Not sure if a buddy was pulling my leg or if he was legit but he told me that the 65 pans were known to crack the frame right at the top left swingarm casting where it is welded to the frame.. He says there is a plate that gets welded across the tube / casting to increase strength of the support. I can see this being an issue if the bike had a sidecar but it sounds kind of fishy to me..

Any validity to this? Right now the frame and straight and the weld looks good. The frame on the parts manual is up to 65D and was used way into the shovels.. Maybe only early 65 frames?

TIA

 

Yes, he is correct. It looks like this, and HD even sold a 'kit' to upgrade the earlier bikes.

 

‘67 frame was cracked through when I got the bike. Buddy welded it up and added the plate. ‘69 has plate as well. ‘68 no plate.

 

How thick is it?? 1/4 inch? 3/16?

 

1/4”.

 

Well I got up to a little over 110K on my 65 before shutting her down for a complete redo and it was never an issue

 

Funny thing about this pic is that it looks like the frame broke at the end of the welded bracket.

I talked to my buddy. He broke his frame and welded in the bracket.. He seemed to think riding offroad hard broke it..

 

I don’t know much of the history of the bike other than it was torn apart for many years. The frame was cracked and my buddy welded up the crack and added the plate IIRC.

 

Gusset plate #47261-68 was available as a repair part for 58–early-68 frames. Apparently it was fitted as original on frames as of about mid/later-68. Here is page 73 from my 61–71 H-D catalog.







On another forum in 2011 a certain person said the factory offered a gusset plate as a dealer-install repair item as of the early-60s. But I found nothing about it in my 58–68 H-D catalog so I asked him if the gusset he was referring to was in any factory documentation and if it was the same style as the gusset with the -68 part number but he did not respond.

Several years after that someone else said the same things as that certain person so I asked him about it but he too did not reply.
Eric

 

I found it in the same parts manual.. Interesting in that they call it a repair part. So do you only install it after the frame cracks?