I found out what the popping noise is...it's the front caliper. As soon as I loosened the top bolt, I heard that same popping noise. Seems like there is too much play in the caliper holes and when I apply the front brake the caliper is slamming against the bolt.

I can recreate it every time by going back and forth with the bike applying the brake backing it up, then going forward and applying the brake within a foot of distance. If I keep going forward and reapply the brake, I don't hear it. Not until I reset it back to neutral by going backwards, which I hear the pop then too.

But for some reason, I guess because of the vibration and movement going down the road, it gets reset back to neutral and when I apply the brake it happens almost every time while riding...does that make sense?

I tried tightening the bolts different ways, top dominant, bottom dominant, neutral, and also I removed the ABS bracket all together, and it still happens. I hope HD sees this as much of an issue as I do.

 

My 14 Sb does the same thing, sounds like a cicada. There was a thread on this a couple days ago a few pages back. Consensus was that its normal and I'd have to agree. I don't mind a slight sound from the brakes as long as stopping power isn't affected.

 

I looked over the service manual, and I think it may be a good idea to check that the brake pad mounting pin is torqued to spec and that the pads are on the locator springs. It seems like there's some back and forth play that shouldn't be happening. The pad pin bolt is just above the harley logo. That gets torqued to 15 ft lbs. The caliper bolts get torqued to about 30 ft lbs, so they really shouldn't move at all.