Finally,,,, It's alive and kicking, more pictures

[Dan_Lockwood]

Well guy, it's finally almost done. I say almost because I've got a couple little items to sort out to be totally finished. My wife and I put 81 miles on it yesterday and it was a great feeling to have it back together. I spent 12 weeks without a bike and I'm glad it's running again.

I'll repost two of the original pictures of the ole '76 FLH in original paint and then do the new pictures.















As you can see it looks pretty much like it did before only way different.

I do have a quick question about the oil pump though. How do you keep oil from seeping out under the heads of the oil pump attachment bolts. I've use all new gaskets and thread sealer on the bolts. My next step is to try nylon washers under the heads of the bolts to try and seal it that way.

My front caliper rattles quite badly, but considering it's quite a few years old, it has a right to I guess. Is there an anti rattle spring like you can get for the rear caliper to kind of lock against the pins? I think this would be enough to stop the rattle.

I do really appreciate all the support you guys have given me over the past year or so.

Thanks again for the help.



Dan
__________________
'76 FLH Electra Glide Project
'55 Chevy Nomad Gasser 540 ci / 660 hp

Dan's Picture Albums

[Speedbump]

That's gorgeous! Awesome paint and detail work. Now relax and have a cold one.

[newultraclassic]

Originally Posted by Dan_Lockwood

Well guy, it's finally almost done. I say almost because I've got a couple little items to sort out to be totally finished. My wife and I put 81 miles on it yesterday and it was a great feeling to have it back together. I spent 12 weeks without a bike and I'm glad it's running again.

I'll repost two of the original pictures of the ole '76 FLH in original paint and then do the new pictures.















As you can see it looks pretty much like it did before only way different.

I do have a quick question about the oil pump though. How do you keep oil from seeping out under the heads of the oil pump attachment bolts. I've use all new gaskets and thread sealer on the bolts. My next step is to try nylon washers under the heads of the bolts to try and seal it that way.

My front caliper rattles quite badly, but considering it's quite a few years old, it has a right to I guess. Is there an anti rattle spring like you can get for the rear caliper to kind of lock against the pins? I think this would be enough to stop the rattle.

I do really appreciate all the support you guys have given me over the past year or so.

Thanks again for the help.



Dan
__________________
'76 FLH Electra Glide Project
'55 Chevy Nomad Gasser 540 ci / 660 hp

Dan's Picture Albums

J&P sells an anti-rattle kit for early rear calipers. I'm not sure about the front. What happens to both front and rear calipers is the holes get egg-shaped where they mount on the bracket pins. What I did on my 1982 Shovelhead was to bore the holes and install bronze bushings to tighten up the caliper on the 1/2" mounting pins.

[Dan_Lockwood]

Originally Posted by newultraclassic

J&P sells an anti-rattle kit for early rear calipers. I'm not sure about the front. What happens to both front and rear calipers is the holes get egg-shaped where they mount on the bracket pins. What I did on my 1982 Shovelhead was to bore the holes and install bronze bushings to tighten up the caliper on the 1/2" mounting pins.

NUC, I did something like that last night. I noticed that the parts book shows a bushing for the two front fork caliper pins. I think my originals are steel inserts in the aluminum. I made new bolt in guide pin but the double ended mount pin is still loose in the bushing. I guess I could press in a bronze or oil light bushing, I have many sizes to choose from in my assortment as well as reamers to resize them afterwards. I also took the anti-rattle flat metal plate that goes over the two locating pins with the 90 degree flat on it and bent it a bit more to try and preload the caliper in the up position. It all helped but still not exactly what I'd call very tight.

I'll run it again and see what happens. I was going to try to put a compression spring between the fork tube and the caliper to see if that helped but there really isn't much room for that.

I have one of the rear spring plates that goes over the axle and lays on top of the swingarm lifthing the caliper upward. That seems to work fine, just too bad there isn't a fix like that for the front.

I was riding old downtown St. Charles MO on Sunday and it's very rough and to just piss me off it's also old brick, talk about rattles on the frontend.... I had to almost ride my front brake a bit to keep it quit.

