Stone through drive belt advice
 

Bike ,, 2015 Street Glide ,,, 35,000 miles.....Doing a pre inspection look around before a 2000 km ride this weekend,, and found stone in belt …. Pulled out small stone, (it basically crumbled out as I was pulling and pushing)….The stone went all the way through belt.... No damage to sprockets …. I can push a small screwdriver through hole.....
Manual says, if hole /damage is not on the edges should be OK..... As it is smack dead in the center of the belt ,, (and it is not a large hole/damage),, I am quietly confident belt does not need replacing,, at least not for straight away ...


Pictures tell a thousand words ,,,,, This is what I am looking at ,,,,, What do you guys think !!!!! Ride or not ?????
https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.hdf...362b11bdf8.png
https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.hdf...82abf02c58.png
https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.hdf...21faf70c25.png
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.hdf...0e6fef30fc.png
https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.hdf...acf6326028.png
https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.hdf...49d2c3feb2.png

Eh, if it were me, I'd replace it as I wouldn't want it to leave me stranded in the middle of nowhere (happened to me, but I didn't have a previous hole). I'm sure you could get 50K more on it. Or 5k more. Piece of mind is a great thing IMO.

I'm not one to replace stuff when everybody else would, but I'd ride it home and replace that belt. That's not say it's going to break tomorrow or even next week, but I'd always have walking shoes in my bag and I wouldn't beat on it in 1st or 2nd gear.

I have photos somewhere of an almost identical wound, from some years ago. Mine was due to a thin sliver of sharp flint, which I was able to remove. Also my riding at that time was relatively local, with no long trips. I continued to ride with the same belt, checking it at intervals, until after around 4k miles the wound started to change appearance. I also by then had a long touring trip planned, although still some time off, so replaced with a new one. At no time did the belt actually break or cause any problems.

So if you have a coast-to-coast trip coming up certainly replace asap, however if you are in no rush and have no long journeys planned, you can consider leaving it as is for a while, but do keep a close eye on it. The belt I describe above was one of the original wide ones, but belt technology and materials have moved on a lot since Harley introduced them, one reason current belts are so much narrower.

Before a trip I myself would certainly change it. If you had one break like I have and be stranded you wouldn't ask.

I've seen a few threads of this over the years. Some have had success filling the hole with epoxy or JB Weld and just running it. One or two took it over 100K miles.

Am I having hallucinations?
You most DEFINITELY have sprocket damage !
.It will probably go another 1000 miles or so..
But every time that sprocket comes around it is injuring the belt somewhere else.
I would at least take the rough edges off the sprocket.
Not a full-blown emergency yet.........but getting there.