Shovelhead Rear End Re-do. Part 1

So, post Shovelfest, I have several things in mind. I need a rear tire, I'm down to wear bars. I need to figure out why I lost my rear brakes. I just rebuilt the rear caliper with fresh pads and a new bleed fitting, but I just lost the rear brakes again. I think I need to drop a few teeth on my rear sprocket for my highway rpms to drop just a bit as well.

So I put up the rear wheel to see how many teeth are on my sprocket. I have a 48, as I thought, so a 46 would be what I should try. I have 40-62 BDL belt primary and a 24 tooth front final drive with the 130/90-16 tire and with a 48 tooth rear sproket.  It should run 2780 rpm per Baker RPM Calculator. If I drop to a 46 rear sprocket I should do 2670 rpm at 70 mph. I am a bit concerned that with the 2.44 first gear that I might lug it off the line, but I'm running a 93 cubic inch motor with T&O torque monster flywheels. If this combination is junk, I will let you know.

Anywhoo, I go to inspect the rear sprocket and I notice that rear rotor and caliper are dragging something fierce.


Only in certain spots though. I guess I need a need rotor, too.



Wheel off, I'm really nervous about pulling the steel bolts from this aluminum "mag". Well, I think it's aluminum and not magnesium. I know it's not steel. I'm thinking thread galling, galvanic corrosion, loc-tite, and the bolt heads are already half stripped and means something is going to break.


Plenty of heat can't hurt anything. Yellow(MAP) gas.


Then I hammered the impact bit socket into the bolt head and hit it with an air impact driver. Amazingly, all the bolts came out without losing a thread, bolt head, or impact bit. I was very pleasantly surprised.

Holy cow! This rotor is not just wavy, it's totally cupped.