Wide Glide Clunking Front End

[glider.]

It should be noted that the fall away test as described in the service manual should be performed if any service of this type is performed on the wide glide front end to insure proper setup of the neck bearings.

Here's another cure that some have had good luck with...

Remove the top nut's chrome cover and the lock nut (1.5" nut), draw a line around the washer before removing. I take a narrow strip of sand paper wrapped around the tip of my finger, and sand inside the circle you drew to rough up the chrome. Be carefull to stay within the line, so that when your done the chrome cover will hide all sanding marks. Get a new washer and sand the bottom surface to rough it up. Install washer on the top triple tree, the two sanded surfaces go together, install nut and torque to 100 ft lbs. At this point you have to check fallaway and adjust bearings as needed to get it right using the serrated adjuster under the tree.
What your doing is putting two rough surfaces together and increasing the clamp load against them. They can no longer move independent of each other and your 'clunk' should be gone.

Another way to deal with this situation if you care to get into it, you can use some shim stock or even an old feeler guage of the proper thickness and shim the top tree to the steering stem post to remove some of the slop which should just about eliminate it completely as it is a clearance problem between the two parts with excessive clearance being the cause of the movement.

Here's a great web page link showing how to do this.

WideGlideClunk

Here's more input on this problem.

STEERING HEAD WASHER.jpg

steering head washer kit.pdf

STEERING HEAD WASHER.jpg Link 2

steering head washer kit.pdf Link 2

 

[rayhdavidson]

Thanks for the tip. My Softail has been giving me the same problems. I did tightened it all pretty well and wonder if i also should place a shim in between the head stem bearing bolt and the base of the tee top? I will try as it is rather annoying having this clunking.
Cheers Mate"

 

[glider.]

Follow what I sent you in a PM and you should be fine with the softails. The proceedure differs from dynas and softails.

Tightening it "pretty well" isn't 70 LBS torque. Try it with a torque wrench and see what you have then.

HD upped the torque value on this stem nut because of this problem from 40 LBS.

Here's the softail proceedure.
http://www.hdtimeline.com/chassis_s...front_end/757-softail_clunking_front_end.html

 

[brucea]

I recently acquired a '93 Wide Glide. I have a front end clunk and was about to dig into it, when I came across this post. I see the 'Steering Head Washer Kit' for the 2006-2008 models. Any idea if the problem that you explaian is for the earlier Dyna's as well? It's annoying for sure...

 

[glider.]

I recently acquired a '93 Wide Glide. I have a front end clunk and was about to dig into it, when I came across this post. I see the 'Steering Head Washer Kit' for the 2006-2008 models. Any idea if the problem that you explaian is for the earlier Dyna's as well? It's annoying for sure...

Go with the top link in the post above. It's just basically the top tree that is moving under stress under the nut causing the noise.

 

[teleman001]

I wonder if this is my problem on the street glide?

Ever heard of this on an FL?

 

[glider.]

Very possible on the WG front ends but different setup on your bike. I had to do the adjustment on the steering head a couple of thousand after I bought the 07 RK because of the knocking going over bumps. It took care of the noise.

Do the swing away method like they explain in the manual.

 

[FNPhillips]

The first clunk means that the steering neck bearings should replaced in addition to adjusting them to spec. Think of the noise as if it were a hammer hitting the bearing rollers and races.