the pump housing, and the idler gear on that side had several broken teeth. In addition, there was significant scoring of the pump housing along the edge of the idler gear where bearing material had gotten trapped between the gear and the housing. In short, the oil pump was trashed.
The good news here was that between the cam case and the oil pump, we had found a great deal of the trashed cam bearing. The cheap INA cam bearing used after 1992 has only 19 needle rollers, versus 29 for the much better Torrington used in earlier models. We had 8 whole needle bearings, and 13 pieces of bearing, along with pieces of race and broken gear teeth. The trashed idler gear is to the left of the pins, with a close-up in the last photo:
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Since the next stop in oil flow after the pump is the filter, we removed it for inspection. We strained the filter oil through a shop towel to see what it contained, and as you can see, it was mostly fine particulate, save two pieces of larger material. The filter mount had a decent amount of solid debris in it (at the 8 o'clock position in the photo) but mostly the lighweight race material...it appears that the gear teeth and needle bearings were a little too heavy to be pushed easily down the oil line. . For good measure, we cut the oil filer apart and fanned out the paper material. There, we found only small particles, sort of like miniature glitter or silver powder. After flushing out the oil line to catch any possible remaining debris, we moved on.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Taking a break from the oil system, I wanted to get to the bottom of why there had been a decent amount of water contaminating the transmission fluid. I removed the trap door cover and the cause was quickly apparent...the clutch cable had broken off at the threads where it enters the cover. Fortunately, the hollow threaded portion was easily moved, and we were able to simply turn it until it screwed itself through to the inside of the door. A quick snip of the cable, and the cover was ready to accept a new cable assembly. Would that the rest of the engine had been this easy! With the trap door cover back in place, we decided it was a good time to break for lunch.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
After lunch, we didn't feel we could do much more with the Road King until I could get the trashed bearing race out and check for damage. I had begun compiling a list of needed parts to order, and Jeff had several work issues he had to resolve by telephone to keep his folks happy back in Chicago. Feeling we were at a natural break point on the RK, Jeff helped me with a variety of other chores I had to accomplish, including taking photos of a Fat Boy I had just finished customizing and am getting ready to sell. The pictures turned out great, and Nemo the Yorkie got a chance to run around crazily (his favorite thing to do) while we were shooting. If you want to see some of the pics, click here.
With most of the afternoon gone, it was time for Jeff to get ready to fly home. We both took much-needed showers, and after he packed his gear, I drove him out to BWI. Having Jeff's help on this project has made it three times more fun than I ever would have had on my own, and once the needed parts and tools arrive, we're looking forward to scheduling another chance to work together on this great project. Here's a pic of Jeff hard at work on the King:
 |
Since I had to go back to my real job today, I thought it would be a day off from the tear-down...but I'm having too much fun to stay out of the garage for long. Since my bride went out shopping for a couple of hours, I thought I'd see what I could get done.
After seeing how the metal debris had made it out of the cam chest and through the oil pump, with the finer particles making it back to the oil tank, it made sense to proceed with a complete tear down of the engine for a comprehensive inspection and cleaning. Not wanting to get into a major project late in the evening, I settled for marking the cables and hoses, then removing the carburetor and intake manifold to clear the way for top-end disassembly tomorrow.
 |
 |
 |
 |
Friday night I managed the first decent night of sleep I'd had in days, and I felt terrific as a result. Fully charged and rarin' to go, I headed out to the garage with the goal of completing both the top end and primary drive removal before I called it a (half) day and spent some family time. Working without Jeff's help and company was definitely a comparative downer, but I'm still having a blast with this project, so motivation isn't really an issue. Since we had already removed the rockers to get the pushrods out, all I had to do to prep the heads for removal was unscrew the finger-tight bolts on the rocker boxes and remove them. If you're wondering why the (empty) boxes went back on in the first place, Jeff and I took some time just before he left to give the bike a quick wash, which it desperately needed. Accordingly, we needed to replace covers and plug holes to make sure no water got where it shouldn't.
With the rocker boxes removed, I loosened the head bolts 1/8 turn at a time, following the sequence specified in the Service Manual. They quickly became loose enough to finger turn, and it was with some anticipation that I removed the front head...I wasn't sure what I would find there.
