Lubrication After Long Storage Harley Oil & Lubrication Discuss Lubrication After Long Storage in the Harley Tech & Harley How-to forums; A buddy of mine just got an old Harley from his uncle and was worried because it had not been started or turned over in at least 5 years or ...

[JayDee]

A buddy of mine just got an old Harley from his uncle and was worried because it had not been started or turned over in at least 5 years or longer.

Anyone have any recommendations on anythign special to do with the lubrication before he strts or ride it?

I suggested squirting some oil into the sparkplug holes, putting it into 3rd gear and rolling it forward and backward to lube the cylinder walls, pistons and rings.

[evoKENevo]

Marvel Mystery Oil..great stuff..yet not well known by most folks these days.
I've used it for a lot of things - incld'g a little in 1st tank of gas while breaking in fresh engines.
One time I even put it (instead of regular oil) in a guy's engine that just WOULD'NT break in..because he put Slick-50 in there right from the start. After just running the engine that way several times for a few minutes at a time things were right again..and time to drain and refill with regular (not syn.) oil...still running today.

[Majicbringer]

To get things moving I'd pour some Mystery Oil, or something similar, into the cylinders and let it sit for a good while, and I don't mean hours. Put it it in gear and see if the pistons are moving.

Syn won't hurt the bike once you have it running again, but not for getting it moving again.