If they're failing and have grease then they are overloaded or not designed correctly for the application. That's the story on bearings. The bearing issue has been beat to death here on these FL's. It's a design flaw, pure and simple.
Bearings in industrial application, should meet an L10 rating meaning 10 years at the design load and speed. How many times does a shaft go around on an electric motor in 10 years turning 3600 rpm for instance? There is a bit more to the L10 spec's but not much...they are suppose to last 10 years.
wheel bearing life ? SHORT ! mine failed at 2500 miles. junk chinese crap.
all you can do when installing new bearings is pop the seals off and pack them with some real grease. not that wok juice crap they send them over here with. then install correctly with the correct tool so you don't side load them.
the only other choice is, don't ride the damn thing and they will last along time.
Last edited by hardheaded; 04-21-2017 at 05:44 PM.
All the bearing failures started when HD switched away from bearings designed for axial loading and went to straight ball bearings.
Yep. The serviceable, tapered roller bearings never gave a problem if cleaned and lubed at each tire change or thereabouts.
Guess the MOCO noticed how durable and reliable they were and just simply couldn't stand that!
Took 'em a while, but they managed to replace those totally reliable parts with the cheap-assed Chinese crap they install today.
Plus, they made doubly sure that standard, high quality bearings couldn't be made to work with that weird magnetic-bearing ABS sensor system they use, instead of plain ol' tone wheels like those used on essentially every other ABS equipped vehicle on the planet.
That's the MOCO's way of doing things all right. They design and install cheap junk parts and then do their level-best to make sure the owner can't replace them with quality, US-made parts.
This happened on my 09 RK had less than 11k miles, seems to be a quality control issue. Sold that bike with 62k miles and never had the problem again and have 53k miles on my 11 Limited with no problems. HD is the only bike I've owned where I routinely visually check the bearings.
On the 09 I had grease marks but the bike was new and didn't think anything of it, then when it failed I heard grinding. I'm glad I had stock pipes on the bike not sure I would have heard it otherwise.
Pictures was taken from the side of the road while I waited for the tow, I pulled the seal away, I could see it was already separated anyway.
14 Ultra currently 6500 miles. My bike is at the dealership right now. Started as a mild hum when cornering that over the last couple weeks is now intense enough that I can feel it in my handlebars when making left sweeping turns like on exit ramps. Handlebar vibration is slight but I know it's there. Rode with my wife for the first time recently and with an extra 115lbs on the back it was really loud.
Dealer says they checked everything out and it's fine, charged me $30 diagnostic fee's (bragging that they took it "easy on me") and told me to come get it. I guess I'll be able to prove that there was really a problem when it fails mid corner and I eat a guard rail or tree.
Last edited by ssmith9867; 04-22-2017 at 09:36 AM.
14 Ultra currently 6500 miles. My bike is at the dealership right now. Started as a mild hum when cornering that over the last couple weeks is now intense enough that I can feel it in my handlebars when making left sweeping turns like on exit ramps. Handlebar vibration is slight but I know it's there. Rode with my wife for the first time recently and with an extra 115lbs on the back it was really loud.
Dealer says they checked everything out and it's fine, charged me $30 diagnostic fee's (bragging that they took it "easy on me") and told me to come get it. I guess I'll be able to prove that there was really a problem when it fails mid corner and I eat a guard rail or tree.
if you remotely think there is a problem with your wheel bearings (or any thing else on a bike ) get it up in the air and check it out, no matter what the dealer said ! your life may depend on it and it does.
04-21-2017, 07:46 AM