As the head came off, there was a significant level of carbon particles covering most of the piston top. Since we had squirted some oil into the cylinders prior to turning the engine by hand (to relieve pressure before removing the rockers) some of that oil, carrying carbon debris, trickled down the front of the cylinder. The head (not surprisingly) held similar debris:
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Removing the rear head exposed similar carbon debris, but only about half of what the front cylinder had:
 |
 |
 |
With the heads safely put aside, it was time to remove the cylinders. Both of them came of cleanly with no hang-ups...always a good sign.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Here are some shots of the pistons, heads and cylinders after cleaning the worst of the carbon deposits off. Both front and rear cylinders showed signs of scoring on the front and rear of each cylinder wall. The sides of the cylinder walls were smooth. Running a finger along the scored portions, the ridges were rounded off instead of sharp. This leads me to believe the scoring was over the long term, and not a result of any sharp debris entering the cylinders. It looks as if the cylinders will need to be honed before they can be used again.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
After cleaning the rest of the heads and removing the old gasket material, they were ready to be put aside until the rebuild.
 |
 |
With the top end broken down, I turned my attention to the primary. The first order of business was to remove the cover:
 |
 |
Next, I loosened and removed the tensioner, clutch hub and compensating sprocket nuts. The chain and sprockets for the drive and clutch come out as a unit, exposing the back of the primary case. A few bolts later, the case comes free, exposing the engine and transmission pinions.
 |
 |
 |
 |
At this point, I decided to call it a day in the garage, hit the showers and head out for a nice meal with my bride. Tomorrow I'll (hopefully) remove and split the cases to inspect and remove any debris. I'll also be removing the remnants of the failed cam bearing so I can inspect the bearing seat. Please keep your fingers crossed that all will be well...case repair/replacement won't likely be cheap!
I started the day by heading to Harbor Freight Tools to return my shop stool...after just a few months, the pneumatic piston simply collapsed through the frame, jarring my back (including two compression fractures of the T-spine) something fierce.
 |
Needless to say, I wasn't happy when I got there. But the HF folks made it right, giving me a full refund along with apologies. Money in hand, I headed to Sam's Club to pick up their version, which I already like better...the wheels roll much more easily and there is a handy parts tray below. After returning home with my new seat, I changed into my grubbies and headed to the garage for what I hoped would be the last day of tear-down.
Having done most of the prep yesterday, there was little to do before removing the engine from the frame. I disconnected the stator wires, pulled the remaining oil lines, and removed the oil filter mount. After removing the bolts that connected the engine to the front motor mount and the transmission, the case assembly was ready to leave the frame for the first time in 12 years. Please pardon the poor quality of some of the pictures, with Jeff gone I have to hold the camera with one hand while appearing to do work with the other!
 |
 |
 |
With the case out of the frame, the bike looked pretty empty...and really, really dirty. I'm looking forward to getting in there and cleaning 12 years of gunk out of all the nooks & crannies.
 |
 |
 |
With the case sitting on the workbench, I was ready to try to remove what was left of the cam bearing...namely just the outer race. Using a tool that I had ordered especially for this job (it just came in the mail yesterday), I carefully inserted the tool, lined it up and screwed on the puller nut. It caught a little...but not nearly enough. After the tool pulled through several times, I figured I should cut my losses and move on to splitting the cases. Perhaps getting a good look at the backside of the seat might reveal a better way to remove the broken race.
 |
 |
 |
Before splitting the cases, the first order of business was to pour the remaining oil out of the cases so I wouldn't end up with a very wet workbench. After that, I went to work on the case bolts and studs. While the bolts that thread into the case broke easily enough, those that go through the case are fitted to the holes to aid in correct case alignment. After 12 years, those puppies are a PAIN to get out. I think I averaged 15 minutes apiece on three of those, and probably went through half a can of PB Blaster. They were so tight I had to use a breaker bar to get them to turn, and I was very worried that one of the bolt heads would shear off. Fortunately enough, they all eventually came free. After working a putty knife around the case seam to loosen the RTV Silicone sealer, the right case came free.
 |
 |
With the right case off, it was much easier to inspect the bearing race. The crankcase side of the bearing seat showed several scores where apparently a needle bearing fragment was caught between the flyhwheel and the case. You can see the scoring creating an arc to the left of the bearing hole in the first two picutres. The race itself appeared to be almost welded into the case, and varied approaches yielded no progress whatsoever. I tried tapping it out, cutting a diagonal with a Dremel to try and start a corkscrew, but nothing would move that puppy...I only succeeded in breaking more of the remaining side pieces off.
 |
 |
 |
Resigning myself that there was nothing more I could do with the tools at hand, I set the other half of the case in a pan to drain the residual oil, and started cleaning up. I'll have to discuss things with Robert so we can determine whether we will try and get this case repaired, or explore other options.
 |
 |
With less and less to do mechanically until we source and buy parts, I'm only spending a couple of hours in the evening working on the bike. Tonight, I decided to finish up the next-to-last step on the cases, which was removing the alternator/stator. The round cover is ringed on the inside with permananet magnets, which are literally all that hold it in place. A determined tug and the cover came free, exposing the stator core. Four torx and two phillips screws later, the stator came free and joined the other engine parts in the "bagged & tagged" bin.
