Always check your pulley bolts! A freidnly reminder
 

I almost fell victim to sheared rear pulley bolts today, but I noticed a strange noise as I was getting off the freeway and pulled over to investigate. All 5 of my pulley bolts had broken loose. 1 was out enough that it was hitting the inside of my swing arm while the rest were about halfway out.

The chrome bolts I had were a 3/8" allen which I did not have but one of my buddies did. Yes, I used red loctite when isntalling teh pulley originally but had neglected to chekthe bolts since then. This is the first time I have ever had an issue like this.

I tightened up 4 of the bolts. The 5th would not thread in all the way with the wheel on the bike. I babied the bike home at about 30 mph stopping every several miles to check the bolts.

I ran a tap through the threads in the 5th hold and all is well. Just gummed up with loctite. I went adn got some grade 8 bolts and used more red loctite than I did last time. Hopefully it holds this time but I know the check it more often as well.

I feel lucky that a disaster was averted. Oh yeah, I installed the pulley and everything as well so there is no one to blame but myself.

Drew

good reminder! Someone I ride with has an older 90's bike and had some grounding probs...turns out that almost every bolt on his bike was loose...

thats one of the things I do as Im cleaning the bike..checking for loose bolts and stuff leaking.

Glad you made it thru the episode without any damage to your person or the bike.

Ya know, with all these people posting about how they've wrecked their bikes lately, i think there may be a bad omen above softail riders as of late.. good thing you caught that before it got in a bad way.

Yeah that is one of the MAIN things that I bought when I purchased my wheels and pulley, is some Diamond Engineering 12 point pulley bolts. Polished Stainless steel Grade 8, 180,000 PSI Tensile. Some folks say just use blue loctite, I think Im gonna use Red just to be sure.

I don't know if any tests have been performed to prove what I am about to say but I was warned by a McMaster-Carr Sales Rep. of a very similar problem using chrome bolts. Using chrome plated bolts pose two problems. Problem one is that loctite does not adhere to chrome very well because it is a smooth hard coating. In other words it is not porous so the loctite cannot embed itself into the metal. Problem two is that the chrome plating process actually weakens the bolt therefore leading to possible sheared bolts. So if you want the appearance of a chrome bolt then use a regular grade 8 bolt with a chrome cap on it.

If you use red be prepared to never be able to remove the bolts. Red is for permanent applications and therefore you usually have to use a torch to heat up the loctite in order to remove the bolt. Although since you are using polished stainless bolts the red may not adhere to it as it would a standard steel bolt.

Harley Davidson - Making mechanics out of riders for over 100 years.

Appears to be the truth here.

I'll be happy if I can never remove the pulley again. Believe me after coming off the freeway with all 5 bolts backing out I never want to see that again. If I ever get new wheels, it's a new pulley. I put so much loctite on these bolts, it will probably take a full propane torch to get one to loosen.

I am grateful to be walking with a bike in one piece after that experience. When I think what could have happened should my pulley have sheared off on the freeway at 75 mph. Hmmmm. Red loctite all the freaking way.

I got the goldish grade 8 bolts as the hardware store near me was the only place open today and I am leaving on a trip on Friday so I needed to fix it today, but I would much rather know that it is on and on good than have a chrome bolt in it. The funny thing is I ran chrome bolts in previous wheels without issue.

Once again I installed the pulley originally as well and will never sue a chrome bolt to secure a pulley again on my bike. I don't care how it looks.

Drew

Drew, glad you made it out with only minor issues. Look at it this way... better to find it now than next Thursday or Friday on your road trip. :icon_eek:

As you can imagine, bolt choice has been a real concern in the Corvette racing world. Here's a thread from a few years ago that I bookmarked. Have a read - especially posts 8 thru 12.

Yeah, that is how I saw it Bob. Better today than in the middle of nowhere somewhere. Thanks for teh thread, I'm gonna read it now.

Drew