Why are Harleys cool?

[Markg1]

Mark can I ask a question re initial post: what do you mean by "crotch rocket"?

As far as HD's being cool I think most of the loud in your face sort of hd's are really uncool here! Probably fantastic on an open US highway with no helmet/wind in your hair etc, but not when they startle people in town. (I would't ride without helmet btw).

The only cool HD is the Vrod ~ mainly for the look but also the fact that it doesn't sound like a HD!

My fella rides a R111 & it is good fun when people don't hear it coming ~ THEN they are startled when they see it.

Funnily enough he really likes the Vrod & I fancy a Vmax so maybe one day we will have both in our bike shed too! But with 4 bikes in there already & no cash left it might be a while!

Maybe "crotch rocket" is an inappropraite term. What I meant by "crotch rockets" are sport bikes or a believe another word is cafe racer.

Sounds like you and I have the same taste in bikes. I too don't like the overly loud bikes or the bikes that rattle like crazy. I like power bikes that have a nice rumble! I love my vrod but there is nothing like the power of a vmax!!! You gotta get them both!!!

[Markg1]

I don't disagree with the reliablity of air cooled engines. I was defending my statement that air cooled engines are outdated. All engines are inefficient. Only 15% of the energy form the fuel you put in your tank gets used to move your car. The rest is lost in heat and various other variables. Engines with higher efficiency have more energy leave as mechanical motion and less as waste heat. It is also more difficult for air cooled engines to achieve low emissions. Who knows, Harley might have no other choice but to go water cooled! Oh no! Can you imagine that. A Vrod engine that produces 125bhp and over 85 ft pounds of torque (which is really fuel efficient) moving a road king! It's okay guys, technolgy is not all bad. As far as those over 100 degrees days of stop and go driving, I think my water cooled Harley will run as cool as it's name!

The interesting thing is that everything is not as cut a dried as you would think. I lifted the fuel mileage specs for both the V-Rod (one of my favorite bikes), and the Road King - a bike that weighs significantly more than the V-Rod with an air cooled engine from motorcyclistonline.com. While the V-Rod would likely face a heavier throttle hand in any testing, this goes to show just how efficient an air cooled Harley engine is when compared to a modern liquid cooled design.

2010 V-Rod
CAN Liters Per Kilometer (City)
6.9
CAN Liters Per Kilometer (Hwy)
5.6
US Miles Per Gallon (City)
34
US Miles Per Gallon (Hwy)

2011 Road King
CAN Liters Per Kilometer (City)
6.7
CAN Liters Per Kilometer (Hwy)
4.4
US Miles Per Gallon (City)
35
US Miles Per Gallon (Hwy)
54

Measuring fuel mileage is easy and from the info above you get to really understand that all is not as it theoretically should be. The air cooled "outdated" engine is actually more efficient at moving a significantly heavier motorcycle than the more modern liquid cooled V-Rod. My experience riding air cooled Harleys matches this. They are one of the more fuel efficient bikes that I have ever ridden, even though they are heavy....and in some eyes outdated.

I respect your opinion but responding to your quote "that everything is not as cut a dried as you would think" I beg to differ. Your not looking at the whole picture. I too looked up some numbers:

2009 road king horsepower= 79.04; torque= 92.72; displacment =1584 cc
2009 vrod horsepower = 117.24 torque = 78.43 displacment 1250 cc

These are dyno numbers not estimated from Harley.

As far as 34mpg on the vrod I get that when i'm on the throttle all the time. I'm well above 40 mpg!

Lets talk about these numbers. The vrod has a much smaller engine and producing almost 40 more horsepower and not far off the pace of torque. As a matter of fact a 1982 v45 magna is producing more horsepower than the road king with half the displacement. There are current 600cc bikes out there producing well over 100bhp. You would have a hard time getting these kind of numbers with an air cooled 600cc engine and it being reliable. I have not even talked about emissions. With our government getting real strick on emissions air cooled engines are not even close to water cooled engines in that department! So maybe things are not as "cut and dry as you might think".

