While riding my 06 Dyna with 16,000 miles yesterday I heard a whining noise upon deceleration only in 1st gear. The noise only happened 3 times during a 130 mile ride. Today we had to ride home another 130 miles and the noise became more frequent as the trip progressed. Now it made the noise upon acceleration also but much more pronounced while downshifting . Noise goes away completely when coasting in neutral clutch in or out. By the time we got home it was growling. All this in two days. Had a Baker inner primary bearing installed 2,500 miles ago even though the bike had no problem. Just didnt want to have the issue. Bike performs fine, no shifting or engine problems just sounds horrible. Not moving the bike anymore. Taking the primary cover off to take a look. What should I look for?

 

The obvious place to start is with the Baker bearing; pull the primary and check the bearing for any roughness. It doesn't take much to make a lot of noise. If that checks out, move on to the main shaft bearing.

 

Inner primary bearing is toast after 2,500 miles. Main shaft bearing seems fine. Not too happy that we did all that work over the winter to avoid this very issue and it got me anyway. I guess the Baker bearing isnt the answer to the reoccurring IPM problem. Not sure if we should go back to the HD bearing and just be very careful when installing the retaining ring or research another bearing. Just want to be back in the saddle with peace of mind. Thanks for your input.

 

How was the primary chain tension, too tight?

 

The Primary chain tension was correct. Almost wish that was the answer. Not cool riding a bike that can go down with little warning especially when you do a lot of long distance trips.

 

The S&S IPB race with the OEM bearing works well but not available for the '06 Dyna models; touring and softail models only. All ***** makes a bearing similar to the Baker unit; same concept but not sure if it's available for the '06 Dyna models.

I know what you mean about not to happy. I had an annoying drip from the IPB on my '02 FLHT which was repaired but I didn't replace all the seals while at it and a few months later, back in to replace the mainshaft/5th gear seal. Apparently, when I made that repair, I got careless and didn't tape off the mainshaft splines prior to installing the inner primary housing and nicked that seal; it started dripping immediately. So, the third time in, I got all the leaks stopped. The upside is that anything wrong on the inner primary side doesn't bother me anymore; I can get in and out in a hurry.

 

Its a shame when you've had to do a repair so often that you can tear the bike down in record time. The bearing, race and seal cost under 50 bucks but its the not knowing when its gonna go thats the issue. Got too much money into this bike to sell it. Besides, just not right to pull one over on another biker who isnt aware of the 06 Dyna design errors.

 

Not coincidental IMO that the IPB bearing failures started with the '06 Dyna and then '07 everything else Big Twin, and continues to be an issue even today. I blame the 6 speed tranny, not the IPB, which performs beautifully in earlier 5 speed models.

I still run the original bearing in my almost 14 year old bike ( with a 5 speed!.)

 

The All ***** race-less IPB will not fit an '06 Dyna, according to All *****. Probably cause it's much wider than the Baker High-Torque due to being a double-row bearing. Only fits 5-speeds anyway.

I had catastrophic failure of the OEM race/bearing on my '04 Dyna a year & half ago, & replaced it with an All ***** one-piece IPB. Has worked perfectly since with 10K miles so far.

Just out of curiosity, did you remove either of the side shields on the sealed Baker bearing at install, to maximize lube to the bearing? Seems odd that it would fail so quickly.

 

The shields were removed before installation and the bearing appeared to be well lubed upon removal. Wish we could find something we did wrong rather than coming to the ugly possibility that I need to replace the case because my bike was produced in Feb 06 and therefore has no dowel pins for true alignment. HD supposedly corrected that design error by July 06. Love my bike but thats a lot of work and expense.