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Primary drain plug location?

RideTheLightning

Active Member
Working my way through my servicing for the first time, and it seems that either


a) My sporty has no transmission oil

OR

b) I goofed something up while trying to drain it or have the wrong location of the plug

I have attached a pic as well as uploaded it to tinypic to point out the bolt that I undid:

30mv1nc.jpg


When I did this I had little drops of oil, but when I got the bolt completely out there was nothing. The bike was on the jiffy stand when I did this and the bike was warm.

What am I doing wrong? :D
 

Attachments

  • trans plug.jpg
    trans plug.jpg
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Sporties have only 2 oils, one for the engine and the other for the primary and trans combined. I would be concerned about no oil coming out thou. Check the drain hole to be sure there is nothing blocking it. If nothing else pull the derby covet to see if the oil is blocked by something.
 
I'm not familiar with sportsters but, where your arrow points in your picture looks like it is a bolt for the outer primary cover. Just to the right and on the bottom looks like that would be the primary drain plug (hex nut).
 
The arrow is on one of the primary cover bolts the drain plug is just a wee bit further back and under the primary cover
take the derby cover off and you will be able to see if there is oil in there it is also the easiest way to get the oil back in
have the bike upright or not all of the oil will drain out

Brian
 
Sporties have only 2 oils, one for the engine and the other for the primary and trans combined. I would be concerned about no oil coming out thou. Check the drain hole to be sure there is nothing blocking it. If nothing else pull the derby covet to see if the oil is blocked by something.
I have a feeling that by just going off of the manual, I id something wrong. I undid the bolt with an allen key. In retrospect, I think it should have been a 5/8 crescent wrench or something along those lines.

I was going to remove the cover to do exactly what you suggested, but I stripped one of the TORX heads:panic

I don't think I have the tools at my place to fix that boo-boo. :(
 
Common occurrence to strip the head of a derby cover torx screw drill the head off and once the cover is off the tension is released and you will be able to remove the rest of the screw with a pliers
replace the derby cover screws with allen headed ones and use a wee bit of anti seize on the heads of the screws

Brian
 
I'm not familiar with sportsters but, where your arrow points in your picture looks like it is a bolt for the outer primary cover. Just to the right and on the bottom looks like that would be the primary drain plug (hex nut).
Agreed...
I think you need a 5/8" wrench or 1/4" allen.
 
I am attaching a couple of pages of my manual. As Fin says the drain plug is further under the primary (figure 21) and the oil level plug is in figure 15.
 

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  • 0297_001.pdf
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Thanks for sharing the service manuel on how to change the primary fluid:D I bough my bike about 2 months ago and it didnt come with a manuel. Eventually i am going to buy a service manuel but for know just trying to save money for the 20 k tune up.
 
Just my opinion, but a Service Manual is way more important and will save you so much more money that if I could only pay for one or the other, I would buy the Service Manual first and delay the 20,000 mile service.
 
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