Gear driven cams?

[gizz46]

H.D. will never go to gear, The machine fit is not near close to the fit you need for gear drive.
First to make gears work right the crank can not have over .003" run out, and a lot of bikes have much more than that. Second the cam plate needs to be right,
and H.D. cast plate may work or may not.
The twin cam is not set up from the factory to use gear drive, you need to set it up by hand, and H.D. is not going to do every Twin Cam by hand.
Some times you luck out and every thing is Ok but other times you are going to need to buy other stuff that is not bad, But won't work with gear drives!
It seems like the newer bikes are not set up as close as the older bikes ie crank run out, cam plate holed not in specs. for the gear drive.
I have found you need to replace the push rods with adjustable ones, New lifters, both cam bearings front and rear ,new bearing plate,and maybe a new cam plate, and the crank shaft if the run out is very bad, to get a top notch job out of it. I also change to a Basley spring in the oil pump.:newsmile040:

 

[Troy1225]

The Harley shop in Onalaska, WI had two hand crankable cam plates set up...one with gear drive and one with chain drive including the tensioners. I was really surprised at how much harder it was to crank the chain drive compaired to the gear drive. I would think there would have to be some HP loss with the chain drive.

 

[HeavyFuel]

H.D. will never go to gear, The machine fit is not near close to the fit you need for gear drive.
First to make gears work right the crank can not have over .003" run out, and a lot of bikes have much more than that. Second the cam plate needs to be right,
and H.D. cast plate may work or may not.
The twin cam is not set up from the factory to use gear drive, you need to set it up by hand, and H.D. is not going to do every Twin Cam by hand.
Some times you luck out and every thing is Ok but other times you are going to need to buy other stuff that is not bad, But won't work with gear drives!
It seems like the newer bikes are not set up as close as the older bikes ie crank run out, cam plate holed not in specs. for the gear drive.
I have found you need to replace the push rods with adjustable ones, New lifters, both cam bearings front and rear ,new bearing plate,and maybe a new cam plate, and the crank shaft if the run out is very bad, to get a top notch job out of it. I also change to a Basley spring in the oil pump.:newsmile040:

It's interesting that Yamaha went the gear drive set up with the roadstar and roadliner engines given the higher costs that would likely be involved. I don't think any of the other manufacturers use gear drive in their cruiser v-twins.