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I say "yes."....When I put in my cams and adjustables, I did not. I followed the install instructions to a T. About 2k miles later, I was riding down the interstate and had one loosen. I heard a clatter and did not know what was wrong. I pulled over and tried to start the bike one too many times. It kicked back and bent the loose pushrod. I ended up on a trailer...When I put the new rod in, I went back and Loctited them all.
If you tighten the jam nuts properly(enough), there should be no need for loctite ever. I think most of these problems were cases of the jam nuts never being tightened (or tightened ENOUGH) in the first place....Easy to do if you are talking, daydreaming, caught up in worrying about the next step in your project, etc. Yeah, I know, you think you never would. How many times have you buttoned something up and then not remembered if you torqued that certain bolt...BTW, those jam nuts should be tightened against each other to the tune of about 35 foot pounds; they are hard stuff and require a bit of thread stretch to do their job....
Do NOT just tighten them till they have heavy drag. Each brand has a specific thread pitch and a recommended procedure for adjusting them. If you don't follow the procedure you could wind up with a tight p-rod and when the lifter pumps up the valve could stay open, bad things happen then, bent valves, low comp., burnt valves. Get the instructions for the p-rods and follow them exactly.
alright, the job is now done( I finished at about midnight last night). For the pushrods, no locktite and 20ft/lbs on the jam nuts. I adjusted them till there was not up/down shake and then gave them 3 additional turns. They felt tight, but after 10 or so minutes the lifters bleed down alittle and they rotated by hand with a fair amount of drag... The bike runs great....in the garage...its raining now. Later today or tomorrow I will get her out for a spin.
alright, the job is now done( I finished at about midnight last night). For the pushrods, no locktite and 20ft/lbs on the jam nuts. I adjusted them till there was not up/down shake and then gave them 3 additional turns. They felt tight, but after 10 or so minutes the lifters bleed down alittle and they rotated by hand with a fair amount of drag... The bike runs great....in the garage...its raining now. Later today or tomorrow I will get her out for a spin.
Chris
....on the base circle of each respective lobe, right? Just making sure...
....on the base circle of each respective lobe, right? Just making sure...
Yes.... And it quit raining so I took her out on a 25 mile ride. Its awesome. The only problem I noticed is that a couple times when I was rolling along at 10 mph, my back tire left some long black marks on the street Gotta love the extra torque... I can't say if the HP went up, but the torque definately did!
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