American-V Blog

At last: we've only been suggesting that Harley do an FLD for half a dozen years (sixteen if you include previous magazines), and Harley have finally brought out a Dyna Road King, albeit known as the Switchback (well, we assume it's the switchback). Modern 17 and 18-inch tyre fitments beneath full mudguards, the new 103 motor, FL forks and nacelle, footboards and a QD screen and new QD slantbags.

Basically, it's a 4-speed FL lookalike and, subject to a roadtest, is at the top of my personal wishlist: practical, flexible and hopefully comes with a choice of other wheels, 'cos I could live without the 5-spokes.

All of a sudden, the lack of a standard Road King isn't such a great loss.

Just hope they price it with the other Dynas: no prices yet.

In case you were wondering, The Electra Glide That Never Was in AmV14 shows what the undressed version could look like with laced wheels. Stunning.

Early 2012 model news coming in points to an upgrade to Harley's Softail family for 2012 with a new 103-inch - TC103B - engine across the board, as will a couple of the Dyna models. 

The Softail range will comprise the 'yet-to-make-an-impact' Blackline, ever popular Fat Boy and Fat Boy Low - which we'll take as being a Fat Boy Special in the UK - the evergreen Heritage Softail Classic and the recently reintroduced Softail Deluxe. As previously mentioned, the Cross Bones and Rocker C have not been carried over.

On the Dyna front, both the Wide Glide and Fat Bob get a TC103 engine while the Street Bob and Super Glide Custom stick with the TC96 for the time being. The BIG news, though is a new model: the Switchback.

Well, we assume it's a Dyna because it is listed with the Fat Bob and Wide Glide but that could be a red herring: there's no model designation offered so it could be a new Softail. One thing is for certain, which is that it will be a convertible, and the FXR/FXD range has a history of convertibles.

The Sportster range looks like it will be short of an 883, with the 883R not showing for 2012 unless there's a form that hasn't been filed yet, but otherwise continues as 2011 - colour notwitstanding.

There will also be an Anniversary V-Rod - in the form of a Night Rod Special Anniversary Edition, to celebrate 10 years of the watercooled motor - which will run alongside the Muscle and the regular Night Rod Special.

And in the Touring family, the Road Glide will be replaced by a Road Glide Custom, and we think it's about time that Harley reintroduced the Road Glide here - even if it's in limited numbers - because there's just a chance that its time has finally arrived: we're more willing to accept a bagger without a Batwing, and the Vision is just so much better than the Ultra in the long haul stakes, and we reckon that's because of the frame-mounted screen.

The 110-inch CVO models for 2012 will comprise the Softail Convertible, Road Glide Custom, Street Glide and Ultra Classic Electra Glide.

More as we get it!

The much maligned Blackline is with us, and you've really got to ride one to appreciate what Harley have managed to achieve with it!

Mechanically, it's a proper Harley for the Shovelhead generation, even if it's supposed to be aimed at youngsters trading up from Sportsters. The Dyna FXs have got some serious Softail competition.

While down at the California Dreamin' pre-event party, we got the chance to swing a leg across Battistini's 'production bobber' - the Venti - and it would have rude not to.

Read all about it in AmV46, out in early May 2011.

Who else but Confederate? Not so much breaking the mould as reinventing it, and the most creative use of the S&S X-Wedge Motor seen to date, with Confederate's trademark integrated powertrain.

Just a quickie - you'll lose enough time dribbling over the pics in the link, if this sort of thing floats your boat - so I'll leave you to it.

I've gone all light-headed, but am really pleased to see a return to form from Matt Chambers' crew, now returned to their beloved New Orleans.

Thanks to Cyril Huze for the heads-up.

http://www.confederate.com/cm4/cx3.php

We put one of the new Indian Chiefs – a 2009/2010 model from the Kings Mountain factory – through its paces in American-V 39 and came away very impressed with both the bike and the company's attitude to getting it right, and consigning almost sixty years of false hopes and heroic failures to history.

We concluded:

• Its high price was justified by the sheer quality of materials and engineering: from the double-stitched leather to the steel, whether chromed, painted or powder-coated.
• The twin Brembo front brakes were reassuringly capable.
• The Powerplus 105 engine is strong, and looks stunning.
• It reintroduces a sense of exclusive exotica to American-made motorcycles in the UK, using a different business model to Harley-Davidson.
• The minimal vibration of the hand-build, unbalanced, solid-mounted motor isn't a barrier to using the motor properly: smoother and more sophisticated than the Gilroy Powerplus 100 but more character than Harley's Twin Cam 96B.
• The QD system for the rack, backrest and panniers is very well designed, allowing the bike to run undressed without any aesthetic compromise.
• It could be improved by self-cancelling indicators with more visible tell-tales, and a fuel gauge.
• The same switchgear as previous generation Victorys – including a trigger to control the digital element of the clever speedo – will be more familiar to recent converts to American motorcycles than Harley's traditional switch clusters.

For more details, and the chequered history of Indian from their days as America's dominant motorcycle manufacturer to the present day, see American-V issue 39: on sale in all good newsagents and most WH Smiths with a strong motorcycle section, by mail order or in a digital on-line form.

Don't quite know how this slipped under the radar – although arriving on deadline might have something to do with it – but Harley have announced their 2010 CVO Electra Glide Ultra in Black, with a capital B.

