Well, I took the Deuce off the stand a couple of daysago and today went to take it out for it's first run of the season. Checked the tires and everything else then came to the oil.
First off, this is my first year with this bike, picking it up about 12 months ago, brand new. It was also my first softail, my other bike last year was a '97 Road King. I put 2500 miles on it, had the dealer do the 2500 mile service and then put it away for the winter on the HD storage stand. The dealer of course used Syn3 oil.
Back to today. With the bike on the jiffy stand I went to check the oil. Could not believe what I saw...went to get a flashlight to verify it. There was nothing in the tank. Nothing was on the floor of the garage, there was oil at the end of last year. What happened to it?
I assumed that it drained into the crankcase, but to be honest, I did not know what to think. OK, I decided to crank the engine and watched the oil level rise in the tank. OK, little pressure off at the sight of the oil but then I looked at the oil and my concer went up again. It looked like chocolat milk, frothy, milky even.
At this point, I checked my warrantee card and then went for a ride, about 20 minutes, 10 miles to get the oil up to temp. Back in the garage, I checked the oil and it looked pretty normal.
My questions:
Should a softail drin into the crankcase like this over the winter?
Should the oil look like it did sitting in the cranhcase over the winter?
I have a boat and milky oil is a big issue in a water cooled engine...but what about an air-cooled v-twin?