Thanks for the help and suggestions.

Later dude.

Dan

[newultraclassic]

Originally Posted by Dan_Lockwood

NUC, I did something like that last night. I noticed that the parts book shows a bushing for the two front fork caliper pins. I think my originals are steel inserts in the aluminum. I made new bolt in guide pin but the double ended mount pin is still loose in the bushing. I guess I could press in a bronze or oil light bushing, I have many sizes to choose from in my assortment as well as reamers to resize them afterwards. I also took the anti-rattle flat metal plate that goes over the two locating pins with the 90 degree flat on it and bent it a bit more to try and preload the caliper in the up position. It all helped but still not exactly what I'd call very tight.

I'll run it again and see what happens. I was going to try to put a compression spring between the fork tube and the caliper to see if that helped but there really isn't much room for that.

I have one of the rear spring plates that goes over the axle and lays on top of the swingarm lifthing the caliper upward. That seems to work fine, just too bad there isn't a fix like that for the front.

I was riding old downtown St. Charles MO on Sunday and it's very rough and to just piss me off it's also old brick, talk about rattles on the frontend.... I had to almost ride my front brake a bit to keep it quit.

Thanks for the help and suggestions.

Later dude.

Dan

Yeah, whatever you can do to keep those original calipers running is good. They are no longer available from your friendly historically-minded Harley dealer so the only choice is aftermarket ones. They are not cheap. The A/M rear on my bike replaced the original which was totally worn out in 1992. It cost $250 then! They are about $350 now. The rear pistons alone are $57.00!!!!!!!

To show you how I walk the walk and talk the talk, I went to a vintage bike show and swap meet on Saturday at Dixon, California. I found a caliper back in good shape and two broken outers, one with a good piston. One of the outers is salvageable by cutting both the outers and welding the parts together to make one good one. I'll make that a nice little project for this winter. I paid $10 for the parts and got a good piston to boot.


I do that all the time, especially with broken primaries, many of which are salvageable. I got so enthusiastic about it about ten years ago that I bought a Lincoln TIG welder and took a two semester class at the local City College. I'm having fun over here anyway.

.

[FXRocket]

Wow, that is a really nice shovel man...Top flight work indeed! So, what did you do with the old fairing? :-)

[Fatty George]

holy crap! that thing looks great. you did a hell of a job there.

[Dan_Lockwood]

Originally Posted by FXRocket

Wow, that is a really nice shovel man...Top flight work indeed! So, what did you do with the old fairing? :-)

Whether it's a good thing to do or not, I saved all the original chrome, bags, batwing fairing, etc. I have the original narrow king/queen Harley seat as well.

I thought if I ever sold the '76 that having all of the takeoff parts, it might mean more money, but I really don't know about that.

Thanks guys for the nice comments. This is my first Harley refurbish. The guy I bought it from last July, who is not mechanical at all, asked how I knew where everthing goes. I told him hell if I know, this is all new to me. Well things like this just make sense how things fit, and of cource having a parts book with a couple good manuals always helps.

I've got just a couple minor drips here and there but I found a couple last night so I think I'm getting closer to a leak free bike.

Thanks again guys.

Dan

[vindex1963]

Nice, nice, nice, I can't say anything more. You MUST be proud. Nice!!!

[Dan_Lockwood]

Originally Posted by vindex1963

Nice, nice, nice, I can't say anything more. You MUST be proud. Nice!!!

I'm very happy with how it turned out, but now I have to get rid of a major rattle that started a couple weekends ago. See my other post, Rattle in my Shovelhead.

Thanks for the nice comments.

And to the guy that wants to buy a shovelhead and drive the dickens out of it, I truly agree, you have to be able to tinker with these things.

If someone offered me a good price for the '76 I think I'd be tempted to upgrade to a newer Harley. The '76 does draw quite a bit of attention when we're out at the local watering holes. Some have mistaken it for a new Harley instead of a 30 year old bike.

Sorry for the rambling, thanks again.

Dan