So my point is that displacment for displacement an air cooled engine cannot compare to a water cooled engine!

I guess will have to agree to disagree. I have a question for you. If air cooled engines are so efficient why aren't they in cars?

[High_Side]

I don't disagree with the reliablity of air cooled engines. I was defending my statement that air cooled engines are outdated. All engines are inefficient. Only 15% of the energy form the fuel you put in your tank gets used to move your car. The rest is lost in heat and various other variables. Engines with higher efficiency have more energy leave as mechanical motion and less as waste heat. It is also more difficult for air cooled engines to achieve low emissions. Who knows, Harley might have no other choice but to go water cooled! Oh no! Can you imagine that. A Vrod engine that produces 125bhp and over 85 ft pounds of torque (which is really fuel efficient) moving a road king! It's okay guys, technolgy is not all bad. As far as those over 100 degrees days of stop and go driving, I think my water cooled Harley will run as cool as it's name!

The interesting thing is that everything is not as cut a dried as you would think. I lifted the fuel mileage specs for both the V-Rod (one of my favorite bikes), and the Road King - a bike that weighs significantly more than the V-Rod with an air cooled engine from motorcyclistonline.com. While the V-Rod would likely face a heavier throttle hand in any testing, this goes to show just how efficient an air cooled Harley engine is when compared to a modern liquid cooled design.

2010 V-Rod
CAN Liters Per Kilometer (City)
6.9
CAN Liters Per Kilometer (Hwy)
5.6
US Miles Per Gallon (City)
34
US Miles Per Gallon (Hwy)

2011 Road King
CAN Liters Per Kilometer (City)
6.7
CAN Liters Per Kilometer (Hwy)
4.4
US Miles Per Gallon (City)
35
US Miles Per Gallon (Hwy)
54

Measuring fuel mileage is easy and from the info above you get to really understand that all is not as it theoretically should be. The air cooled "outdated" engine is actually more efficient at moving a significantly heavier motorcycle than the more modern liquid cooled V-Rod. My experience riding air cooled Harleys matches this. They are one of the more fuel efficient bikes that I have ever ridden, even though they are heavy....and in some eyes outdated.

I respect your opinion but responding to your quote "that everything is not as cut a dried as you would think" I beg to differ. Your not looking at the whole picture. I too looked up some numbers:

2009 road king horsepower= 79.04; torque= 92.72; displacment =1584 cc
2009 vrod horsepower = 117.24 torque = 78.43 displacment 1250 cc

These are dyno numbers not estimated from Harley.

As far as 34mpg on the vrod I get that when i'm on the throttle all the time. I'm well above 40 mpg!

Lets talk about these numbers. The vrod has a much smaller engine and producing almost 40 more horsepower and not far off the pace of torque. As a matter of fact a 1982 v45 magna is producing more horsepower than the road king with half the displacement. There are current 600cc bikes out there producing well over 100bhp. You would have a hard time getting these kind of numbers with an air cooled 600cc engine and it being reliable. I have not even talked about emissions. With our government getting real strick on emissions air cooled engines are not even close to water cooled engines in that department! So maybe things are not as "cut and dry as you might think".

So my point is that displacment for displacement an air cooled engine cannot compare to a water cooled engine!

I guess will have to agree to disagree. I have a question for you. If air cooled engines are so efficient why aren't they in cars?

At the risk of this turning in to a flame war, (which is not what I'm after) we need to talk about "your point" and actually how it keeps shifting as the conversation continues. "Your point" at first was about air cooled engines not being as reliable as a general statement and I pointed out in my post that in the application of a low-stress cruiser they seem to be as reliable as anything out there in my experience. Nowhere, did I ever state that for a engine of higher performance that air cooling was as good. I'll repost it for you to read again:

Now I'm not saying that Harleys are not reliable, it's just a fact that water cooled engines are more reliable.

