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Road King Chirp....still chasing

danthern

danthern

Active Member
Afternoon....I've been chasing for about a year now an engine chirp in my 09 FLHRC. I have other posts on this forum detailing what I've done in an attempt to resolve it. In short, I've replaced essentially the entire top end, including heads, pistons, honed the cylinders, lifters, push rods, rockers and boxes, front mount, inspected rear mounts and pivot shaft, replaced throttle body, drive belt is ok, replaced all exhaust gaskets, yada yada yada...all this was done by me. After I gave up in frustration I took it to a couple of indies (3 actually)who were no help. I then took it to my local dealer who diagnosed a bad oil pump which they replaced, no change in the sound. While he was there he checked everything in the bottom, all specced out good. New cam tensioner, etc. He sent it to their sister shop who installed a new clutch basket and went through the tranny and replaced all the bearings, etc. No go....I believe I've isolated it to the front cylinder. I've had this theory before and have ground the rocker cover to rule out something hitting it. I pulled the cover again today and ran the engine with it off. I don't hear the chirp with the cover off. Usually it's audible on idle and increases in volume on acceleration. It is definitely RPM synchronized. Any ideas would be appreciated. Thanks in advance
 
danthern said:
I pulled the cover again today and ran the engine with it off. I don't hear the chirp with the cover off.
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Is it just me or is this a very important statement that seems to be getting glossed over?

Sounds like despite your previous efforts, something is definitely rubbing inside this cover or the cover is defective in some way that causes a chirp.
 
That's the key statement I was making....I've ground the ribs significantly. What could cause a solid cover to fail and cause something to hit just out of the blue? Would you grind more?
 
danthern said:
That's the key statement I was making....I've ground the ribs significantly. What could cause a solid cover to fail and cause something to hit just out of the blue? Would you grind more?
Click to expand...

I was just commenting on your original post. I know next to nothing about the internal workings of these engines. Hopefully one of our real experts will throw their opinion in here.
 
What is the lift of your cam? Do you see wear marks in the cover?
 
How about the Vent?

With top cover off it doesn't make noise... ON it does...

I'd be taking it apart OR just replace... There is the Problem...:shock

signed....BUBBIE
 
If you see no evidence of the rocker arm contacting the cover then don't remove metal that doesn't need to be removed. Since you replaced the heads I assume that all clearances were checked and that there is no valve spring bind. The valve guides can make some noise if to tight. It's been my experience that a chirp that is RPM related is usually a leaking head gasket.
 
Can you put "pressure" somehow on the mounts while running and see if that deadens the chirp?
 
Bubbie maybe on to something with the vent. With the cover removed the vent would not be at work.
 
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