Hey guys,

Posted a few days ago about the noise my bike was making (that I suspected may have been coming from a lifter going bad).

Anyway had some time yesterday and pulled the lifters out to have a look. Good news is they are intact, no pieces broken off. There is some wear on one of the rollers and also some wear on one of the camshaft lobes (the rear- most is the only one I can see so far). The lifters do roll smoothly and don't feel gritty. But the rollers also seem to have a fair amount of play from side to side.

I drained the oil to check for metal parts and the oil is clean. Looks like she wet sumped on me though so a good portion of the oil is in the crankcase and camchest, so I'm not able to look at all of the oil right now. She has wet sumped on me after sitting for a very short period of time a couple of times now so I guess I need to replace the check valve ball and spring and maybe something else I'm not thinking of. I'm also going to take Spanners advice and replace my oil lines while I've got her torn down.

Fortunately the top of the motor had plenty of oil in it when I pulled the rocker covers so I don't think lack of oil flow was causing the noise I was hearing.

So regardless of whether the worn lifter and cam was the source of the noise it's definitely time at 70,000 miles to replace the lifters anyway and I've been jonesin to try one of those EV 27 cams for a while anyway.

For all of you Evo gurus out there does it look like this worn lifter and the worn cam lobe could have been making noise at this point or is there maybe something else lurking too? At this point she doesn't smoke or use oil so although I'm going to do the top end eventually I don't want to tear it apart just to look for something right now.

At this point I'm planning to replace the cam and lifters. I don't want adjustable pushrods so I think I'm sticking with the ones already in there. The bearing surfaces look smooth on them, although there are rough spots at the end of the shaft (not on the ball at the end) on a couple of them. You have to look real close but they are there. I don't think this should be a problem but I don't know for sure. Do you guys think they should be replaced too or does the location of the roughness make it a non-issue?

From what I have seen the cam bearing is usually not an issue on these bikes (1988 FLHTC) so I will probably leave that. Otherwise I will inspect the breather gear, etc and replace as necessary.

Sorry for the long winded post but anything else I should be looking to replace while I'm in there? And would this level of wear typically be causing a tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap noise while going down the road? (Doesn't do it at idle)

 

I would replace the bearing and push rods while in there (70,000 miles + putting a bigger cam in), it would suck to have to go back in.

just my 2 cents.

 

You still have the "good" inner bearing in 88, I believe. I would just put new lifters and a cam in. That was probably the source of your noise. My lifters and cam were in about the same condition and replaced at 67,750 miles.

 

For what the bearing and push rods cost. I would do them all and take no chances. I did and was very happy with everything. Heck next time u have to take it apart is going to be a while to do it complete ...

 

There is nothing wrong with your pushrods...that cam and those lifters are stuffed though!

Doesn't take a huge lump out of a cam to make a bad noise but I am not completely convinced that there isn't another cause for this noise.....I might only be saying that because I haven't heard the noise at first hand so don't go getting all despondent on me.

Put it back together again and it might be fine (I hope it is) but there is a slight chance you have another issue going on. Any chance you could post a pic of the ends of your rockers that bear down on the ends of the valve stems?

 

Oh yeah....do the bearing, even if there is a Torrington already in there.....for what it costs it makes sense to replace it.

 

I agree, it's possible there are 2 separate issues causing a noise. I've put away my toys for tonight and sitting down to eat so I'll post pics of the bearing parts of the rocker arms on my next day off (I work the next 2 and I work LLLLONNNNGGGG days).

Thanks for the advice everyone. I should have known not to ask about the bearing...I agree for what it costs I should and will do it. It's just that I'm doing most of these things for the first time so there is always a possibility that I'll screw something up and make it worse.

I'll do a search about this but while we're on the subject should I use a blind hole puller to get the bearing out and can I install the bearing using a socket and tapping it in?

Thanks...

 

Your on the right path ... i agree with spanners as usual and believe your cam and rollers are just worn and need replacement . Your pics. show normal wear and some metal partical displacement on the bearing running surfaces that is normal for a 25 year old bike.
I would go for replacement of ...
Cam to modern available cam.
Cam brgs.
Lifters
Lifter blocks
High quality oil and filter.
Carb. update for performance with better cam.

 

You can get the bearing out with a blind hole puller and you can, but I don't endorse this, get the new one in with a socket and some impact quite easily......heat the hole up first though and listen for the change in tone that lets you know it is seated.....it is not difficult to smack it through the back of the crankcase so go easy on it.

 

make sure you check the up/down movement on the lifter roller...I had one go out on a TC and you couldn't tell it was bad unless you took a caliper and measured the reading from the top of the lifter to the bottom of the roller...when I pushed the caliper up, the roller moved up....had scarred the cam lobes......