Steering Wobble

I just purchased an 08 Street Glide. The bike wobbled and rear steered right off the showroom floor. Tire pressure is correct and steering head bearings are correctly adjusted. I'm looking at a steering stabilizer but don't feel that I should have to install one on a 21,000 dollar bike. Any info would greatly help.

I'd be taking it back to the dealer and making them fix it,It is a safety issue....

Xactly what Whacker said!!! It should be right, right outta the box... Something ain't right and it could be deadly!!!

You shouldn't have to think this one out for yourself, let them fix it or give you another bike. Be firm and good luck.

Rear wheel off-center? Don't just "eyeball" it, measure it, or @ least make absolutely sure the dealer does.

One thing I didn't find out about until the 1st time I took my '95 Sportster to an indy shop for new tires is that the rear wheel being off-center is a common problem. Shop owner said go get that coffee-can off the shelf over there & it was full of axle spacers. Fish thru to find the right ones for that particular bike & whichever ones he'd take off a bike he'd toss back in the can - probably fit another one someday. He said it was such a common problem he checked ever single bike he serviced & I know another indy does too.

checked my 06 rear. not centered by nearly .5 in. but the belt seems to be tracting well and true. have the front tire centered well, but in in order to center the rear more than just bushings seem to have to be considered. biggest thing would be the drive belt being true. does maybe the frame comp. for this? i believe the rear could be centered. would take some machining,shims. but before getting into this, i need to know if the frame somehow is designed around this. this is stock from olde mother harley, the bike tracts down the road just great. any thoughts?

The front and rear wheels of all big twin Harleys are not on center with each other. They are designed to be off center with each other to compensate for the weight of the left side primary drive hanging outside of the frame. The wheels on HD's with a right side drive are centered inline with each other because the engine is centered in the frame and weight is evenly distributed side to side.

If you are getting rear wheel steering, it's possible the engine is mis-aligned in the frame. There is an adjuster on the lower front and the top of the engine.

On the FLH bikes you have two engine mounts, one below the tranny and one at the lower front of the engine. The swing arm pivot bolts pass through the housing of the the tranny. The upper and lower adjustment links on the motor are used to align the rear swing arm. The upper link will move the engine side to side in a verticle plane. This aligns the axle shaft and swing arm perpendicular to the verticle centerline axiis of the frame. The lower front link adjusts the front of the engine side to side. This aligns the swing arm in parallel plane with the centerline of the frame from front to back.

You said the steering head bearings are adjusted correctly. Were these checked by the dealer? Because the FLH bikes have reverse triple trees, the front wheel will always center itself when the tire is off of the ground. However, the front wheel centering itself does not mean the bearings are adjusted correctly. On the FLH models, the swing-by method is used to check bearing tightness.

With the bike on a lift and the wheels off of the ground, you move the wheel all the way to open side and let it go. The wheel will swing back and forth, and should center itself. The number of swing by's determines the correct bearing adjustment. A full swing-by is when the wheel moves from one side pass the center line to the other side. On the FLH models correct swing-by is 2 1/2. So when you move the wheel to one side, let's say the right side, it should swing-by to the left side once, back to right side once and then a half swing back to center. Less than 2 1/2 swings and the bearings are too tight, more than 2 1/2 swings, the bearings are too loose.

In any case, I would take it back to the dealer and have them fix it. Hope this helps, good luck and keep us posted.

you may want to make sure you don't have a bad tire or set of tires or maybe the wheels aren't true. My Electra Glide is not going to win any awards for razor sharp handling..it's loose. Work it hard and it'll flop and weave some but it didn't wobble untill I got a defective tire and it really wobbled bad at slow speeds.

think i'll just leave well enough alone, it steers great can take my hands off the grips w/o any drift, tracts straight, tires wear good, only way i can tell the wheel is off center is with a tape measure

when I changed frames I also have a offset, you can't see it untill you measure it, but It tracks fine no wobbles and no unusuall tread wear. I did figure why I had the tracking problem, I put the belt on backwards from the way it was before, and I guess from former wear it shaped itself to the pully's

Ringo
That is very impressive information on wheel, centering and tracking geometry. It sounds like you kind've engineered these bikes, ya know?
COOL

Thanks for th kudo's jazhog, but I have to thank my instructors for this knowledge. I'm enrolled in a new motorcycle service technology program that one of the local college's started up about a year and a half ago. We just completed the frame geometry pertion of the program about 2 weeks ago.

The program is about 18 months to complete and covers every aspect of motorcyles, from engines, trannys, tuning, wheel lacing, brakes, frame geometry, electrical, dyno, performance engine builds, and total ground up bike builds. It's a great program. The only program that exist outside of MMI that I'm aware of. We have a state of the art Dyno room that has a dual drum dyno, and the room is atmospherically controlled. With the air make-up system they installed We can similate any driving conditions, air temps and humidity levels. With the dual drum system we can even dyno trikes and quads.

All the instructors have been in the busines for 20-30 years. The director of the program is very knowledgeable. He use to write for American Iron magazine and set 23 national speed records during the 1980's racing bikes.
I should be done in May of next year and will be able to apply for my state license. My goal is to open up my own shop.

Ringo

to bad there isn't more schools out there doing the same.

Ringo

That's great! Is always a good thing to gain knowledge and achieve your goals. Really hope and pray that it all works out for ya... Look ahead brother, and stay in tuned... "JAZZ"