The latest in my on-going saga of the Barn Find Harley Sportster 1200 rebuild. What did I screw up this time?

Go back to chapter one of this saga and see if that offer I made you looks better in hindsight? PM me if there is anything I can do to help you, advice-wise. Working on bikes is how I am spending my retirement.

24hr campfire consensus is you shoulda put 1 oz of seafoam into each cylinder also with the marvel mystery oil.








Seafoam can fix anything from athlete's foot to cracked o-rings on solid fuel rocket boosters and everything in between.


LOL!!!

shoulda bought a stihl

Do yourself a favor and buy one of these Clymer Manuals. I had an old iron head Sportster many years ago and used the Clymer manual to put a new top end on the motor. The top ends are pretty easy to work on. I got to where I could take the top end off of it in less than a couple of hours,...no special tools required. I doubt if the new type motors are any more complicated from the cases up. Putting a top end in a Harley is about like rebuilding an air compressor pump.

The Clymer manuals spell everything out in detail and use a lot of photos.

https://www.themotorbookstore.com/h...JyJ6i5wIVDpSzCh2ACAriEAQYBCABEgLjCfD_BwE

Got a Clymer manual off eBay last week!

I think the Sporty's value is climbing every time I touch it.

My internet is too slow and my patience to thin to watch youtube, but if you have stuck pistons and plugs, remove the intake manifold and pour each head port full of penetrant, of which auto trans fluid is very good, and let it sit. Try to bump it back and forth periodically until it moves. If you can get the exhaust pipes off the heads without breaking something, remove them and fill the heads there too. It will eventually free up. You can sometimes speed the process by applying hair dryer heat to the heads and cylinders after you get them full of penetrant.

It's better to heat it first then add the oil.
The cooling will help pull it in.

Yea....I wish we could just get a condensed explanation of what happened.....in printed words. I don't want to make time to watch the video, either.

Stuck pistons are very common on bikes, especially after long storage. When I worked in a motorcycle shop we'd see at least a dozen every spring. If you don't store them with a bit of oil spread around the cylinders when you park it, the rings will rust to the cylinder walls. I see new pistons and a rebore in the future, although it's possible that the damage isn't too bad. Squirt Kroil penetrating oil in the sparkplug holes and let it sit overnight before trying to turn it again. If Kroil won't loosen it, it won't loosen.

Once it's running and all tricked out, it's still going to be a Sportster. There are a bunch of other crotch rockets that will outperform it, and real Harley riders want a full grown Hog. Back in the dark ages, the 61 cubic inch bike was the granddaddy of the Sportster, and those weren't terribly popular, either.
Jerry

Had a buddy that traded a land cruiser for a sportster. Think you got a better deal. Tho he was much shorten than me. I couldn't ride the thing comfortably. Even with the forward pegs..

Careful not to leave to much at in the cylinders if you use it as penetrant...it burns, but slowly

eh, don't dog a sportster. Its a classic look

A good performance shop (avoid the dealer SE junk ) can put a sporty in the tens easily and even the nines with a few $$$$$

I know a guy who’s been riding Sportsters forty years as his primary mode of transportation, been living in the wind all that time, committed to the lifestyle good and bad, and he turns wrenches for a Harley dealership, always has. What does he need to do to be a real Harley rider?

It’s the Wave man, he has to know how to do the Harley Wave. All others are just posers.

Knees in the breeze. Doesn't matter what ya ride.

Once in East Texas a long time ago I knew a biker chick, a blond who had an actual shovelhead Lowrider an older admirer had given to her. One time she let me ride it, her following on my Kawasaki at the time.

We pass a group of big ol’ Harley riders coming the other way and me and them are all waving at each other like long lost brothers.

Nobody waved at her 🙂

^^^^

Flave is right. You really are a dumbass, aintcha.

Buddy of mine bought a new hd soft tail standard. He kept getting onto his wife because she would always wave overhanded to other riders! I don’t know if she ever did learn the Harley "Wave" or not...
laffin

Never said anything different.

That Harley woman story? Exactly true as told. She was a looker who liked men, went through all of us in a whirlwind and then went on her way. The funniest part about that whole episode was that she confided to my buddy’s girlfriend that I was exceptionally good in the sack. I mean if anyone would know about stuff like that she would. She had done a bunch of us and said I was the best.

I seem to remember I brung that topic up a time or two

She didn’t nickname you "sharp things" did she?
laffin

Back when I was single I used tell my students “You can call me what my girlfriends call me; Mr. O’Birdy or Sir”.

Then one time I said “You can call me what my girlfriends call me....”

...and some kid says “What’s that.... Shorty?”

Not a thing.

This always makes me laugh. Try riding 500 miles in a day on a big Harley bagger (the supposed real man's bike). Then try riding 500 miles on a Sporty (the supposed girl's bike). You'll quickly find it takes more of a man to ride the Sporty than the living room couch.

I actually own both and I approve of this message.

Your romantic exploits aside, did she ever let you ride the Shovel? :):). I have a Shovelhead Lowrider and also an EVO Lowrider. Guess which one everybody comments on.

My current ride is a one off EVO design big twin pro street. The next build will be a shovel, wouldn’t mind a knuckle but that’s unlikely to happen.

That one time, about a 150 mile day.

That was my motorcycle period, what ever bike I had was my only transportation. Never could own a Harley back then on account of they got stolen so much (1980's), I would never be able to just park it at the mall/workplace/apartment whatever.

Might rectify that shortcoming in these next few years I dunno, still got the itch, but my lifestyle is different now.

I rode my old shovel for years. Lotsa folks had no idea what it was. The new bikes have taken over.

Aw, C'mon. Just go for the knuckler. Lol.

I think S & S is making knuckle crate motors.

????????????????

Prob'ly relevant to point out with respect to Sportys that just because a motorcycle ain't the fastest/most agile/coolest doesn't mean it ain't gonna be fun.

Most fun I ever had on backroads was on a 650 dual sport thumper, and that was right after 50,000 miles on a Nijna 750. That Ninja was better'n me no matter what I did, whereas on that thumper I had to hit every shift and line just right to run with the fast boys.

I'd consider an 883 for that very reason, 'cept I have read they are geared lower and therefore run kinda busy at Interstate speeds.

I always thought the 883 was a descendant of the 750 K. I learned to ride on a 1948 61" EL, complete with foot clutch, and spring fork and lived through it. With todays traffic a hard tail, stiff front springing and needing one foot for a clutch instead of the ground is a recipe for not getting old. The kick starter is the real test of manhood

Beautiful bike 😎

Many years ago I was having a beer out on the front porch of a old East Texas bar, one of them warm humid nights when the bugs swarm the outside lights. Row of bikes out front, mostly Harley’s, muddy pickup trucks parked elsewhere on the gravel lot.

A screen door creaks and slams, and a pretty, inebriated blonde weaves over to her Ol’ Man’s Shovel Wide Glide (Road Glide???), stands on the floorboard, reaches out to grab the high bars, throws a leg over and, hair falling over the gas tank, commenced to try and start it, been a long time but IIRC she got it on like the seventh or eighth kick. I’ve been in love with that image ever since