Back on two...

[OneSickPsycho]

This past weekend I had the opportunity to ride again. My shattered kneecap had kept me away from riding for a solid year... well... it was my shattered kneecap and some projects around the house that have kept me from doing some maintenence on my bike.

Anyway, over the past month or so I have REALLY been itching to ride and finally had the confidence in my fucked up leg to be willing to do it. My family was congregating in SW Florida for Christmas and the day before ONSSP and I left, my aunt emailed me about riding. My father and uncle both have Harley Electra Glide Standards and live within about a mile of eachother... and my uncle was storing a friend's Electra Glide Ultra Classic, like so:



I was a bit apprehensive about riding... 1) it's been a year and I've never ridden a bike that big... 2) it's someone elses bike... an expensive one at that...

Fuck it. I did it and it was GLORIOUS.

Taking off from the driveway I was quite nervous... this was a BIG machine. Quite a departure from what I was accustomed to. Everything on this bike was big. The grips had to be 2" in diameter. The bars were huge. The seat was huge. The tank was mammouth. The levers were the size of foot pegs and the rear brake pedal seemed to be borrowed off a mid-70's Caddy. Low speed manuevering was an exercise in brow sweat, shakey knees, and a lot of puckering... perhaps even a non-pavement skidmark or two.

Anyway, after several stop and go's I was back in action... everything felt comfortable, albeit foreign, but comfortable. Speaking of comfortable. Riding along for a while I look down at the odometer... Yeah, first time on a bike in a year and my ass is just starting to get uncomfortable at 80 miles. I'm thinking if I would have been on the TL, my ass would have been DONE at 80 miles. Now I'm starting to get the whole touring bike thing.

We ended the day with only two stops in 170 miles. The first was to get gas on the way out and the 2nd was about 100 miles into the ride to get some BK. Long straight boring SW FL roads, but a DAMN good time just being back on two.

Overall, I liked the big ol' Harley. It was huge, but VERY comfortable. I could definitely see knocking out a 4-500 mile day like nothing on a bike like this.

I was really surprised at how it handled too. Yeah, I wasn't going to win any races, but the steering was very neutral and the suspension, while soft, held strong in the turns. Scraping the kickstand on just about every left sucked, but what would you expect? The bike was very stable and surprisingly agile, for weighing half a ton.

Power was what I expected... absent. Off the line the v-twin torque did it's job and it had no problem getting all that weight moving. At speed however, the throttle was more of a 'make loud noise' switch than any sort of linkage to the rear tire. I found myself down shifting and revving the balls off the thing when I felt the need to accellerate hard. That being said, on a bike like that you don't NEED to do all that... It's a relax, be comfortable, and watch the miles tick by sort of machine.

The gearbox was suprisingly smooth... much smoother than my drop-kick the lever, clunk into place Buell had been. Granted, it's nothing like any of my Jap bikes as far as smoothness, but it was wayyyyy smoother than the Buell. If I had one of these bikes however, I would REALLY want the 6-speed tranny. That would have been nice on the short stretch of highway we rode.

The brakes stopped the bike, but that's about it. I remember reading a review in one of the MC rags about how the front brake did nothing, but in concert with the rear it stopped these machines well. I didn't really notice that, but I didn't have any panic braking opportunities either. The front brake seemed to stop the bike reasonably well and I didn't notice much difference using both the brakes at the same time. Perhaps that's just because I didn't HAVE to use them both as an emergency measure and just out of habit I don't usually apply much pressure to the rear.

Prior to riding this machine, I thought I got the whole Harley thing. Fit and finish is always superb, they look and sound great (IMHO), and there's a ton of history that it's neat to be a part of. However, after riding this bike I see that there is MUCH more to these machines than I previously thought. If someone's looking for a machine to rape the corners, triple the speed limit, and to push their own personal abilities to the limit, look elsewhere. If you're looking for a high quality comfortable machine that you can ride for NOTHING else than to simply enjoy the ride. Go buy a Harley... one's now on my short list.