I have just replaced my rear tire. When I reinstalled the wheel I noticed the wheel is not centered. Did I do something wrong? On the left side I can just barely get my index finger between the tire and the fender, on the right side there is more room and my finger fits with clearance. I am 99% positive I put the spacers in correctly.

 

You might want to check the drive train alignment per the service manual. Last time this happened to me the rear tire was actually angled vertically, not off center. I went through the procedure and a couple turns on the top drive train stabilizer straightened her up.

 

If you only replaced the tire, then it has to be the way the spacers were put in. I don't think that a tire change would effect the alignment.

 

You are correct, tire change should not effect alignment. Maybe the mis-alignment went unnoticed until the op changed the tire. I noticed mine because i changed to a wider tire and while checking clearance i noticed the same symptoms as the op described, who knows how long it was actually out of alignment... Just giving the benefit of the doubt when the op says he put the spacers in correctly and offering advice on other possible problems.

 

On the older bikes (like my 02) the rear tire is offset a touch to the left. Make sure alignment is good and everything is back together correction, but it may just be the design of the bike (each is different). Native Custom Baggers (near me) said he sees it all the time and can mill down the brake calipers mount and make a longer spacer for the left side, which sounds expensive to me. Was also told about the offset by Jake at Glide-Pro. Jake said one tip is to loosen up the rear fender to pull it over a bit, once tightened back up the rear wheel looks more centered (although usually not perfect). I wanted to run a fatter rear wheel and could not because of this, I may have Native Custom mill the brake mount at my next tire change.

 

Thats usually the cause is if you left out a spacer when reinstalling them.

 

Agree. My 04 is the same way. Asked my Indy about it and he said that is normal. My bet is it was like that before the tire change, and you just didn't bother to notice because you weren't looking that closely at the rear tire before.

 

You can't 'leave a spacer' out and the thing work right! The brake will bind, at the least, pulley and belt be wrong and out of line. Bad things might happen!

I had the alignment on my bike checked by a friend and Harley mechanic, shortly before fitting a wider tyre. It is plumb in the centre of my fender, so it can be done!

 

I would check the fender struts especially where they come off of the horizontal and come down the side of the fender. I had one break on a road trip and the fender eventually got into the sidewall of the tire. Had to replace the tire with less than 5k on it and replace the fender strut, luckily the dealer had a take off that I could buy as it was not a part they usually stock.

 

There all off center. My 08 FLHX is, my 02 FXDWG and 99 FXDL was.