For all those working on their bikes, if you don’t have one, buy one right away to avoid a quite frequent annoying mistake while installing a transmission mainsheet case bearing seal. This simple tool let you set the seal perfectly in place at .050” below the case surface. Good bye transmission oil leaks. Machined from billet aluminum and finished in red anodizing (so that you easily find it in the shop or garage!) this new seal installer is for large seals used on 1987 to 2006 Big Twins (except Dyna models ). $49.95 at George’s Garage..
3 Responses to “Transmission Main Shaft Seal Installer”
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George has made a few tools similar to JIMS® tools and you can buy direct. (JIMS® is dealer-only.)
The H-D® 0.050″ seal inset depth has remained the same since 1936. The raw metal edge of the back of the seal’s metal ring needs to seat into the dry cork washer at the bottom of the mainshaft (tranny case) counter bore. So, you’ll have a collar seal around the mainshaft and a seal at the back, where the metal seal perimeter meets cork.
You can tell if the previous mechanic installed the old seal correctly, because the old cork should have an evenly distributed “seal line” indentation in the exterior surface, when it is removed for replacement.
JIMS also has distributors.
George has copied/mimicked several of JIMS tools in the past. George has no distributors, but if he did you can bet pricing would be the same or higher than JIMS. Support the people who put the R&D dollars into these product originally!
JIMS® has made some mistakes on it’s tools…small mistakes but huge when you go to use the tool.
The tool in question is JIMS® (97235-55B) 1955-68 (motor) sprocket shaft seal tool. The tool ships from JIMS® that has two locator pins for the seal. These pins are 0.088″ long and since the pins are the only part of the tool that make contact with the seal, if you don’t surface mill the pis down to 0.070″, then the longer pins will allow the tool to wobble. Not good.
So, JIMS® has made millions, probably sold off JIMS to another management company years ago.
Anytime you can find a mechanic like George to make something cheaper and better than the original, I’m for it.
All the other manufacturers have deserted R&D on 1936-1964 OHV tools. We need some fresh eyes on repop, while the rest of the world gets carried off by the ridiculous electirc-start modern motorcycles.
Screw the future of modern motorcycles. Some of are happily stuck in the past, and we need support form the “garage inventors” of the world.
Bite me Harley-Davidson®, you modern freaks.