intermittant noise in front cylinder . . .

First I must find out what to do, and what to look for. Time for the old man to go to school. After I take off the rocker boxes, then what . . .?

The loan ain't gonna happen, so I'll miss the bash at the Biker Barn, but more importantly, I'll miss the last of the good riding weather. Things could be a lot worse. I'm counting my blessings .

Rocker arm end play,the bushings and shims...the shafts and the rockers themselves for pitting....see if anything is loose or outta spec....

http://www.baggersmag.com/tech/0706_hrbp_shovelhead_rocker_arm/viewall.html

Thanks, Lucifer. I will study it in more depth when I get home from work.

I have to take the heads off to get the rocker boxes off of them. I might be able to get at the front rocker box without taking the head off, not sure yet. Back one definitely has to come off, though. That means I have to take the carb, intake, and pipes off, too .

You should figure out what the problem is before ordering parts. You may have just wasted $300+ on parts you didn't need to replace and not fixed the problem. If a rocker(s) is loose you may have broken/lost a shim, you'll need to find that broken/lost shim before running the motor again. That may entail disassembling the entire motor. Pieces can flow down the oil passages into the crankcase. You said the noise was "up high", lifters are not up high. Never throw away old Harley parts! What's wrong with you man?? You will have to pull both heads to get to the rockers.

I guess you didn't read the whole post. The tappets & blocks HAD to be replaced anyway. Another half-assed job by my so-called engine rebuilder. Those parts should have never found their way into my motor. Bearings in the tappets were shot; One of them had over a 1/16" play in them. Don't tell me that won't cause noise at the top end, because it will. The tappets were sticking in the blocks, and had also been ground down on one side - who knows what the asshole had in mind when he was doing that. And to top it all off, the blocks were missing pieces of metal at the bottom end where the wheel moves up and down. We are sure those are old wounds that happened in somebody else's motor, before the blocks had been put on my motor. Otherwise, the motor would have been toast a long time ago.

I and my indie inspected the rocker arms very carefully when my heads were rebuilt last winter and nothing was wrong with them at that time.

And as far as never throwing old parts away - well, it won't be the first time I've shitcanned old parts. I want to make sure NOBODY gets these old parts because they are no good. If they'd have been thrown out before some jerk stuck them in MY motor, I wouldn't be having these problems now.

Sure is a good lookin motor though.

My EVO had a lot of top end noise for prolly 80 thou of its 110 thou life. I was always changing cams, lifters, pushrods and even cut the pushrod tubes shorter. The only thing that helped a little was adjusting the pushrods deeper into the lifters.

Whenever I had the motor apart I was always inspecting the rockers cause I could swear that's where the noise was coming from but the rockers where always within spec and never looked worn. So I never replaced them and I never did find the problem.

Hell even this new S&S motor has a bit of lifter noise every so often.

Good luck, I hope the first fix is all ya need. How's the cam??

Well, I'm tired of counting my blessings - I'm gonna rant for a while. The whole trip has been snake bit from the gitgo, I guess. I got the motor and tranny from Rob's Used Harley Parts in Weston, Va. I started having issues with the motor as soon as I started it up - leaks everywhere, low compression, oil seeping down the rear cylinder and puffing out the exhaust, etc. When I found out the cylinders were only getting 60 & 65 lbs., and a spark plug hole was stripped, and the timing inspection hole was stripped, and oil pump leaking at the inside gasket (turns out the pump was warped and I had to get another one), I told him I wanted to send the motor back for a REAL rebuild. By that time, he had another company doing his rebuilds. He only offered to pay half of what it would cost in parts & labor. So I declined and started trying to do the work myself. By this time my warranty had run out, for it was only for six months from the date of purchase, and I didn't actually start it up until after a year had passed. $4500 for a buggared motor. I talked to a guy who supposedly did his rebuild work and he said they put solid lifters in and rings and seals, etc., but I doubt if they ever touched the inside of the motor. Rob blames the bad motor on a guy named "Buster", who was hired by his rebuilder to help him out. I heard from Rob that every motor this jerkoff "worked on" came back to him for repairs. There were about a dozen or so before the guy was finally fired. I had to scrap the Kiehin butterfly carb that came with the motor after several rebuild attempts by me. It just never worked right and had vacuum leaks at the throttle shaft - worn out bushings. There were other problems with the motor. One of the cylinders is so deeply scratched we couldn't get them all out by honing. The other one isn't even a Harley cylinder. And I suspect the motor is out of balance. I have well over $5000 in this motor and it's still a POS.

Oh, the cam. I guess it's ok. but I've replaced the seal 3 times now and it still leaks oil out the bottom hole in the cone.

But none of this stuff is supposed to be happening with a "freshly rebuilt" motor, as it was advertised.

Feel for you Josh...You're right ....should have just had to bolt the engine in and ride,not get turned into a master Shovel wrench...
Most of us here wouldn't have been able to put up with what you did for so long... I know I would have lost it long ago and would have paid Rob a visit with a bag of door knobs for not making it right and Buster would have got busted up with a bag of POS shovel parts, and probably more than just me feel that way...You're a much stronger man than I am....

If you can change lifters and blocks without taking the heads off,go that way...blow out the pushrods to make sure they're clear and no crap got in them to block oil getting to the rocker boxes...Hopefully this will be the end of you're problems....

That's exactly the plan. The Sifton kit I was gonna order included new push rods, but I think mine are okay to re-use. I'm searching around for just a set of blocks & solid lifters and maybe I can save a few bucks that way.

I got the old push rods, blocks & lifters out easily without removing the heads and the new ones should go in easy, too. I rolled the old push rods over a piece of glass and they look straight .

I've ridden about 8,000 miles on the old shovel so far and hoping to put on more soon . . .

I'd check the valve spring tension also. Just a thought. Sticky valve?

Mines going to my Indy to replace clutch plates and spring. Just because I got 72k on the original. I see Barnett recomends ATF for lube on their clutches. Any comments about this?

Greatest thing about ATF (Type F - I think is what I use for my Barnett clutch) is it's only $4.50 a quart. At that cost you could change it every month lol.

Keep us informed JB. Good Luck

Type F is usually what they recommend...Works fine...ATF gives the clutch good hook up....Most of the clutch manufacturers suggest using ATF...but you can use what you want....I used it for a few years but now I just dump a quart of 10w-40 fossil in it...Primary is pretty low tech...

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Thanks HRK. I called him a little while ago. He recommended S&S parts, but they are way out of my price range. He called me back with a better price on the Sifton tappet kit, and a blue silicone set of pushrod seals for $360 delivered. So, I saved $25 going with Calif. Phil . M.O. is going out tomorrow. Yup, I'm low tech all the way - don't even have a credit card LOL.

I'll take the $25 I saved with Phil and take Mac the Wife out to lunch tomorrow.