Fully trimmed with their new Gloss Black Rumble collection from P&A forming part of the 185 specifically chosen unique black parts as well as a handlebar-mounted Garmin Zumo SatNav, it comes with the black and chrome 110-inch Screamin' Eagle motor, 6-speed Cruise Drive transmission and ABS braking, and is dripping with the usual CVO touches from a spectacularly sinister Crimson Mist Black / Dark Slate and Flame graphics to 'Contrast Chrome' wheels and a dual control heated leather seat.

Reading through the specs, this is taking Dark Custom to new heights, and don't let the lack of chrome leave you with the impression that it's not going to stand out – and as as one of just 999 numbered editions it's unlikely to be fighting with another one for attention.

If you've got £29,690 burning a hole in your pocket, and want to enjoy the twin benefits of high status and low profile, Harley have just created your bike.

Harley-Davidson's Website

To be fair, it wasn't really hiding - in fact it got its dealer launch over the weekend, but it's not the sort of thing we're big on attending. But then we found ourselves at Fowlers in Bristol today and there were four of them!

First impressions ... errrr ... brave move by Honda but frankly I'm unimpressed. Didn't think the build quality was up to much - very much below expectations for Honda - cosmetically it seemed like a parody of a proper chopper and there were more things to point at and wince than to congratulate them on.

To be honest, if someone had told me it was made by a Chinese manufacturer rather than at an American plant of a Japanese maker, I wouldn't have been surprised. Welding looked scruffy in places, the yokes seemed weedy for a 250cc cruiser and there were too many angles working against each other for my tastes.

Didn't like the quality of the castings - wheels or kickstand - didn't like the plastic mudguards, didn't like the dash, didn't like the height of the back end, which I sincerely hope was kicked so high to accommodate a rider and pillion, at which point it would have settled down to something a lot more sensible.

But I especially didn't like the price tag: £12k plus for a 1300cc factory chopper? MCN, in their infinite wisdom, have suggested it's a rival for the Rocker C and as such is relatively cheap, but having now seen one, they're so wide of the mark that they should hang their heads in shame. It's got too much of the finish of the now defunct plain Rocker – rough finished where it should be smooth or polished – and it doesn't hold a candle to the Rocker's finish - metal or paint. It doesn't stand close comparison to the new Wide Glide which is cheaper, bigger, better looking, will have a higher residual value and is the real deal.

Its nearest rival, I'd suggest, is the plain finish 1737cc 8-Ball Vegas, which is a better bike in every respect on face value, and is three quarters of the price.

It's reckoned that Honda will only be bringing 300 of them into the country initially, and it might find a market on a degree of exclusivity, but only among the clinically insane unless it gives a good account of itself on the road. Sitting on it, the steering is certainly very neutral for such a radical headstock, and there's a chance it's going to deliver on the road, but we're not aware of any dealer demonstrators being made available. We'll have to see if Honda will let us play with a press fleet demonstrator after that critique, if they've got one: we're more than willing to put one through its paces, and I'm still prepared to be wooed by its sophistication and style, but it had better be brilliant to make up for its apparent shortcomings.

To be honest, I'd far rather play with their DN-01 production concept bike with its auto gearbox and radical styling, but while that's a V-twin, it's from one of Honda's Japanese plants and so doesn't qualify for the magazine.

22nd Jan 2010: There's another new Hot Rod Sportster on the streets, and it's a stunner.
Loosely based on a cross between the Iron and Nightster models, it's a 1200cc model with a blacked-out engine, slammed suspension, a new low-profile speedo mount and a first for a factory XL: a 16-inch front tyre beneath a minimal mudguard, which buy my reckoning - if an FX is an FL with FX forks - means it should be the XF1200.

Think of the Zero Samurai that shared the cover of last issue and then add a black XL motor and modern tyres and you'll have a pretty good mental picture.

Harley have even put the mirrors beneath the handlebars, which gives it a very clean, strong, custom silhouette, and with it's black laced wheels, solo seat and close-fitting rear mudguard that doubles as a fork brace, it'll tick a lot of boxes for bobber fans who are looking for a factory bike.

And "Forty-Eight"? The year when the peanut tank that will forever be associated with the Sportster was introduced - a full nine years before the XL - fitted to the DKW-derived, Bantam-like 125cc Model-S.

And it is a proper peanut tank, returning to a smaller 2.1 US Gallon tank (7.95l / 1.75 Imp. Gallon) that fails to fill the top frame rail just like on those Sportsters of old. Graphically, it takes the Sportster script that has been reused over many years and models, which makes a very different statement in the three colours: silver, orange and black; with the Brilliant Silver looking every inch the timeless classic, Vivid Black the modern hot rod and Mirage Orange the understated traditional.

The "Forty-Eight"continues the 'drilled for lightness' theme of the Nightster, with holes drilled wherever possible - which now includes the fork brace and the mountings for the shorter tank, and will retain the rear mudguard detail of the Nightster and Iron for the UK market, rather than the side-mount of the American model. It does look as though we'll be keeping the short shocks and forks though, keeping the stance low and aggressive, and the seat height down to 710mm, lower than both the Iron and the Nightster, but still a piece higher than the 883 Low.

Will it work?

It's Choppertown without the grazed knuckles, which will miss the point for many, but I suspect it will find it a fan-base very quickly. Much of that will depend on how £7,990 sounds to you?

See the new 2010 Harley-Davidson "Forty-Eight" video here.