harleyKmodel

The poor guy reaming sidecar loops has a tremendous backlog of frames to work on...

Wow, great picture. I suspect those two cheater bars by his belly are what they used to bend the frames into alignment.

There is nothing to say those frames in the background are all waiting to get sidecar loops machined. Its more likely the "float" inventory for the frame shop. Harley or book publishers seem to be suppressing any web page that lists big-bike production numbers. I did see one site that said in 1947 there were over 10,000 big bikes built for the calendar year. Using a 200-day work year, that's 50 frames a day. So the picture is about a day's production.

That's another problem with K-models. The production numbers were so low it encouraged engineers, management, and workers to do sketchy stuff. If they tried to build K-models on the same final assembly line, it would be a nightmare. I assume they set up another line to make the 10 bikes a day.

The -59 eyebrow has a smaller hole for the rotary switch. The 59A has a larger hold as they went to the toggle. I believe this is the only difference between the two parts.

The -59 is a hard part to find. Even when you do, it's likely the smaller hole has been hogged out for the later switch.

I need the small hole eyebrow (-59) if anyone has one in their pile. Plenty of good stuff to swap.

In typical Harley fashion, they probably grabbed the first one in the bin of brows.

PS, I believe that the -59 P/N had a slightly smaller cast slot for the early 6V single ring headlight. The light switch hole was machined. The -59A casting had a wider slot. The rear slot for the tach cable (62 to 64) would have been incorporated by machining as necessary in both castings.

To add some more info, I just recently had an original paint 62 ch leave my possession with the factory tach set up on it. It was in fact a -59 visor with a perfect notch cut into it. It didn't look like it was done by a novice and all suggested it looked factory. The -59 visor is as Dave C says, small hole for the rotary switch and small slot for the early headlamp bucket. I was fortunate to find a mint -59 visor which is rare in any condition the other day. Also another interesting find with the original paint 62 as I was comparing visors to some restorations I've completed, I noticed the rotary switch sat lower in the original paint bikes visor. What I found is between the rotary switch and the bottom of the visor switch hole there was an internal tooth washer. It's not in the parts book but seems fishy that two original paint bikes that were next to me have it there. Coincidence??

when the star washer is installed between the switch housing and the underside of brow its intended to resist the housing from rotating relative to the brow.
when you repeatedly turn the knob clockwise to its stop while riding you could eventually loosen the switch.
placing the star washer between switch housing inhibits housing rotation to a great extent.

dr dick wrote:when the star washer is installed between the switch housing and the underside of brow its intended to resist the housing from rotating relative to the brow.
when you repeatedly turn the knob clockwise to its stop while riding you could eventually loosen the switch.
placing the star washer between switch housing inhibits housing rotation to a great extent.

It's purpose is understood, I guess my point was that it is not shown in any parts books. (that I have anyway) I stumbled across this by accident on the two original paint bikes in my possession. I was curious if your 60 has it on there. You can't see it from the underside but more then likely it is there if one or two of the threads show on the rotary switch on the top side. Thanks Murph