I noticed a base gasket leak on my 99 heritage. I just bought this bike used from a local guy. The dealership quoted me about $400.00 to replace the gaskets. This sounds fair to me but my question is should I get anything else done to the motor while it's apart? The bike has 81k miles on it. At 59k miles the motor was completely rebuilt by the local HD shop, I have the paperwork on it from the dealership. The new rebuild has about 22k miles on it. I am not sure what should be done at this kinda mileage so any help would be appreciated.

 

Fix the base gasket and roll on...................

 

Me, I would either fix the base gasket and ride or through a hone job on each cylinder and a new set of rings and a new set of gaskets, but thats me doing it my self.

 

If the rings come out of the cylinders, you should hone the cylinders and replace the rings. If they can replace the base gaskets without removing the pistons (raise up the jug until the wrist pin keeper is visible, remove wristpin/jug, replace base gasket, reverse) then leave the rings alone. I've never tried it that way, but a local shop said they do it like that all the time.

 

One thing that i would recommend to do that works wonderful. First i would hone cylinder, new rings, lap bottom of cylinders for perfect flatness, and also purchase part#59-8050 from Bikers Choice. It is a cylinder pigtail kit. Where the oil return comes down the cylinder is where the leak occurs. This pigtail kit willfixany future leak problems in the future. The kit retails for $58.95. That's a whole lot cheaper than another$400.The kit is made to tap into the original drain whole. Then youscrew the pigtail in, done! Then when you put the cylinder back on the pigtail goes through the gasket right into the case. By doing that it by-passes all the leak areas.

 

My 2000 RG has been wet with oil for years at the base , I won,t fix it till it gets where oil start running out .