I have a 2006 Road King Custom non-ABS and I have been noticing an issue with my front brakes since I replaced the pads a few months ago. When I did the pads, I also flushed the fluid, but did not disassemble the calipers or anything. Well now, whenever I roll the bike or am moving at low speed, I hear a sound like one of the pads dragging against the rotor. If I hit the front brake lever, it goes away for a second and then comes back. As of late, it has turned from a simple "grinding" or dragging sound to a squeal. I do not notice that the front wheel is actually tight, and I don't notice that the brakes start grabbing or anything as I ride. I don't smell brakes getting hot as if they were tightening up and binding Right now it appears to be nothing more than annoying. Is this something I should be worried about though? Do I have a problem with one of the calipers? Pistons seized up on one side? Bad hose? What are your thoughts? I recently replaced the front tire, and at that time it seemed to be coming from the left caliper.

 

Do you have the original rotors? If so they should be on the opposite side they are stamped. Left stamped rotor, on right side of bike etc. There was a problem with brakes squealing, Harleys fix was to swap the rotors left to right. Mine started to get noisy after taking the front end apart to lower it. I replaced the stock rotors with a set of two piece rotors, and the squealing went away.

 

Did you push the pistons all the way back into the caliper?

 

Yeah I pressed all the pistons back in. Was curious if that caused one to sieze or something. Weird that it goes away when I blip the brakes, then comes back after about 2 seconds, not immediately.

I might take a look at the rotor swap. Seems like it would be easy enough to try anyways. I am assuming the direction of rotation needs to be the same, or is that what changes with the swap?

 

You change the rotation when swapping sides.
I would get some brake cleaner, put something in 1 caliper at a time that is a little over 1/2 inch wide squeeze the brakes until the piston is almost all the way out, and clean the pistons, then put it back together.
The pistons build up a lot of junk because they don't get much protection.
I would also switch the rotors around.

 

The dragging sound you are hearing is very common. It's the nature of disc brakes. The pads are always in contact with the rotors even when no pressure is being applied. That's what you are hearing.

Typically, the sound is more prominent when new pads are installed on a used rotor. The surface finish of a used rotor is obviously not as perfect as a new rotor and that can lead to a more prominent dragging sound when there is not pressure being applied.

Functionally, the brakes are most likely just fine. In my opinion, unless the noise is really significant or extremely annoying, it's probably not worth the time and effort (and cost) to try to eliminate it.

On another subject, the picture you have in your signature... Is that US12 in Idaho? I was just there about a week or two ago and have a similar picture. Were those next 100 miles some of the nicest miles you've ever done, or what? One of the nicest rides I've ever been on, that's for sure.

 

Yes that's the top of Lolo pass on US 12. It's right at my backdoor. We used to ride up to Lochsa Lodge from Missoula every Wednesday night. I cannot count how many times I have gotten to ride that road, and every time has just been awesome!