Hey guys,

I have a 2010 Road King with 28,000 miles on it, I bought it new in Sept. '09.

I've been dealing with a sputtering issue for a while now. Basically, it has sporadic sputter when I accelerate and gets progressively worse as the fuel level goes down. When the problem first arose, I took it to the dealer and they found that the intake seals on the cylinder heads were leaking (they did the test by spraying carb cleaner at the intake seals and the bike died). They replaced the seals and they also replaced the fuel filter in the tank. They did a pressure test on the fuel system and everything checked out fine.

The bike seemed to run fine after the work was done. I usually don't let fuel run too low, I usually fill up when there is a quarter tank left, but today I let it run down to about 1/8 of a tank and the sputtering got really bad. At a 1/2 tank the sputtering is noticeable, at an 1/8 of a tank, I thought I wouldn't make it home. The engine would cut out at idle, the check engine light came on, and it was sputtering and popping horribly.

When I filled up the tank, the check engine light didn't come on and the sputtering almost disappeared completely after restart, it was still there sporadically, but not nearly as bad as when it was low on fuel.

Any ideas of what is happening? I'm assuming there's a leak in one of the fuel hoses inside the tank that gets "sealed" when the tank is full of gas, but is sucking air when the fuel level drops below the leak.

Any advice is appreciated.

Thanks,

Alex

 

A plastic piece inside of the fuel tank that cracks and causes something similar to your issue, fuel pressure regulator nipple? A few threads talk about it in the archive, possibly an issue that came up here on the forum in the past 4 months...

 

I'd suspect that the fuel pickup line or whatever it's called inside the tank might have a break or hole in it.

 

I agree with both statements above. If you are good when the tank is full, the fuel line break or hole is under the fuel level and won't draw air. When your fuel level drops enough you are sucking air in instead of fuel and that is causing your cutout issue.

 

+1...More than likely there is a whole in the fuel line inside the tank.