 |
 |
 |
 |
With the stator removed, the case is ready for the flywheels to be pressed out. Since I don't have a hydraulic press, I'll need to take it to a shop to have that done. I also took some time to unbolt the oil pan from underneath the transmission and clean it out. I expected to find some debris sitting at the bottom of the tank, but it was pretty darn clean for a 12-year-old bike. The large hole at the bottom right is the drain hole for the transmission case, which sits directly above the oil pan.
 |
 |
I'll likely spend the next couple of days cleaning the frame little by little...there's a lot of gunk to get to! Check back for more posts periodically, and I'll try to provide estimates of continuation dates as soon as I know. If you have any questions or comments, you can E-mail Me and I'll get back with you shortly. Thanks for spending time sharing in the project, and hopefully we'll be back in the wrenching business very soon!
Though it took longer than I had hoped, the case repair is finally done. The UPS guy dropped it off Friday afternoon, and after spending Saturday up in Gettysburg, Pa for a rather small motorcycle rally, I was ready to start wrenching again.
After unboxing the case, it was good to see that the repair seemed to be in good shape. The first two pics below show the case repair from the gearcase side and the flywheel side. Especially nice to see was that new Timken/Torrington bearing in place. Thought the next two pics are a bit fuzzy, you can see that the new Timken bearing is packed with around 28 rollers, while the cheap INA bearing (I'm holding it for comparison) has only about 18, with flimsy metal spacers between. Those spacers don't age well under the loads of torque that cam undergoes while doing it's job, and it's not a matter of IF they will fail, but WHEN. |
 |
 |
 |
Close inspection of the case shows some harmless souveneirs of the old bearing failure in the form of little pockmarks on the side of the flywheel and the inside of the case. This will hopefully be the last time these are seen for a long while! After coating the case edges with Yamabond, I fitted them together, tapped in brand new case bolts, and torqued them to spec per the Harley manual. Using the side of the gearcase to anchor the Starrett dial guage, I then checked the "runout" of the pinion shaft to make sure it was still turning true...a shaky flywheel will destroy an engine pretty quickly. Satisfied that the crank and pinion were in good shape, I'll let the Yamabond cure thoroughly before cleaning up the excess and moving to the next part of the build.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Editorial note: During the week, I can only spend a few hours a night working on this build, so the narratives from here forward are going to be a bit shorter. Also, I'd like to have more pictures for you, but I can't take "action shots" because I have to hold the camera...tough to do when most component installations are two-handed jobs!
I'm excited to get back in and finally start putting together the part where all the trouble started: the cam case. Robert's Uncle Jeff in Wisconsin was kind enough to donate a matched Cam & Pinion Gear set, along with a stock breather and shims. Unfortunately I won't be able to use the stock breather, as there was some scarring in the breather hole. The good news is the machine shop bored it smooth, and furnished a steel S&S breather gear (.030 oversize) to replace the stock plastic breather.
Evo cams and pinion gears come in "sizes" that are designated by color: red, orange, green, white, etc. Each "size" is only marginally different, and the reason is that not all gearcases are perfectly the same size. The slight variances in cam size allow the builder to fit their cams to the gearcase with just the right amount of tolerance...too large and the cams bind and whine, too small and the cams are loose and clatter. The cam and pinion gear Jeff sent us were in the "white" size range, so I measured the old cam (using the proper .108 measuring pins) to see how close the new cam and pinon gear were to the original:
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
As it turns out, both the cam and pinion gear were nearly dead-on with the stock items: Less than .002 difference between the diameters, and .003 on the lengths. This was great news, as we shouldn't have to worry about gear fitment at all for this build.
With the fitment issue resolved, I set the cam loosely in the gearbox, and turned my attention to the breather, shown in the second photo below. The breather gear sits sandwiched between the lip of the breather hole, and a flat area on the inside of the gearbox cover. Ideally, there should be the smallest of gaps between the front of the breather gear and that flat, just enough to ensure the breather spins freely without excessive front/back play. To achieve this, the breather comes with a set of precision shim washers. Using a feeler guage and a straight edge, I measured the gap and chose the correct spacer (I actually used both hands to measure, but I had to hold the camera for the photo).
