Arrrggghhhhh! My '07 1200 Custom has a leak through the lower rocker box gasket. I knew it had a small leak, but it's not like fluid is gushing out. I discovered it last weekend while I was changing the oil. It's an issue that has to be watched, but I was planning on taking care of it over the winter.

So, on Wednesday, I take my bike to the dealership for its safety inspection. The service desk guy hunts me down on the showroom floor and informs me that the bike will not pass inspection because (1) the tires are worn (Okay. I suspected as much) and (2) the rocker box is leaking. Huh? I've never heard of such a thing. How is it possible to fail a safety inspection because you've got a smudge of oil off the back of your rear cylinder? When I confront him about it, he says that this is THEIR standard and, if I need a less thorough inspection, that I should take the bike to a gas station. Wow. Way to win friends and encourage me to do business with you, Homer.

But this is all beside the point. How is it possible that my ride has a gasket leak? The bike has only 9k miles on it! (I bought it last year with less than 100 miles on it, from a lady who bought it new and parked it in her garage for the next 5 years.) It's barely broke in. This kind of thing shouldn't happen for at least another 20+ k miles.

And what is it with HD's design? When I saw the leak, I was thinking the repair has got to be like on the old cars. Considering where the leak is -- above the head -- I figured this would be a simple matter of pulling the tank, then valve cover and replacing the gasket. Oh, no. HD couldn't design something so simple. The entire rocker arm assembly rests on a separate piece of steel called the inner rocker cover. On top of that, four of the bolts that hold that hold the rocker arms to the inner rocker cover also hold the inner rocker cover to the cylinder head. WTF? So, you can't just slide the inner rocker cover off the head intact. No, you have practically remove the rocker arms in order to do that.

Besides, every other piece of equipment that I've ever worked on with push rods and rocker arms, the rocker arms have been clamped directly onto the head. Why the heck does HD need a separate slab of steel to hold the friggin' rocker arms?

So, now what looked originally like an hour job and only one $10 gasket is now looking like a 4 hour job and no less than 3 gaskets excluding the four stinking bolt gaskets. The gaskets alone cost close to $40.

I shudder to think what kind of monstrosity the engineers at HD would come up. Have they forgotten the First Rule of Engineering: Keep It Simple. Or how about its corollary: Never choose a complex solution when a simple one will do. I can only imagine what the engine would look like if HD ever decided to join the 21st century and implement overhead cams (What? You would have to crack the crankcase in order to adjust the cam chain tensioners?) or water cooling (Checking the fluid level would involve draining the entire system and then removing an engine cover, just like you do with the gear oil for the transmission. Speaking of which, why isn't there a dipstick for checking the primary fluid?)

Right now, I'm hatin' Harley. From here, it looks like this whole bike was designed not so much for my riding pleasure, but to separate me from as much of my hard earned cash as possible.

Anyway, that's my rant. Maybe things won't look so bad in the morning.

 

Pretty common on the newer bikes with 2-piece rocker covers. Not sure why, but it is. And it's really not that complicated of a job. I don't work much with the new ones, but I can do the old 3-piecers in under 3 hours for both, and about 1hr45min for 1 cylinder. Total cost is about $20 in gaskets per cylinder.

 

Roni, 2007 1200-C leaked here on the rocker box gasket. the rocker support gasket was not leaking but I replaced the rear one anyway. I replaced both rocker box gaskets even though the front one was not leaking. Neither rocker support box gasket leaked. I did not replace the front support box gasket. You can see where the leak was, where the gasket is leaning outward. I think the Cometic gasket kit was 42 bucks. I was working one armed, completely torn bicep and 75% of my rotator cuff. I still got the rear done in about 3 hours and the front in about 1.5 hours. 11,000 miles ago and all is well.

 

I had the same problem from the top corner, with only 6k miles. I agree, it's a hassle. We shall see what happens with Victory and Indian motorcycles giving HD some real competition.

 

That bike sitting for 5 years was worse on it than it being ridden 5 years.

 

Good point

 

That's when I would have thanked them for the tip and got on the bike a rode it to the nearest gas station.