Welcome to the club! The Bandit is a beautiful piece and gets rid of the first gear knock but at $500 its hard to justifie.

 

Amen on that price. But sometimes you really do get what you pay for.

 

I have a 2012 Road Glide Ultra with the 110 Big Bore kit installed. At 48K miles, I had an issue with the stator, so it went in for warranty work. While there, the Tech found a similar issue with my clutch hub splines. They replaced it with a stock unit under warranty.

At 59K miles, I had to replace the engine (cam chain tensioner failure/warranty) and during tear down, the clutch hub was inspected and no new damage was found.

 

Thanks for the info, it sure looks the problem is with the OEM part, but you'd think all the questionable parts would have been out of the pipeline by the time your 2012 was built.

My stepson went to the HD shop and discussed the issue and they basically told him there was no problem with the OEM clutch splines, even though there seems to be an inordinate number of people with issues.

Part of the problem is there are no symptoms of clutch spline damage. You don't know it until you pull the clutch hub and find damaged splines. So, consequently, you could have damage and be totally unaware of it, and suffer no problems either. Quite the conundrum.

Howard

 

What did you expect the dealer to say? They will never admit to any problems.

 

Yeah, you're probably right, but one can hope.

At least it seems to be a problem that doesn't seem to cause any real issues. But it would be nice to know why it occurs, and/or if it was just a bad batch of clutch hubs. And it would be nice if you could just buy the pressed in splined part and not have to buy the whole clutch hub.

Howard

 

Wow reviving an old thread here are we. Well I can't really explain what causes this issue or why it happens but as the original poster I can tell you this. I replaced the damaged unit in the pictures at the beginning of this thread with a stock clutch basket. The bike had around 30,000 miles on it then. I have upgraded the 103" HQ build to a 124" with T-Man parts and I'm still running that stock clutch basket with 125,000+ miles on the bike. I removed the primary over the summer to replace the transmission output shaft and the clutch basket has zero signs of wear or damage. Again I can't explain why it happened on the stock set up or why it hasn't happened since.

 

I had read somewhere that a person had heard there was a bad batch of clutch baskets from a supplier, problem was incorrect heat treatment. Now whether there is any truth to that I have no idea, but it sure seems to point to a bad initial part since your replacement is fine.

The good thing is that it doesn't seem to cause any problems on its own, but when found means you have to buy more parts to replace bad parts. That's kind of a bummer.

But thanks for getting back with the info about your results.

Howard

 

Same on my '09 Street Glide.
. Upgrading to SE compensator, noticed metal pieces in case. First 1/2" or so are gone. Banging from original week compensator? The hub bearing is not sounding smooth enough when spinning the hub by hand after taking the clutch pack out and cleaning things up. (Sovent) Better do the hub bearing also.
. Sounds like e very common problem.
.

 

I know this is an old thread, BUT I believe I have an idea as to why the splines break. I have an 2008 Fatboy that has had the primary partially replaced once and then totally replaced. Both done at between 25-35k. It noe has 65k on it and I was replacing my clutch when I found the splines broke again. This time I was doing it myself, 1st 2 were under warranty. Okay, here is why I think they break....
...I believe the tolerance for compressing the clutch basket is too small from the factory. I disassembled the basket where the left hand nut holds the basket on. Pulled the snap ring and removed the alignment washer(has 'out' stamped on it) and compression washer. the compression washer has what appears to be a copper surface on it....presumably to avoid steel to aluminum problems. I noticed the coating was compressed and had the spline openings from the hub on it. I also observed what I think it movement transfer from the washer to the hub surface....the hub moved on the shaft, very minimally, but enough to create stress on the shaft splines and break them... I believe the hub needs to be a few thousandths wider to transfer the compression to the shaft via the bearing race... I have a Drag Specialties hub coming... I'm going to measure it and the stock hub and if needed shim the hub a few thousandths tighter... The only way to know if it worked is to wait till next time a due maintenance in the primary... But it makes sense to me after reading what everyone here has said and what I observed when I pulled it all apart......
....if it's going to break I'll break it! current primary has Baker Comp, Haydn tensioner, Screaming Eagle Plates and springs.... I'll post next time I tear her apart!