Cam needle bearing failed on my 2006 Road King. 32K miles on it with regular service (every 5k) with synthetic oil. Anyone else have this issue. Unsure yet as to total damage to engine.

You should only run HD Primary Chain Oil in that primary case and nothing else.
Synthetics are never good in harleys since they are ball bearing motors and Synthetics tend to be to slippery making the bearings skate instead of roll.

Your bike came from the factory with H-D Syn3 20W50 synthetic engine oil in it. Todays petroleum based and synthetic engine oils are compatible with each other so there are no issues there. Check the oil level with your bike on the side stand. There should be two lines on the dipstick. The upper line is the "FULL HOT" line and the lower line is the "FULL COLD" line. As long as the oil level is between the two lines, do not add oil. Resist the temptation to "top off the oil tank". Do not overfill the oil tank.

Good Luck
steve

Harley brand would be expensive but you cant go wrong if you use it. They cant blame you. Now syn vs regular? synthetic oil is though a little more expensive compared to regular, but lasts longer and gives better lubrication. And reduces your need to service the bike. Hence saves man-hours. and cost of lube as well. The choice is yours, ultimately.

Well, it depends. There was indeed a known problem with the cam bearing plate and that's what the oil pump is mounted on. Seems H-D used roller bearings instead of needle bearings on the cams and the bearing were failing. It was something like that anyway. Harley would not fix them under warranty until they failed. Instead, they lengthened the warranty out to 50,000 miles on the bearings. Whether or not this has anything to do with an oil pump problem, I don't know. You didn't say why you thought you had an oil pump problem.

Good Luck
Steve

Sorry to hear about your problem but it does happen. With the mileage that you are showing on your speedo, I would guess that your problem is a tappet roller has gone bad. This is a problem with Harley's. Between 20K and 30K miles is the prime time for a tappet roller to fail. I have seen them fail with as little as 13K miles on the engine but then I've seen them still running at 75K. Just "luck of the draw" so to speak.

One of the reasons Harley designed the "Twin Cam" engine was an attempt to solve this problem. They thought that if they could bring the valve train geometry closer to being perfect, straighten out those pushrods, that would solve the problem. Like a Sportster. I don't think I've ever heard of a Sporty losing a tappet roller. I don't hear about tappet roller failure as often as I used to and that may be the reason.

Now, keep in mind that without hearing your engine or doing any exploratory surgery on it, I'm just guessing here. It could be virtually anything. Disassembly and investigation is the only thing that will tell the story.

I'd advise doing that pretty soon as well. If you've got metal in your oil, it's doing damage all in the engine. I'd go ahead and take it down if I were you. Good Luck.

5w20. I recommend MOBIL 1 and change it every 5k miles.

Hello, (06' C50 owner here) I switched to Mobil 1 4T 10w 40 Full Synthetic Motorcycle Oil at 5K miles. My reason for doing so was the transmission used to clunk into gear pretty bad with regular MC dino oil. With synthetic oil, shifting is almost smooth as butter!

Now I am really depressed. We thought we have a change from driving Honda and Toyota so we decided to buy a new 2009 Tribeca. My first oil change for this car was 1800 miles, after breaking in. I replaced it with 7 qts of Mobile 1 Full Synthetic. Currently, the car has 8900 miles, that is 7100 driven; unfornately, I just filled 3 qts of new Mobile 1. Luckily, I check!!! Is this normal for Tribeca? If so, this is the worst investment of a lifetime. I won't ever buy Subaru again or recommend to anyone!!!

Hello redevil67...This is normal for the HD engine, it going to have valve train, top end noise at some point, some as early as 2000 miles. If you take it to the dealer they will try to sell you on worn tappets...key word here SELL..I've seen this many times, dealer replaces componets, 2000 miles later the noise returns.
These are hydraulic valves and as you probably know they operate at zero lash. Personaly, i feel that the problem is that the cams are not hardened properly or machined incorrectly.. When the leading edge of the cam lobes wear to a strange profile it tends to snap the lifter up in the lifter bore. This causes the rest of the valve train to rattle. You hear the noise on top but the culprit makin it, is the cams..Many chose to go with an aftermarket cam, such as an andrews...Another suggestion, is to switch oils. Don't know what you are useing now, but i'm not a fan of dino oil. As the temperature builds the more an oil is stressed. Lucas full synthetic 20w-50 or Mobil1 15w-50 are both excellent for anti-wear and long term protection.
I hope this helps, please rate me a fixya and good luck with your bike.

I don't see how oil can cause an overheating problem. I think the service tech was screwing with the fuel/ignition map when the bike was on the dyno. Is it a F.I. engine? Lean mixture or retarded/over advanced timing will cause this, among other things. The dealer may have to eat the cost of repair if you can prove they caused the problem. An air cooled engine that overheats is gonna self destruct!! Get it checked out NOW.