Assembly Lube

Got all my parts to change over to gear drive cams. The instructions for pressing in the the bearings and cams reference using assembly lube. Is this a special lube used just for pressing in the bearings? if so, where can I get it? Will a light machine oil or multi-purpose grease work?

my opinion is if you are going to fill up the case with the assy lube and run it then use the assy lube if your running it in 90 wt use 90 wt, or 40 in a forty case just my opinion, but it has worked for me for twenty sum years.

Thanks for the info guy's, I'm on my way.

Ok...so another question. In the instructions that came with the Andrews/S&S gear set it says to install the oil pump and only tighten the screws finger tight, then rotate the engine a couple turns to line up the pump, then tighten screws to proper torque spec. I have also read tech bulletins that say to use the tapered pins to align the oil pump.

Which his the best or correct procedure?

I don't have anything to add, but keep us up to date on this install. I may want to do the same thing in the not too distant future. Did you get a good buy on the gear drive? If so where?. I was also curious as to how many miles you had on your bike and what your cam chain tensioners looked like? Thanks. AL

Hope I'm not breaking the forum rules with this info, but I got a great deal on the gear drive. Bought it through American Classic Motors on Ebay for $564.00. The kit comes with everything and you have your choice of any Andrews cam you want. The kit comes with cams, all gears and installation kit. The installation kit includes cam plate bearings, Thorington inner cam bearings, keys, bolts, and cam cover gasket. If ya go direct to S&S or through JP it runs about $760.00. So on Ebay go to: Ebay motors, motorcycle parts, and type in S&S Andrews.

I have 27K on the bike. Checked the shoes at 18K and only had about 0.01 wear on the outer, and 0.02 on the inner shoe. Checked them at the beginning of this season, 23K, and determined they would have to be changed by 30K. Outer shoe worn about 0.04 and inner about 0.06, 0.09 is the max allowable wear. Gong to start taken it apart on Monday. I'll post my findings.

Thanks for that info Ringo. I'm a little nervous about tearing into a twin cam, never done it before. I've put cams and spacers in shovels but thats about it for my cam installation experience. Anyway Im not going to do any major rebuilding until the bike actually needs it but I figure the gear drive will be the first thing that comes around. Al

Yeah HotRK when I bought the bike a manual was one of the things I negotiated. I told the guy he could keep his T shirt I wanted a manual (btw i got the T shirt anyway) had to twist his arm a little for the manual. I guess right now I'm leaning towards the gear drive so I can do it once and be done with it. I think Im going to keep this bike (an '02 Road King) I looked at the new ones and im convinced I can do better custom paint work than Ive seen on the SE models, and defnitely let somebody like Dewey's or Zippers do the heads and at the end of the day wind up with a better, faster more reliable bike than the new ones. Anyway, that's why I'm very interested in Ringo's gear drive conversion. Ringo if you can do it some pics showing your progress would be right on. AL

Gear drive cams are installed Installation is actually quite simple, providing you follow the instructions that come with the kit. Also, in addition to the SM I have the parts catalog for my bike. This proved to be vary handy in two ways. First, the detailed exploded views in the parts catalog of how different parts of the engine are assembled, in many cases is better than the SM. Second, having all the part numbers made it easy to identify all the O-rings that come with the cam service gasket kit. I also like having the parts catalog, so when I go to the stealer, I know I'm getting the right parts.

As far as how long it took, that depends on whether you choose the partial, (short) or full, (long) disassembly process. On the TC-88 the cam bearngs are pressed into the came plate. The front cam is pressed into a ball bearing and the rear cam is a slip fit into a roller bearing. HD used a roller bearing on the rear cam because of the side load that is created from the tensioner shoes pushing on the chains that drive the cams.

The cam plate comes out as a total unit, plate, cams, sprockets and chain. And of course you have to remove the push rods to get the cam plate assenbly out. This is where the short or long process comes in. The long process is to remove the rocker box covers, rocker arm assembly and remove the push rods from the top of the engine. And of course to get to all the nuts and bolts you have drain and remove your gas tank. The short porcess is to cut the push rods and tubes with a pair of bolt cutters and replace them with adjustables after changing over to the gear drive cams.