 |
 |
 |
The cam is also shimmed (called a "thrust washer") to achieve precision alignment. Since the bearing hole had been welded to repair it, I knew the stock shim would likely no longer be the correct size. Sure enough, the stock shim (.065 thick) thrust the cam gear edge out in front of the breather and pinion gears about .020. I bought a thinner shim (.040) and it lined up the gear fronts well, but with the gearcase cover on, there was too much endplay. To solve this, I ordered custom-sized shim for the front of the cam to get exactly the right amount of endplay. The first photo below shows a side-by-side comparison of the two thrust washers. The second photo shows the cam and breather installed and aligned properly with each other (note the dot and lines on the cam and gears).
 |
 |
With the cam and breather squared away, I turned my attention to installing the oil pump. You'll recall the gears and body of the original oil pump were trashed by the bearing needle rollers and cage debris being sucked into the pump. This is a completely new oil pump, which we were lucky to get a pretty darn good price on. Installation was fairly straightforward, with the most difficult part trying to thread the drive gear, the super-small gear key, and it's lock ring onto the oil pump shaft end. Even with the cam and breather removed, there just wasn't much room to maneuver my fat fingers in there, but after several tries, that little sucker went on. After that, it was simply a matter of sliding the internal and external gears and keys on to the shaft and fitting the oil pump gaskets on the body.
 |
 |
 |
 |
With a lot accomplished for a weeknight, I put the tools away and headed for a hot shower and some needed sack time.
With the gearbox closed up and the oil pump installed, The only thing left to do before installing the engine case back into the frame is re-mount the cylinder studs. As we had marked all of them with their original positions when we removed them, it's simply a matter of a little red loctite, a torque wrench, and some double-nutting to re-install them.
 |
 |
 |
 |
With the cylinder studs intstalled and protected by rubber hose segments, it's now time to mount the engine case back into the bike frame. Since the cases are not lightweight, I had to use two hands for most of this operation, and thus you only get the "after" pictures...sorry! Once the case was dropped in and the engine mount bolts (back, to the transmission, front, to the rubber mount) were in place, I installed the oil filter mount. Using new hose clamps, I then connected the oil lines to their proper positions. Since clearances were pretty tight around the compression fitting at the bottom of the oil pump, this took a little longer than I thought...you don't make much progress 1/8th of a turn at a time!
 |
 |
 |
Well, today I'm officially another year older...though I'm not sure how much wiser. Since workdays put us both home late, Whitney and I have decided to celebrate my birthday Saturday, so this evening I'm in the garage again, turning wrenches...which for me is a pretty good birthday anyway! Now that the cases are in place, it's starting to feel like I'm building a motorcycle, and that's a great feeling. Tonight's mission was to install the primary drive, which transfers power from the engine to the transmission. I started by mounting the back of the primary case, which involved jacking up the joint between the rear of the engine and the front of the transmission in order to align the two just right. Then, after first sealing the mounting holes with RTV silicone so they won't leak primary fluid, I installed the mounting bolts. During the process of tightening, one of the bottom bolts never really caught...it appears these threads had been stripped at some point. Once the case back was tightened to spec, I installed the starter jackshaft, the alternator stator, and stator cover.
 |
 |
 |
 |
With the stator and jackshaft in place, I tightened the starter bolts to the case back, and then installed the drive, clutch, and chain tensioner as one unit. At this point, I had a moment of trepidation. There are three thrust (spacing) washers that were part of the primary drive. I knew one went behind the stator cover (already installed) and this left two more, one very thick and one less thick. I'm using a 1998 Harley-Davidson Service Manual as my guide to this build, and it only shows one washer outside the stator...the spacing washer that aligns the primary drive chain with the clutch hub. Where did the other washer go, and which one was the correct spacing washer? Figuring I could always correct it later (it's easy to get into the primary) I used the thinner washer as the spacer. The other washer fit nicely in the clutch hub, so that's where I put it until I can get down to a service shop that has a Harley manual for the 1996 models. This would prove to be a mistake I would later regret.
After torquing the respective hubs to spec, I moved on to adjust the primary chain tensioner to the proper amount of chain play, then tightened that down. Using a brand-new James gasket, it was time to put the chrome cover in place and call the primary done! The empty frame is starting to look like a motorcycle, which only motivates me more to get this project off the lift and onto the road.
 |
 |
 |
With the cam and gearbox in place, the engine was ready for installation of the pushrod lifters. Since these hydraulic lifters have been soaking in clean oil since they were removed, putting them in means my hands were soaked in oil until the job was finished...meaning I couldn't pick up the camera! Unfortunately, all you get is the "after" picture of the lifter block covers once they were tightened down.
