I took my ‘97 Road King for a nice run to the S.F. Bay Area. It was dad’s birthday, followed by Mother’s Day, followed by my oldest daughter’s birthday. They all live up there and I’m south of L.A. Two days skirting the coast on my way up with camping in Morro Bay, followed by four days of bouncing between family in the east bay, S.F., and the peninsula, and then running the bike for about eight hours for a straight shot to home down the 101 and the 60. It’s been a while since I’ve had decent saddle time on the Road King. I have an M8 Softail that I have been mostly riding lately around SoCal. It’s a really fun bike that wants to be hammered and ridden hard. It’s a hoot, and a different animal than the Evo Road King. So I was coming back to the Road King with fresh eyes. And she is a real sweetheart. The previous owner added a Mikuni pumper, EV27, and Thunderheader. In the past I have pushed this bike to try to exploit the performance upgrades and wring as much out of her as I could, and it’s been fun to ride the bike like that. For this trip I took it easier, just cruising between 70-80. I have recently put the fork fang wind deflectors on the bike and highway pegs. This was my first road trip with the fork fangs and they really do smooth things out. The front end feels more planted than before but still light, and as always the bike handles great and feels nimble. The windshield buffeting is greatly reduced. The camping gear and travel stuff loaded on the bike seem to have very little effect on how the bike rides; the bike carries extra gear and weight effortlessly.
I think that taking an easier approach to riding this bike has given me a better feel for the cam. I have usually ridden the bike hard and hammered the throttle to bring out power from the EV27, and I was feeling the bump in power that happens in the low mids and build in to the high revs. The power surge is cool, but it was bugging me that I wasn’t getting it in the lows. Now, with a steady but gentler roll-on and letting the bike settle at an overall slower speed, the cam and the bike over all work better. The bike does have good power, but it’s for spirited cruising rather than spirited racing. I’m sure that what I am saying is obvious to many people, but I feel that the ride was a bit of a revelation, and I like and appreciate this bike more than before. The bike is getting nicely sorted with the fork fangs and highway peg additions. The two things to sort out next are the oil blow-by coming from the air cleaner. This is not a problem when riding around town, but it is a thing when running the bike on the highway for a while. I keep my motor oil level just a little above the fill line, so I suspect that it’s something other than having too much oil in the oil tank. The other is poor gas mileage, averaging in the low 30’s mpg. The Mikuni has great response, but hopefully I can tune it for better mpg.

 

You should probably keep the oil level a tad low instead of a tad high. Might help with the oil mess around the air cleaner. You can buy a collector can for that or route the oil somewhere else. As far as gas mileage goes, ease off the throttle a bit and maybe you'll get better mileage. You might want to pick up a Ninja or a Hayabusa and beat on that instead.

carl

 

I was thinking he might want to hit enter a few times.

 

My 95 Dyna likes to spit a little oil when I run on the highway. I found it only did it when I filled the oil to the full mark. Lowering the oil level to 3/4 full fixed it.

 

Same here, half way between low and full is the sweet spot on mine.

 

Thank you for your input. I think my saying “fill line” is misleading. I meant to say that I run the oil at the “add line”. This is where it’s it now. It was a little higher than this when I left for the forementioned trip, 1,000 miles ago.



The bike has an Arlen Ness air cleaner. I don’t know if it is possible to reroute the oil breather lines with this setup as the Arlen Ness backing / mounting plate looks like it has an internal channel to take the oil from the heads bolts to a port at the carb’s intake throat, if that makes sense. At least that’s what it looks like to me.




It seems like an elegant design, a nice clean setup, but it gets a little messy.

*Sorry for the long run-on block of text in my original post. I had just gotten home from the ride back, pounded a few beers, and felt like sharing and didn’t think about the typing. Cheers

 

Looks like you're running with the oil low. The next line is Cold Full and the one above that is Hot Full so you can really see how much it expands from cold to hot. As for the oil in the filter and crankcase pressure, how old are the umbrella valves in the Rocker Boxes?
You really do need to vent to atmosphere or even a catch can instead of constantly feeding it it's own excrement.
The fuel mileage is a nature of the beast thing I'm afraid with that carb but what do have for gearing? I went from a 32 tooth front pulley to a 34 tooth and it dropped the rpms at 70 by a lot. In fact the sweet spot is 80 mph and I don't notice a big low speed difference other than 1st, you have to wind that out a little more. Which in my mind is okay. I'm not racing anymore.

 

That’s the oil cold, sitting overnight. I suspect that the umbrella valves are original. And a different air cleaner setup may be in order to reroute the oil. The pulleys are stock, but going to a better gearing for touring is something that I would consider. If low 30’s mpg is the way the Mikuni runs, maybe a different carb for touring is something to consider. What is your carb of choice for an Evo touring bike?

 

Nothin wrong with a slightly modified CV Carb they get good mileage. As for the oil level, the cold mark is above your add mark, is it not? Your oil puking may be due to old, brittle, umbrellas.

 

Great. Thanks for your insight!