Something doesn't smell right.

 

^^^^^ what he said ^^^^^^

 

the only thing that stinks is harley's quality control.

 

Sounds like the plug was cross threaded going in at the factory.

 

ok, went to my brothers house today and we took the primary off and it has a hairline crack between the drain plug hole and the gasket surface where it meets the outer primary cover. who ever put the drain plug in at the factory either cross threaded it or tighten it up so tight it cracked the chain case. can't believe it didn't leak, but you can see the crack on the inside and the outside. anyway it's off now and i think we are just going to have it welded up and then i'll drill and tap it and it'll be done right.

 

Haven't stripped a Harley plug yet, but on a couple of metrics I had I used self-tapping drain plugs whose thread pitch was slightly coarser and had no issues. If you're interseted do a search, there is a few companies that make 'em just for this purpose.

 

we didn't strip this one either, some dumb *** at the factory did. the only one i've ever stripped was on a 79 shovel trans drain many years ago. learned along time ago , even on dirt bikes as a kid that things that go into alum. just get snugged up. and lots of antisize.

 

this is not an item that would be caught by qc. what do you expect them to do, pull every screw on your bike and put it back together?

not sticking up for the moco, just pointing that out......

 

i know they are not gonna catch everything, but it seems to be getting worse as the bikes get newer.

 

Folks the lack of quality control is a direct result of the tremendous market share Harley enjoys.
Now you want to see better quality control, stop buying Harley's.