Next, I got to move from the bottom end of the engine and start to build the top end. First up are the pistons. After checking to make sure the ring gaps were within spec, and that the gaps were aligned in the proper offset, I aligned the piston holes with the pushrod holes and attempted to push in the wrist pins. Even with a ton of lubrication, I could not press these in by hand. Rather than spend $60 on a professional wrist pin installer tool, I used a $1.69 worth of parts (long bolt, nut and a bunch of thick washers) to make one. Lots of wrench turns later, the wrist pins slid into place as easily as could be.
After double-checking the ring gaps were still in their proper places, I oiled up the pistons and cylinders, wrapped a ring compressor around the rings, and slid the cylinders down over the pistons. The cylinders dropped down easily, and seated well on the James cylinder base gaskets. I dropped the two head gaskets on top of the cylinders, and set the heads into place before calling it a night, as by now it was almost midnight. Tomorrow I should be able to bolt the heads in and install the intake manifold and carburetor.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Friends, once again this section will be a bit sparse on pictures...I've been too absorbed in getting things done to take as many as I should. Today I started by installing the head bolts and torquing the entire head/cylinder assembly to Harley specifications. The head bolts have to be installed using a VERY specific and incremental procedure, torquing them a little at a time and in a specific order. This is because you are seating both the cylinder base gaskets and the head gaskets with one procedure, and thus must proceed carefully in order to ensure you get evenly distributed pressure. Overtorquing one side can lead to warpage of the parts as well.
After stepping through the proper head bolt torque sequence, I'm now ready to install the intake manifold and the carburetor. This is a fairly straightforward procedure, except that the bolts can be hard to get to. After installing new rubber gaskets on the manifold ends, I used both hand hex-keys and ball-head hex sockets to tighten the manifold in place. Another new gasket over the manifold intake, and the carburetor bolted right back on. Since this carburetor had spent three years essentially frozen in place, I spent some time cleaning and lubricating all the pivot points and spring assemblies until everything moved as it should.
The braided throttle and idle cables were next to go on, but once again three years of sitting had made them difficult to move. Using a can of Cable Life lubricant and a pressure injector tool, I lubed the internal cable wires until they pulled freely. It was a bit of a messy operation, I think about 80% of what I sprayed ended up on my hands and shirt, but eventually enough lubricant got where it was supposed to go. That done, I connected the cables to the throttle wheel of the carb, and adjusted the cable tension at the handlebars.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Tuesday I will depart the DC area for Chicago, where I will hook up with my friend Jeff. Wednesday morning, we're off to Sturgis! We'll get there Wednesday night. We decided to go a few days BEFORE the rally officially begins, as the riding in the Black Hills is AMAZING and it just gets too crowded to enjoy the ride during official rally week. We'll be coming back on Sunday August 3rd, but I have a business trip to the Florida Panhandle starting the next day, so I won't get back to this project until the weekend of August 8th. I hope many of you are headed to the rally as well, and I'll post back in a couple of weeks!
We'll, we made it home safely from Sturgis, and what a great time! Even though some mechanical difficulties (Jeff's front wheel was eating bearings) limited our riding after the second day, we still had an incredible experience in the Black Hills. For those who don't know me, I am in the Air Force (25 years now) and my very first assignment was to Ellsworth Air Force Base in Rapid City, SD...just 30 miles from Sturgis. It was there, in 1984, that I first attended the Rally, and that is where I caught the Harley bug. Though it was many years before I could afford to take the plunge, that experience of being 19 years old and seeing a river of chrome down Main Street never left me. Sturgis has held a special place in my heart ever since, and every trip back has been magic.
But now that I'm home, it's time to get back to work and finish up this puppy, and my first task today is to install the rocker box bases.
I started by aligning the James gaskets in place on top of each cylinder head. Next, I inserted the pushrods into the corresponding holes in the head assembly, all the way down to their individual holes in the lifter blocks. The pushrods are different lengths, and are thus color-coded to make sure they go in the correct locations. I also labeled each one as we removed them from the engine during disassembly, and thankfully my lables and the color codes agreed.
Once the pushrods were in place, I set the rocker box bases and rocker assemblies in place. The bases and assemblies go in together, as there isn't clearance to get them in separately, at least on the rear head. With a little jiggling, everything settled in to the proper positions. After rotating each cylinder to get both pushrods on the base circle of the cam, I torqued the mounting bolts to spec. Each pushrod did what it was supposed to, which is initially be frozen until the lifters had a little time to bleed down, after which they could be hand-turned with some drag.
A couple of the bolts in very low-clearance areas required the use of a special flat wrench that attaches to the torque wrench. In order to achieve the correct torque, it's important that that flat tool be at a 90-degree angle to the torque wrench shaft when tightening the bolts. With that done, I installed the top rocker box covers, then coated the spark plug threads with anti-zieze compound and installed them into the heads. With a few minutes left before bedtime, I also installed the air cleaner backplate on the carburetor, noting that the breather hose assembly had been left off of the bike when I got it. Making a mental note to pick up a new breather hose and fittings, I decided to call it a night.
