Compensator question
Seasoned HDF Member
Joined: Oct 2012
Posts: 11,216
Likes: 3,044
From: St.Louis Mo.
the bolt is bad about coming loose. The lock tite that comes on the bolt won't hold it sometimes. you have to use red locktite. If you let it run loose it can wear the splines on the crank and hub which would not be a good idea. Your chain tension er can cause problems too if it is loose or broke. The model you are referring to is obsolete as of 2014 models.
Seasoned HDF Member
Joined: Apr 2013
Posts: 32,851
Likes: 17,887
From: Newcastle, OK
Just save your receipts.
Road Warrior
Joined: Apr 2010
Posts: 1,648
Likes: 37
From: Monroe, Louisiana
I clean it off with a wire brush first. I also soak up any oil in the end of the crankshaft with rag wrapped on a allen wrench or small screwdriver sprayed with brake cleaner.
HDF Community Team
Joined: Mar 2008
Posts: 1,892
Likes: 552
From: NH
Well kinda. For awhile there were two different stock numbers for compensators. One was for the original compensator and the other was for the SE compensator, which had some improvements over the previous version. Then like Tucci mentioned, about 2010 or 2011 they started introducing all new bikes with the SE compensator. At that point they reverted back to only one stock number for compensators and that was for the SE version, which made sense. So, if you have replaced your compensator since 2010 you more than likely have the SE version. Then as you know the most recent version of the compensator was introduced with the 2014 model bikes. It appears to have quite a few changes incorporated into it to aid in lubrication shortcomings of the SE version. In true Harley Davidson fashion it takes them years and years to make fundamental improvements. There are literally thousands of us out here who thought we were solving the compensator problem when we upgraded to the new and improved SE version. As it turns out, this was not the case as many are still having problems with lubrication fretting etc.
Grand HDF Member
Joined: Jun 2007
Posts: 4,598
Likes: 421
From: Lansing mi
He's right. Now the 14's have a newer improved SE comp. So now we need to call the SE comps from 13 and back the old style SE comp.
Road Warrior
Joined: Apr 2010
Posts: 1,648
Likes: 37
From: Monroe, Louisiana
Most likely.
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Road Warrior
Joined: May 2009
Posts: 1,537
Likes: 4
From: The Great River Road, Wisconsin
There hydraulic uses springs in the bottom to set the new ratchet position when slack is detected in the chain. The non hydraulic used a fixed position to set tension. Not sure which his picture is. Could be hydraulic with the springs buried in the bottom aluminum assembly/
And for posts sake, the compensator is part of the basket attached to the crank.
The part Tucci took the pic of in the middle of his photo is his cam chain tensioner.
And for posts sake, the compensator is part of the basket attached to the crank.
The part Tucci took the pic of in the middle of his photo is his cam chain tensioner.
Last edited by VTL nut; Dec 9, 2013 at 06:39 AM.
Seasoned HDF Member
Joined: Mar 2010
Posts: 38,525
Likes: 6,406
From: Honah Lee
Appears to me his tensioner is not OEM and manually adjusted. Just not sure. However, I had never heard of the hydraulic primary tensioner (least one like the cam tensioner with actually oil being pumped to a piston) you referred to in you previous post 6.
Last edited by Jackie Paper; Dec 9, 2013 at 08:02 AM.