I chose the long way for a couple of reasons. First, I wanted to change the breather assemblies in the rocker box to the new style. HD has made a few changes to these. The most significant change was in the material used. Prior to 04" the breather housings were made out of plastic. They are now made out of aluminum. The breathers also have a filter in them. This filter is supposed to stop oil from getting to the air cleaner. Over time these get saturated with oil and clogged with dirt just like your oil filter does. New filters are supplied in the gasket kit. I also wanted to check for any wear in the rocker arm assembly.

It probally took me a little longer to do the job than it might take other people. The reason for this is, it's the first time I've done the conversion and I'm am very meticulous and anal. I bag and tag every part that comes off the bike during disassembly. I can thank my father for that. He was a perfectionist and always told me that no matter what you do in life, do it the right way. Doesn't matter if you dig ditches for a living or build rocket engines. His motto was, " If you don't have time to do it the right the first time, when will you have time to fix it". So it took me about 15 hours over three days to complete the job. Good bike mechanics can do it the short way in about 4 hours, and 6-8 hour the long way.

Now as far as wear on the tensioner shoes, this is what I found. I have just over 27K on the bike. The tensioner shoes are 0.180" thick. HD reccommends inspecting them every 20K and replacing them when they wear to half of their original thickness, or .090" of wear. Since the inner cam chain is shorter than the outer chain, and spins faster, the inner shoe wears more. My outer show was worn 0.030", or about a third of the allowable wear. The inner was worn about .050", or just over half of the allowable wear. However all shoes are not created equal. Some people have had them blow out at 10K and other have had them last to 70K. And when the shoes blow out you now have the steel pin the shoe was mounted on riding against the chain at 40-50 psi.:gah:

There are a some theories on why there is no consistancy. One is that the silent chain used in this setup is made from flat links that are stamped out on a punch press. If the sharpness of the punch tools was not maintained, burrs formed on the edges of these links and created excellerated wear on the tensioner shoes. The other theory is that the company that made the shoes did not maintain the material consistancy from one production run to another. I think it was in 06' that HD changed over to a single row roller chain, hydraulic tensioners and nylon shoes. In any case no matter what material is used, keep in mind as it wears, it is going in to the engine.

There are several advantages of the gear drive cams. It takes four HP to spin the HD chain driven cams. So you pick up four rear wheel HP with the gear driven cams. The back lash on the HD ganin drive can throw your timing off as much as 4 degrees. This is eliminated with the gear drive cams. And best of all you never have to be concern if or when your tensioner shoes are going to take a sh$t.

HRK mentioned having some of the proper tools to do the job. JMO, but you need to either borrow, buy or rent the tools used to remove and install all the bearings and gears. For sure, you will not be able to remove or install the inner cam needle bearings without the proper tool. You will need access to a hydraulic press. All the bearings and gears are press fit and it is extremely important that they are properly aligned when pressing them in. Both Jimms and Geroges Garage make all the tools to do the job. JMO, I found Georges to have better pricing and they give a lifetime warranty on all their tools. And last but not least, MAKE SURE YOU FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTINS REGARDING GEAR LASH TOLERANCES. THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT. Not following these instruction is why people run into trouble and compalin about noisy gears. You can definately hear a difference, but it's not that noticalble. If you hear a whirring sound or a ticking like a bad lifter, the gears lash is incorrect. A whirring sound means the gears are fitting to tight. A ticking sound means their to loose. Back lash is the amount of play in the pitch diameter of the the teeth as they mesh together. S&S make undersize and over size gears to achieve correct back lash.

Sorry for the long disertation, but this is my story and I'm stickin to it! I took a bunch of pictures and will post them as soon as I resize them. So I hope this helps and thanks to everyone for their input.

Yes I did, that was the cheapest part of the whole job.