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Now that the major parts of the engine build are complete, it's time to bolt on the pipes, get some fuel to this puppy and see if she'll fire up! It's no secret that the stock header assembly is a royal pain in the a$$ to install, and since this particular set of pipes was a bit rusty, it was even more fun. I started with the front cylinder exhaust pipe. After installing the James gasket, the front pipe and flange went on pretty easily, and it was just a matter of back-and-forth tightening to get'er snugged up right. I then installed the support bracket at the rear of the pipe, as it would have to be stable and solid in order for me to work the connecting pipes onto it.
With the pipe support bracket tightened up, I coated the pipe end with hi-temp gasket maker to guard against air leakage that can cause "popping," especially during deceleration. Now it was time to tackle the rear pipe and associated crossover. Harley uses a "Y" pipe to join the rear cylinder to not only it's own muffler, but to provide cross-flow to the front cylinder's pipe/muffler as well. While this design is more efficent than two separate pipes, it's a whole lot more of a pain to install, as the crossover pipe must be attached to the front pipe at the same time you are lining it up with the rear exhaust port. This sometimes requires some gymanastics, especially when the pipe ends are rusted, as these are. But after a lot of contorting, and a few whacks with a rubber mallet, all seemed to be lined up, and I was able to tighten down the flange on the rear cylinder as well. More gasket maker and some clamp tightening, and the mufflers were in place, hanging from their corresponding brackets at the rear of the bag rails.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
With the pipes and mufflers in place, I installed the fuel tank (without tightening down the mounting bolts), connected the fuel crossover line, connected the fuel petcock to the carburetor fuel line, and finally the tank vent hose. Tank in place, (temporarily, in case I needed to get back into the engine) it was time to add fuel to the tank, oil to the engine, and actually try to fire this thing up!
I opened the fuel line, connected the battery, and made sure the bike was in neutral before firing it up. Since it had been so long since the bike was run, I shot a little starting fluid into the carburetor to help get things moving. That done, I said a little prayer, and hit the starter button.
The good news was the engine cranked just fine, and even coughed to a couple of burps of life (no doubt due to the starter fluid). The bad news: it didn't actually start, nor even make an honest effort beyond those couple of burps. Going back to the basics my dad taught me as a teen: "if an ordinarily running engine won't start, it can only be one of three things--air, fuel, or spark. Check them first." Since the burps indicated the engine was getting spark, I immediately suspected the problem was fuel. A quick removal of the fuel line at the carb showed it was bone dry...the gas in the tank clearly wasn't making it through the petcock into the fuel line.
I removed the tank and set it on it's side so gas wouldn't leak everywhere (though some found it's way out anyway). Pulling the petcock, I took it apart and discovered that was vacuum-actuated...it doesn't flow fuel unless there is a vacuum generated by engine that makes it's way via a hose off of the carburetor. Taking the petcock apart, it was clear the rubber diaphragm in the vacuum chamber that opened the fuel path was stuck in the closed position. Three years of sitting will do that! I cleaned the diaphragm, coated it with silicone spray lubricant, and re-installed the petcock.
Tank back on, I hooked up the lines and tried again...still no fuel flow. Since an aftermarket petcock can be had for about $25 WITHOUT a vacuum feature, I figured I'd cut my losses and pick one up on Monday.
After getting home from work and taking Nemo the Wonder Yorkie out for his daily constitutional, I headed over to see Ed at MDO Modern Cycles in Gaithersburg, MD. Ed is a good guy, and always has stories to tell while he's digging up a part. I picked up a new gravity-feed petcock, and a breather hose for the air cleaner backplate. He didn't have the breather fitting I needed in stock, so he sent me down the street to a place I hadn't been before...Jackman Custom Cycles. Jackman's is a true custom-builder shop, and they also have a very loyal contingent of local riders who bring their bikes in for service. While the owner, Jerry, was still at Sturgis, the guys who stayed behind to mind the store were VERY helpful, not only digging up the fitting I needed, but breaking out the 1996 Service Manual to help me find the correct locations for the primary thrust washers I had "guessed" at in mid-July. Making a mental note of the great service, I headed home, knowing I would definitely do business with these guys in the future.
