Pawnbroker:

The water cooled bikes have higher compression and more advanced spark timing and will run hotter than an air cooled bike all other things like ambient temperature and load being equal.

If the water cooling fails, it can be ridden to get you home or to a dealer for repair, but the automatic spark retard or knock sense may kick in repeatedly and you may notice less power.

 

r0de runr,

Thanks. I thought it was along those lines. One thing though. I remember some conversations about this a while back. I just checked the HD website and it lists both motors as having 10:1 compression. The water cooled bikes have about 3 lbs more torque. And the air cooled have a few better MPG. I ran the comparison feature to see all the differences. I don't want to hijack this thread so back to water pump fixing...

 

Federal law only requires companies to make parts available for the original warranty period (this does not include extended warranties). The 10 year rule is a wives tale.

 

So now what ? They discontinue the pumps and your bike just became useless. What are we suppose to do with them, no one is going to want them with no parts and resale value. Harley should have a class action lawsuit files on them. They should have come out right away after they knew there were problems with them. Harley keeps doing crap like this and they can kiss their *** goodbye.

 

Great post by the OP. About a year ago I read (without pictures) about someone doing a similar solder repair, and keeping the repaired part in case the new one he installed took a ****.

I love my 2014 FLHTK, and if my pump took the death dive, I might be inclined to see if the Bosch pump could be fitted in just for ***** and giggles.

If someone is ahead of the curve on this, and it is posted elsewhere, give a heads up somehow.

 

Curious if a set of offsetting brackets could be fabricated to allow the Bosch pump to fit.

 

You've mentioned this a couple of times. Do you think these contacts are some type of overload protection for the motor windings?

 

No, I don't.

I think those connections are made after the circuit board it installed on top of the motor assembly since they come up through it. It's just a quick/cheap/easy process.

 

That insanely over-teched, POS unit proves that Rube Goldberg is still alive and well and working at the MoCo - apparently as their chief design engineer. Thank you very much for the pics and fix!

I wonder when they'll "obsolete" those M8 motors?

Best wishes,

JP

 

Wouldn't be holding my breath waiting for that to happen.

That would be true of any other company, but the MoCo has been pulling **** like this for decades and they're still around.

If they had any real competition, they'd have been gone years ago. That's all that keeps them in business.