Ticking noise
The top end of a twinkie motor sounds like a sewing machine. Go look at the right side of your motor. Those beautiful chrome pushrod covers should be a clue that there's mechanical activity just below the surface. It's not all buried inside a cast iron engine block, under valve covers and a hood, away from the rider like a car.
You can try swapping out the pushrods and lifters. Perfect fit pushrods are generally a little quieter, but not always. You can try an oil additive, but they don't really do very much for very long. Lucas Oil Stabilizer is as good as any of them. It's made in both dino and synthetic. You can try switching to all dino oil. Try a 20w50 racing formulation with anti-wear additives.
Bikes with windshields or fairings will hear the top end noises more than other bikes. If you take your windshield off, the noises will tend to dissapate in the wind. That kind of defeats the purpose of a touring bike, IMO.
Try ear plugs or louder pipes. and finally.....
don't worry about it. It's part of owning a HD. Some bikes make more noise than others, it varies from bike to bike. The dealer isn't going to be much help getting the noises shut down because they really are "normal".
You can try swapping out the pushrods and lifters. Perfect fit pushrods are generally a little quieter, but not always. You can try an oil additive, but they don't really do very much for very long. Lucas Oil Stabilizer is as good as any of them. It's made in both dino and synthetic. You can try switching to all dino oil. Try a 20w50 racing formulation with anti-wear additives.
Bikes with windshields or fairings will hear the top end noises more than other bikes. If you take your windshield off, the noises will tend to dissapate in the wind. That kind of defeats the purpose of a touring bike, IMO.
Try ear plugs or louder pipes. and finally.....
don't worry about it. It's part of owning a HD. Some bikes make more noise than others, it varies from bike to bike. The dealer isn't going to be much help getting the noises shut down because they really are "normal".
Last edited by Mike; Apr 29, 2010 at 03:12 AM.
Cruiser
Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 154
Likes: 2
From: Whitestown, IN.
Cool. I was looking for this very topic, and here you all just answered my question. I just changed to synthetic in both my girlfriends bike and my own. I noticed that the valve train makes more noise now on my bike, but didn't seem to change at all on hers. I was a bit worried, but now I will just deal with the added noise. Been contemplating a set of Kuryakyn "Sound of Chrome" speakers, guess I have an added reason to install a set. Slightly louder pipes are on the menu too. Between the two I should be able to drown out that ticking. Now I need to find an answer to the noise my brakes make when they warm up.... sounds like they are dragging on the front rotors.
Road Master
Joined: Nov 2009
Posts: 997
Likes: 3
From: Charlotte, N.C.
Sometimes when you change the cam and install one with higher lift It causes the rocker arm to travel farther up and this could cause it to slide back or forward coming in contact with the rocker arm support plate. This is where the tick is coming from that is why a lot of guys change the lifters and adjust the rods to no avail. If you can find the rite size shims and place them between the rocker arm and the support plate to tighten them up your engine will sound like it did when it was new, but this will only last for 15,000miles at best. This is the area of the HD motor that wears faster due to the fact that it is the highest point on the engine and is not oiled as well as the rest of the engine and is exposed to its fair share of rising heat from the heads. The wear is normal and will only go so far. I have submitted an idea form to HD to create a a rocker arm support plate with and adjustment feature so that this can become part of the 10,000mile service instead of shims you adjust a set screw and thats it. You will notice that sometimes if you tune your bike to certain specs this sometimes helps with the ticking.
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