V-Twin Engine Question

[HardcoreZ28]

Finally got the chance to fire up my chopper for the first time this week. She's running but I'm having an oil issue in the front cylinder. There's a good amount of blue smoke coming out that exhaust pipe and I can see a little external oil seepage from the head gasket. The plug is also getting oil on it. Only ran the engine for about 5 or 6 minutes so far to so the plug isn't terrible but you can tell.

I'm hoping the head gasket is my only issue and not rings. Any of you guys know about Harley V-Twins? If the head gasket is weeping oil externally I'm assuming it's also pulling oil in and that's where my smoke is coming from. Thoughts/Opinions?

Also I had a b!tch of a time getting the heads on the motor...for some reason 2 bolts on each head (4 on each) didn't want to thread in easily. They went about 2/3 in and took a lot of effort to get them the rest of the way in. Needed way more torque than spec just to take up the slack between the bolt and head.

Plan is to run a compression and leakdown test tomorrow night and see what the results tell me. If I don't see anything that looks way odd or way obvious I'm planning on pulling the head back off, checking the mating surfaces with a straight edge, and then running a good tap through the head bolt holes. Hopefully a new gasket and the bolts will go in easier after the thread chasing and I'll be in business.

Really looking for verification on my oil burning issue being related to the gasket.

[HeadlessNorseman]

sounds like you definitely need to investigate the problem with the bolts. If they arent clamping the head down like they are supposed to, that could cause your oil leak both ways for sure. Are all 4 bolts the same length and diameter? In my limited experience with v twins(actually a v twin lawn mower wont lie :mrgreen:) a couple of the bolts are short to clear stuff on the intake valve side of the motor. But that def doesnt sound normal to have to put that much torque on head bolts. They should be nice and clean and thread in most of the way by hand. The head is pretty much the only place oil can go into and out of the motor easily

[91chevywt]

How were the threads before you put it together? Did you run a tap in there when you had a chance to make sure everything was clean? Bolt length could be a problem too as stated...all relating to the clamping force of the head gasket on the cylinder.

[HardcoreZ28]

Honestly I didn't run a tap through them before assembly. Typical shoe makers kids are always barefoot kinda tale....was doing customer work til around midnight and snuck in an hour on the bike and half azzed it. I'll have to check the length on the bolts but nobody on the Harley forums has mentioned about different lengths and I think I'd have noticed unless it's only by a few threads. Hoping it's that and not an uneven mating surface.