Valve Spings...

Hey everybody,
I need some help on something. I'm a pretty competent wrench. I'm upping my 1999 FXDX stock 88" to the 95". I purchased the SE 1550 cylinders, the SE flat top cast pistons for a compression of 10.25:1, the SE 203 cam, SE adjustable push rods, the SE high tensile cylinder studs, a Delkron cam plate, Feuling super oil pump, Andrews primary cam drive gears, the SE carb manifold, and a 45 Mikuni carb (just like the SE but not), TP roller rockers, SE liters/tappets, 6500 rpm module and coil, I'm using the stock heads, and recently a SE valve spring kit 18013-03A (the Ovate Beehive spring type, this was due to the parts guy suggesting these based on the SE catalog). My question is, do I need the springs or not? The springs say that they "Fits '04-later XL and '05-later Twin Cam-equipped models." Am I going to screw something up? I just want to build as bullet proof of a bike as I can, and I am here for suggestions. Thanks, Mike

The only question I have is the SE 203 cams. Those are chain drive cams, are they not? It sounds as though you are going to gear drive.

No, I mean the secondary gears to outside of the cam plate. I replaced the stock harley ones with the Andrews ones. Didn't mean to confuse.

What I'm really askin is, are the stock springs ok with a .501" lift or should I go with the SE springs that I purchased, or a different spring? I'm a little confused...

Considering that the S&S 510G cams have .510 lift and are a bolt in design, no headwork required, I think you would be just fine with the stock springs and a .501 lift cam.
Twin Cams can take up to a .550 lift without changing the springs.

Yes, you should be OK with stock springs. Just curious- have I got it right, you are running gears on the outside of the cam plate and chain on the inside (cam to cam)? I just hadn't seen that configuration before.

Sorry if I am confusing you...I replaced the chain drive gears on the outside cam plate with ones from Andrews just cause they're better than the stock HD ones, it's still a chain drive. I couldn't afford to go with an entire gear drive set up like I wanted to...I was trying to do this build up on a budget, my first born son was born 4 months ago, and I want to leave the bike to him someday.

Congratulations on the birth of your son. He will be proud to inherit his dad's bike some day.

[o-sixs]

Those 203 cams are for all practical purposes TW37 cams. The stock springs will be fine. The problem you might have is to much compression with those cams. I'd back off on compression or run cams with more overlap. I used those pistons in a 95 with stock size combustion chambers but with TW55 cams, which have more overlap, and had 185 PSI which is about all you'd want in a street motor, some would say thats to much, and with 203s it should be higher[to much]. I think I'd use the TW37 gear drive from andrews or just stay with the chain drive. I don't see what you're gaining by useing half the setup. I'm not a Harley tech and I may be wrong about that but it sure sounds like a lot of compression to me.

The SE valve springs you purchased are for 7mm valves,used on 05 and later big twins.These springs where originaly designed for a sporster so the seat pressure is to high for chain drive cams.As for the 10.25:1 don't sweat it,with the ignition you have it should work fine.Make shure you have .035-.040 quench and you can get this with different thickness head gaskets.Hope this helps Mike