Adjustable Pushrods what you need to know

Finishing up the 1997 Harley Davidson FLSTF Fatboy. I show you a little bit and give you a quick overview about setting up and Adjusting your Adjustable Pushrods Correctly. In 50 miles I will have to adjust the pushrods again. After that the pushrods will not have to be adjusted for over 5,000 miles. So with out further banter. ADJUSTABLE PUSHRODS JERSEY GARAGE STYLE!

[@tripswtrav]

Awesome. I've been searching for as much info as possible on cam changes on the ol Evo as I'm about to conquer that soon. All parts are here as we speak. Also while I'm at it I have the Ultima electronic ignition to put on as well as some S&S adjustable push rods! Oh and the newer style cam bearing also.

[@jaybourbon8608]

Appreciate the video. Just picked up a 87 FXSTC with a built evo. Got it from an old guy who paid someone to build the engine and had no idea of what is done. 95 psi front and rear cylinder. Definitely has a low end cam. Bike has maybe 400 miles since the rebuild. The lifters are noisy, and I was told on bigger lift cams this is normal, but I really want to check them because I have a buddy with a pretty radical evo and his do not sound like this. Engine has good oil pressure. No idea what pushrods. What cam, or what lifters are in this bike, so I'm hoping to get some direction here on how to check these. Everything looks new so I'm guessing it has new lifters as well. The push rods look light gold color. Not sure if there are markings to identify them? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[@robertpuleston3676]

How did you pump up the lifters ? Pls

[@jerseysgarage8013]

So I soaked them and then I also have a oiler can that you push the trigger and it pumps oil into the lifters. Since this was new lifters and breather and rocker gaskets and also intake gaskets

[@inthegarage.withalvaro.1344]

Are adjustable pushrods more or les quite than solid pushrods ?

[@jerseysgarage8013]

They are actually the same. Most noise from a Harley Davidson engine is due to well the valves, closing and other parts in the engine which like you noticed at a softail seems to be quieter than a touring bike. Well, that’s because they have harmonic balancer‘s in there and what not and it also depends on the where on the engine if how the rider or owner is taking care of the engine, and also it’s going to depend on the model here as Harley Davison has learned about parent material which is a material that the automotive industry has been using for a long time or they use ace a film of oil they have a bushing that allows oil to get through into it, and then it rot then the camshaft and all that ride on a film of oil that also has quieted The engines significantly in the automotive industry‘s been doing that for a long time but you know you’re always going to have some kind of noise. It is a machine and they’re pushrod engines however, him again Harley Davison‘s going through well a lot of R&D and learning how to make their engines quieter the older engines like the Evo‘s. They were a lot noisier than say a M8. And the other thing is you’ll notice that Harley Davison’s interference fit engines like to be rod are a lot quieter sounding down a Harley standard V-twin because they those engines are not interference fit engines, and they have kind of a broad tolerance, which makes them almost bulletproof, not 100%. You can still Terry Mark, but it makes them where you know they’re more forgiving if you will. Where as a interference fit engine has no give they’re not forgiving you know those are tolerance that’s the spec they need to be at. That’s the spec. They’ve been engineers and designs for and one little piece of dirt or the wrong oil can cause any interference engine to experience damage.

[@inthegarage.withalvaro.1344]

@@jerseysgarage8013 thank you for taking the time, whenever I do anything in the cam chest I always go through the top but now thanks to your video I feel more confident about using adjustable push rods. Thanks again.

[@jerseysgarage8013]

@@inthegarage.withalvaro.1344 I’m glad my video was able to help. fueling has a great video about doing adjustable pushrods and Lifters. The lifters I used were fueling. And 2 years later after also doing intake gaskets. Carb cleaning adjustments and one lifter was bad. So I went with all four fueling lifters. A rebuild on the oil pump. A new breather gear. I wanted to do a metal S&S but after thinking about the condition of the oil which was bad. Like real bad. I don’t think it had been changed in 2-3 years. I decided to go back to plastic. Because if I used metal. And they went 2-3 years on a oil change again. That metal crankcase breather gear would seize and cause catastrophic failure. And we did, Barnett racing clutches with the extra friction and disc. Because this bike had a big motor big cam. the bearings in the cam chest were all Torrington’s which is my Favorite cam bearing and crank bearing. To Me they are a better bearing and I feel like they are quieter then the INA. I have found they have tighter tolerance then the INA Bearings. A lot of us old school guys use Torrington.

[@warrennoble]

Just a quick question why wouldn't you use solid pushrods for this job

[@jerseysgarage8013]

The bike has a cam in it so it has a bigger lift, so what they do is they use adjustable pushrods to help with the lift on the valves. Because if you use solid push rods on a bike that has a big cam you could end up smacking the the valves into the piston. Basically the valves would open too far. The piston will come up and hit the valves then the other reason why, some of these people at least push rods were put into this motorcycle, so when I got to the motorcycle, it had already had these in the in the bike, but it also is a performance add-on because it allows you to change the lift on the valves just ever so slightly you know to gain some performance you know because more fuel goes in breathe better, because the exhaust valve is open more so it pushes more exhaust out. But on cams that are bigger, it’s always a good idea to use adjustable pushrods then you don’t have to try to figure out what month pushrod you need to have.

[@jerseysgarage8013]

However, it does become a service item, another service item, but your adjusting the length of the rod to that cam, and to those valves, which is gonna give you the proper amount a lift. Basically it saves time when you’re doing a motor because then you would have to try to figure out your Lyft and your Lyft on your valves and try to figure out what pushrod length you need it.

[@warrennoble]

I was just wondering because I had installed a 525 fueling reaper cam on my 88 along with the template and oil pump installed and they recommended me to use solid pushrods so what do you think?

[@ardyrides834]

​@@warrennoble - I would do as the Cam manufacturer suggest. They have good engineering and Tech Service, supporting the Cams that they manufacture.

[@bullast2046]

“Bolt In” cams are just that.. you can certainly use your solid pushrods, it just means you have to take the rocker boxes apart.. these are just convenient

[@matthewjones7935]

Trouble with this video is that there arent just coarse and fine thread push rods. Every pushrod manufacturer has a different thread pitch.

[@jerseysgarage8013]

The manufacturer with have instructions but most our the same and I have used a bunch of different ones. But of course you should always read the manufacturer specifications

[@DevilDog59]

You are correct there are manufacturers that use different threads per inch and if you got a bike that someone previously installed adjustable push rods and you need to adjust them this is the process I use at my shop. When you have adjustable push rods removed measure the thread pitch with a thread pitch gauge. A standard hydraulic lifter has 0.200 inches of travel and you want to set them with a preload of 0.100 which is the half way point of the hydraulic lifter travel. Get out the calculator and we will use 32 thread per inch as an example 1 divided by 32 equals 0.03125 times 3.5(number of turns) equals 0.109 that is around the halfway travel of of the hydraulic lifter. If you have a different thread pitch just put that number into above equation then plug in a number a turns into the equation until you get to the 0.100 inches of hydraulic lifter travel which is half of the total lifter travel on a standard hydraulic lifter. Hope this helps answer your question