I love motorcycles. I love sleek, fast machines that can track a perfect line through a high-speed turn and have power-to-weight ratios that make Porsches perform like Plymouths by comparison. Since I love all that is high-tech in two-wheeled transportation, I don’t love Harley-Davidson motorcycles. They are the two-wheeled equivalent of NASCAR, freezing technology in the twentieth century to satisfy a market for nostalgia.
But at least a brand new Hog has modern tires and brakes and safety equipment, even if it is saddled with an engine design from 1909: that was the year Harley Davidson first produced the 45-degree V-twin. The design gives the Harley a sound like no other motorcycle, the asymmetric fart of cylinders that fire unevenly.
Take the already retro technology of a Harley and erase a century of performance and safety improvements and you have a Chopper: MAGA on two wheels.
Harley-Davidson motorcycles are heavier, slower and will not handle as well any bike on the road with a similar engine size. And when compared to bikes made by Italian, British and Japanese manufacturers, Harleys have less than half the power for a given engine size—and cost twice as much.
But nothing else sounds like a Harley, according to the gourmets of growl. It’s an audible designer label: putt-putt sound over substance. The difference in handling and performance between a Honda, Ducati or any other modern motorcycle and a full-size Harley is the difference between a Ferrari and an Escalade—the Escalade may have style and just as much horsepower, but on a twisty road or an autobahn, the Italian sports car is going to disappear up the road faster than a steak tossed in a kennel.
If Harleys can’t keep up with Ducatis as they are shipped from the factory, they are at least safe and as fast as computer-aided design can make a bike that uses a century-old drivetrain. But turn that Harley into a chopper, and even the mediocre turning and braking of the original drops to new lows.
The most radical choppers have front ends extended so far that the bike has the turning radius of a school bus. And to complement their terrible turning, they use a hard-tail rear suspension. As the name suggests, the hard-tail has neither springs nor shocks in the rear. The tire is suspension. It’s the same handling and braking you would get with an 800-pound bicycle.
The most extreme choppers eliminate the front brakes for styling. As with a car, 80 percent of the stopping power is in the front brakes. With no front brake, these bikes take hundreds of feet to stop. And the back brake has to be used with care to avoid locking it up and sliding.
Decades ago some motorcycles were built with hand shifters and foot clutches. The clutches became known as suicide clutches. Other designs put the hand clutch on the shit lever. Either way, the ride has to let go of the handlebars to shift. It was a real safety improvement to allow the rider to shift with both hands on the handlebars. But for several hundred dollars the Widowmaker Company (no kidding) makes a Jockey shifter for Harleys with a hand clutch.
Use an engine design from 1909, reverse a century of improvements in shifting, braking and control and you have a chopper--the bike that is MAGA.
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