Once home, it was a few minutes work to replace the rusted factory vacuum petcock with the shiny chrome gravity-feed one I had just bought. I also installed the breather fitting and hose and opened the primary.
 |
My goal was to recover my misplaced thick thrust washer and move it to where it belonged, which was where I had put the thinner one instead. What I discovered was that when I torqued down the clutch basket, I had set that washer in the close-fitting hole but good...it would not budge. Since my new friends at Jackman's had specialized puller tools and hydraulic press if needed, I temporarily put the primary back together so I could see if my fuel problem had been solved.
Primary components back in place, I opened the new petcock and once again hit the starter. After just a few cranks, the engine fired up strong! Not wanting to run it with a mis-aligned primary, I immediately shut it off, removed the clutch basket, and dropped it off at Jackman's the next morning.
While Jackman's couldn't get to my clutch basket/frozen washer on Tuesday, by close of business Wednesday they called me with good news...the washer was free! Coming from work, I couldn't get there before they closed, so I picked up my basket and wayward washer this morning before I went to work. After filing down the washer's rough edges, installing the assembly just took a few minutes. I adjusted the primary chain tension, and once again prepared to hit the starter button.
Crank, crank, crank, crank...VROOOOM! The motor came to life, and sounded as smooth as it could be. Friends, I don't think I'll ever get over that feeling of euphoria you get when a major project comes together and you finally hit the moment of truth...and everything WORKS! While there are still lots of things to check, and many test miles to put on the bike, I allowed myself a little fist-pumping before buttoning the primary back up. Here's the video--it's a big file, so click the round blue arrow and be patient while it loads:
| Launch in external player |
The bike ran well when cold and with the enrichener engaged. As it began to warm up, performance went down. While I know that two of the lifters are on their way out and need replacing, at this point the rough running feels more like the carb needs some fine-tuning, which is outside of my skill set (all of my bikes to date have been EFI). I'll have to update Robert and see if he wants to have me take it to Jackman's for a once-over. Here's the video of the first ride (click the blue arrow to start):
| Launch in external player |
I awakened early, and decided to run the bike by Jackman's to see what Jerry's thoughts were on the carb tuning. Since Jackman's is about 18 miles away, it also provided a good chance to take the bike for it's first real ride...around my block yesterday didn't really count. The bike started quietly, which is different than what I'm used to on my (much higher compression) bike. Instead of a strong BAM! and the engine roaring to life, this engine just sort of turns on quietly, you have to listen to avoid overcranking the starter. As I pulled onto the road, the bike ran fairly well overall, but there was still some of the hesitation on accel/popping on decel that I had noticed yesterday. As I put a few miles behind me, however, the engine smoothed out considerably, the hesitation became much more intermittent, and the decel also quited down significantly. Cleary the bike just needed to warm up thoroughly, which is not surprising considering many of those parts haven't moved for over three years.
One thing I did notice was the shifter arm would stick in the down position each time I downshifted, and I would have to manually raise it with the side of my foot after each downshift. That shifter arm is normally spring-loaded, but apparently something was sticking somewhere and would need a look. The ride to Jackman's was otherwise uneventful, the engine ran smoothly overall and just settled in and enjoyed the cool, sunny morning.
Jerry had the shop opened by the time I arrived, and came out to take a look at the bike. Carb tuning is something he knows very well, and he gave me the "worst case" estimate of two hours labor if he had to pull the carb bowl, but less than that for a simple adjustment. He also told me that shifter spring is deep inside the transmission. Since replacement of that spring involves pulling the entire tranny gear assembly, on Jerry's recommendation I will try lubricating and re-setting every friction point in the shifter linkage before even thinking about major transmission work.
While we were talking, I noticed a few drops of oil on the ground below the right side of the engine. The oil was coming from the chrome nose cone that holds up the outside of the cam, which indicated that the cam seal was bad. This make sense, as that seal took a lot of force when that cam bearing failed, and then it just sat and dried out for the three years since. While replacing that bushing will require removing the pipes again, it's fairly small potatoes when compared to all the work this engine has undergone. Overall, I'm pretty happy at this point that most of the remaining issues seem manageable, and that the bike rides smoothly even before the carb tuning.
After riding home and letting the bike cool down, I was going to start the process of removing the exhaust all over again so I could get the cam cover off. When I went to do this, I noticed something curious: the cam cover was actually warmer than the engine cylinder fins! Somehow, a lot of heat is being generated in the gear case, so that is definitely something I need to check out.
