Shovelhead - Together Again

Motormounts need tightening. Nuts on the heads barely touching.


Torque the top bolt.


Smoke the head mount bolts. I can't find a torque value for these.


Throttle cables on.


Rubberbands on.


Looks good, well crap. Try again with...


the hose clamps on the rubberbands. I have new rubber bands, but I re-used the old ones, kind of an experiment. I know I will have the carb off to check the torque on the headbolts. So I would have use the new ones the second time.



Attach the vacuum line for the VOES switch.


Bolt one of the carb support bracket.


Bolt two of the carb support bracket.


Gas line through the pigtail and to the carb inlet.


Oh crap. I forget about this. The push throttle cables needs to be routed to the outside of the rocker box oil line.


Take the cable bracket off.


Reroute. Good to go.


Adjust the throttle cables.



Air filter.


Cover.


Fresh plugs from the toolbox.


Gap at 0.040.


Plugs in.


Plug wires.


Time for gas.


It kicked off easy, but I think there is an intake leak because it dies out without throttle even when warm. Time to take the carb off and re-torque the headbolts now anyway.



Sounds like it's sucking wind.

Pushrods and exhaust

Big Jim hooked me up with some pushrod tube seals guaranteed not to leak.


Something like this.


Pushrods. Front exhaust is longest, rear exhaust is next longest, both intakes are same short ones.


Middle seal here.


Top seal.


Bottom seal.


First pushrod goes in.


I forgot to put the rockerbox lines in. This is the top one. It's easier to put on with the heads, but too late for that now.


Easy enough.


Long one read to go.



Fill the take with 60wt.


Kick 'er through.


Better make sure the pump hasn't air locked.


Pull the check ball spring.


Watch it fill with oil.


I had to pull the oil line again and kick to make sure it was pumping okay.


Now I got all the pushrods in and adjusted.


Here's my special keeper installation tool. A large cheap smooth screwdriver.


Push down, slide over.


Front two pushrods went in great, but the rear cylinder pushrods were giving me fits. But those problems were easier to spot.

I left an old seal in the rear intake side, and


the rear exhaust tube didn't fit into the newer tappet blocks.


I pulled the push rods swapped the tube and got rid of the extra seal, and everything fit.


Everything is together now.


On to the exhaust, I have to enlarge a gasket hole for the oversized rear head bolt.


I'm trying the evo gasket trick this time instead of silicon. We'll see how it goes.


It's a stretch for sure.



Hanger bolt,


Both pipes on.


Last hanger bolt.


Clutch needs to go back on.


The carb and sparkplugs are next. Almost there.