Well after chasing top end noise for the last year and even having two dealers look at I had come to the conclusion it was normal. But no, in my case it was not. The machinist doing my head work found the problem. A guide had seized to the rear exhaust valve. The guide was riding up and down with the valve. There goes another 150.00 bucks. The strange thing was is I had the first dealer check the bike because I thought I dropped a valve coming out of the mountains. They said nothing wrong with this motor. Second dealer same, same. I'll listen to what my ears tell me from now on. If they are telling me there is a problem there probably is.

 

Unless you take it apart that may be hard to find. I assume the dealers didn't go that far.

 

I cant stand some of the stealers out there.

At least you found the problem

 

Sometimes I think a hand from above is watching out for me. If I hadn't pulled the threads on the same head I had the guide problem I think something a lot worse could have happened going down the Interstate like a sucked valve, a seized motor...
All it would take is that guide hanging below deck or hanging open.

 

That bites for sure...yep a bent valve could be bad and expensive.

Still, I would assume the guide has beat the crap out of the head, right?

 

I would think but machinist says just an oversize guide and I'll be better than new.

 

Dealerships don't often repair components, mostly it's R&R. That's not just Harley, it's the industry.

One of the reasons I do so much of my own work is that I get to make more of those decisions for myself. If I pull my heads, I can choose to take them into a shop that specializes in heads for rebuild.

 

Great catch, glad you found it.

Toby

 

Glad you found the problem. I've seen your other posts about using thrust washers to shim the rockers. Are you even going to bother doing that now?

Would have been interesting to have heard the ticking sound this caused.

 

I already did the shims and they did quiet things down some but I still had a pretty significant amount of noise. Honestly I thought it was a rubbing pushrod tube. I found rub marks on a pushrod. Come to think of it, it's the rear exhaust pushrod...Interesting.