46 & 47 Indian Chief Speedometer Cable Lube

[DEEBS47Chief1991]

Has anyone ever lubricated a 46 or 47 Indian rear wheel driven speedometer cable? Looks like you would have to hang it up and fashion a cone at one end to fill with oil and let gravity do its job. Has anybody ever done something like this?

47 Speedo Cable.jpg DSCN2836.JPG

[pisten-bully]

...pull the inner cable out (the bottom fitting at the drive slides off the cable), clean the inner cable and lightly grease, then fish some 16gauge wire down the outer cable, or housing, and tie a scrap of Scotchbrite to the end, soak a bit of solvent (or WD40) and pull the Scotchbrite through. Depends on how rusty or cruddy the outer cable is inside...you can simply rinse and repeat! Works for me!

[DEEBS47Chief1991]

Hi Harry, thanks for the post. I have tried to pull the end off but it seems to be permanently crimped. Is it on that tight?

[pisten-bully]

hmmm, one can never know with a 77 y.o. motorcycle...original or replacement? Dunno how a cable could be assembled with both sides crimped, but maybe along the line somewhere that lower end was somehow permanently attached. Should be a square drive end on the lower end of the cable that slides into the pinion gear that is driven by the drive gear in the drive housing. Old grease holding it, rust?

[PaulCDF]

" hang it up and fashion a cone at one end to fill with oil and let gravity do its job." Deebs that is how I previously did mine. After reading this post pulled the cable for maintenance and following Harrys suggestion. I must have a repo or H-D cable I've been running all these years as I could not get the drive end off. Sooo . . . I hung to cable up; used a bit of match stick to lift cable out of casing; used aluminum tape to make a little dam, Shot PB blaster graphite into this Rube Goldberg set up. Small short sprays until graphite dripped out other end of cable. Took cable down and laid flat let that dry then hung cable up again BUT with other end UP and repeated process. Seems good. We will see.


blaster_graphite_dry-dd2a015a speedometer lube.png Speedometer cable B Drive end.JPG Speedometer Cable C Speedohead end.JPG Speedometer cable IMG_4748.JPG