Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/128208
2003 Harley-Davidson Heritage Sottail Classic THE RIDE The signature V -twin drone from the dual exhaust system on the Classic is muscular yet pleasant as you row through the gears in the fivespeed transmission. Excessive noise is muted, thanks to the cat-back mufflers. Like every Big Twin Harley, when it comes to top-end power, the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. You can overrev the Twin Cam to catch the next gear without the motor falling on its face, but best results are achieved by shifting early, while it is still churning out max torque. By the way, the Magneti Marellisourced EFI is excellent. Gone are the days when you would have to pull the choke on your carbed Softail then go inside and find something to do for 15 minutes before the engine was sufficiently warmed to begin the journey. Nowadays, it's thumb the starter, gas it and go. The troublefree system is extremely responsive, leaving no hint of a flat spot, no matter what the throttle position. And speaking of the transmission, that and the clutch are eons better than the units found on the same model 10 years ago. Since then, Harley engineers have successfully improved the gear changes by reworking the detents in the shift cylinder. Upshifts are far less likely to produce a missed shift than "back in the old days," and neutral is also way easier to find. There are also positive stops for first gear and fifth gear - no more slop. An additional Heritage Softail's debut), I had to ask myself the following: If it sucked so badly, then why is the Heritage Softail still here? Because the truth is that the Her- cruiser companies have altered the converging - I mean, take a look at offerings in an attempt to catch the the V-Rod - but in the U.S. cruiser Harley spirit. Nowadays, evidence market, it seems that Harley still dic- suggests that the technological roads tates the pace. itage Softail Classic didn't, and it doesn't. Here's some more perspective for you: Even back then, the Japanese cruisers were stiIl pretty much a bad joke. Sure, they were mechanically superior to the Harleys, but it hardly mattered. Nobody in the Land of the Rising Sun really got it with regard to the cruiser thing. It was hard for them to swallow that most cruiser fans abhorred (and many still do) such technological conveniences as transmissions that shift with sportbike precision and maintenance-free shaft drives and overhead cam engines devoid of rumble and shake. How ironic it is, then, that with the advent of the Twin Cam 88B engine, the twin counterbalanced sister of the venerable Evolution V-twin's successor, Harley-Davidson continues to lead its customers toward the light of better technology while the Japanese and even some new domestic metric 44 APRIL 9, 2003' cue I e between Japan and Milwaukee are styling and performance of their n e _ s clutch pack and different springs also help to make the lever effort less akin to one of those hand squeeze torture devices that the jocks use to increase their forearm strength. Once you have established a cruising speed of around 70 mph,