I thought I'd get cracking right away on some of the remaining issues, namely the cam cover heating/oil leak and the sticking shifter. I pulled the cam cover, and using a small slide hammer, removed the oil seal. The rubber sealing ring had become hard and somewhat brittle, and I found three cracks in the material that told me this was my culprit. Taking the opportunity of having the cover off the bike, I inspected the cam bushing that the seal sits behind. This bushing is what holds the outboard end of the cam up, and thus is critical to reliable engine operation.
 |
 |
As you can see in the first picture above, the bushing has a hole in the side that allows oil in, so the cam end floats on a thin film of lubricant instead of wearing down the bushing material. As you can see in the second picture, the oil hole in the bushing is not lined up with the oil hole in the cam cover. This means that when the engine cam bearing failed, the cam spun the bushing much like it spun the bearing race in the engine case at the other end. The mis-aligned holes meant the bushing wasn't getting as much oil as it should, and might also indicate that the bushing was loose enough to still be spinning in the case. A spinning bushing would readily explain why the cam cover had been heating up, as that's a lot of friction. Since the bushing must be removed or installed using a hydraulic press (which I don't have), I set the cam cover aside to take to Jerry's shop in the morning.
Moving on to the shifter, I removed the linkage that connects the shifter pedal to the transmission. There was quite a bit of rust in the joints, so I sprayed both ends with liberal amounts of Liquid Wrench. Not surprisingly, the fluid was coming out dark brown as it floated a lot of that rust right out of the joints. Re-mounting the linkage, I found the sticking problem much improved...the shifter arm returned to the normal position after each shift. It's still a touch tight on the downshift, but compared to pulling the entire tranny to replace a spring, I think it is very manageable.
 |
 |
 |
 |
I dropped off the cam cover with Jerry before heading in to work for the day. As I was getting off work, I called to check on what he had found...and it wasn't the best news. That bushing had popped out with almost no pressure applied at all, and thus likely had been spinning in the cover. Fitting a new bushing in a cover that had been worn like that would only encourage failure, so replacing the entire cam cover was the best option. A new one is about $160, but Jerry had a take-off in good shape he let me have for half of that, which was very helpful.
Once I got back in the garage, I set the new cam cover in place and tightened the bolts. As I was doing so, it was readily apparent that the new cover, not worn like the old one, was going to be a tight fit. This meant I would likely need to replace the cam shim washer to bring the cam endplay back into tolerance. This is not great news from a time standpoint, as it means I would have to remove the gas tank and rocker assemblies in order to relieve the pressure on the cam so I could remove it to change the shim. It's tough to get a setback like that when you feel you are so very close to finishing, but it's also not something you want to leave to chance...a too-tight or binding cam can lead right down the road to another engine failure. With that in mind, I started the tear-down, and got the rockers boxes off before calling it an evening. I won't post any pictures here, just refer to the first four pictures from August 9th to see what the engine would look like at this stage. The silver lining in this situation is I wanted to replace the worn lifters with new ones, and tearing the top end back down gave me the room to do that. I dropped the new lifters in clean oil to allow them to charge the hydraulic mechanism overnight, and headed for bed.
 |
 |
With the rockers off, I could pull the lifters and remove the cam easily. The good news is that with the old cam cover, the cam gear (with the stock shim) was actually sticking out in front of the other gears just slightly when set to the correct endplay. This was likely due to a combination of the case repair surface not being perfectly flat, and the worn cam bushing at the other end. Using the new cover, I used a slightly thinner shim that lined up the cam gear evenly with the breather and pinion gears, as it should be. With the cam cover back on, the binding was no longer a problem, and the endplay tolerance was at the upper end of the allowable limits. Since the case repair isn't perfectly flat, I had to measure endplay from the closest point to the cam. Feeling much better about the long-term survivability of the engine, I installed the new lifters, and re-installed the lifter blocks, pushrods & covers, rocker boxes, and gas tank. I also re-installed the exhaust system, saying a litle prayer that it would be the last time.
Though it was past 10PM, I couldn't resist starting the bike up to make sure all was running, and even took it out for a 5-mile ride. I had experimented with the ignition timing a bit, thinking that might be the issue with the engine running a bit rough, but the timing I set actually did not work as well as the previous setting. Since Jerry is the expert on this, tomorrow, I'll drop the bike off at Jackman's for ignition/carb tuning.
 |
 |
 |
Having dropped off the bike early Wednesday morning, I didn't expect it to get done on the same day, so yesterday was a wash. When I got home from work today, I called Jerry's shop to find the bike was finished. I hopped in the truck and headed over to pick it up, but the normally 35-minute drive was jammed up with rush-hour traffic, and I didn't make it there until just a few minutes after they had closed and left. As I am traveling to the Boston area early tomorrow morning, the bike will have to wait until Monday. I will be seeing Robert on this trip, and it will be nice to get him caught up on what's going on with the build...though I have to admit there isn't much information that this blog doesn't cover.
(pick up bike from Jackman's)
200 miles of test rides...no problems!
| Launch in external player |
| Launch in external player |