You make a logical argument and for machines that are stressed to the gills looking for ultimate h.p. water-cooling is the logical answer. For the application of a low-stress cruiser however, air-cooling works perfectly well. The evidence is in how many high mileage Harley's and air cooled BMWs out there that have had no heat related issues. I ride mostly water-cooled higher performance bikes but most of the high-mileage bikes that I have come across are the air-cooled Beemers or Harleys.

And from my own experience last year when my wife and I were stuck in 2 hours of construction: She was on her air cooled Ducati and I was on my Honda VFR. It seems that the VFR had a bad wire on the cooling fan and boiled over leaving me stuck in one lane of traffic on the Glacier pass with a mountain on 1 side and an 1200 ' drop on the other. The air cooled Duck had no issues.

Then "your point" then shifted to water-cooled engines being much more fuel efficient:

Who knows, Harley might have no other choice but to go water cooled! Oh no! Can you imagine that. A Vrod engine that produces 125bhp and over 85 ft pounds of torque (which is really fuel efficient) moving a road king! It's okay guys, technolgy is not all bad.

I replied to this with data that illustrated that the air cooled engine in the Road King right now is actually more fuel efficient than the liquid cooled V-Rod engine which pushes a much lighter bike. This is not to say that in ultimate performance terms a liquid cooled engine cannot be made to be more efficient than air cooled..... Your statement was just contrary to the facts.

Now that "your point" has moved to relative power / displacement or air cooled vs. liquid cooled, I completely agree and have from the beginning. It's the "unreliable" and "poor fuel efficiency" statements that you made which I disagreed with and provided some experience and facts to disagree.

I appreciate the discussion and tried not to come over and punch you in the nose over what I saw were your misconceptions over something that really doesn't matter. And even though I don't own a Harley, I want to inject some facts in to the anti-Harley or anti air-cooled Harley discussions that come along from time to time. Feel free to disagree - thats why it is a forum.

And to answer your last question as to why cars do not use air cooled engines? It's because they would look funny with an air cooled engine hanging out in the breeze of course!

[Markg1]

I do not feel punched in the nose nor do I feel picked on. As a matter of fact this is the best forum with great members! And your right it really doesn't matter. Im not a harley nor an air cooled engine hater. Like I said my lawn mower is air cooled and I love it.

I do stand by my comment that water cooled engines are more reliable than air cooled and when you compare horsepower to horsepower more efficient. I'd like to see a sportster produce 165bhp and get 50mpg!

But this thread is about how cool Harleys are and to tell you the truth I think the fat bob is a cool Harley! That would be one that I would consider.

[High_Side]

But this thread is about how cool Harleys are and to tell you the truth I think the fat bob is a cool Harley! That would be one that I would consider.

Cheers,

High_Side

[mogster]

Don't forget us sisters' too lads!!!

[Kingshead]

Cars with air cooled engines have been around for a long time, Porsche just to name one. And yes, I know their new models are water cooled, but that doesn't invalidate the fact air cooled engines have worked in cars just fine.

Martin

[Markg1]

Cars with air cooled engines have been around for a long time, Porsche just to name one. And yes, I know their new models are water cooled, but that doesn't invalidate the fact air cooled engines have worked in cars just fine.

Martin

So did VW and they lasted about 60,000 miles.

[SlingVTR]

I cant stand Harleys, in this country they just dont work, with roundabouts and corners to go round but in the states they do, I hate the way Harley have dressed up old bikes to look like new ones and before you say "this is about how cool Harleys are" here is one I think is cool........had to go a long way back to find it, I think its a pan head?

[waterbuffalo750]

Measuring fuel mileage is easy and from the info above you get to really understand that all is not as it theoretically should be. The air cooled "outdated" engine is actually more efficient at moving a significantly heavier motorcycle than the more modern liquid cooled V-Rod. My experience riding air cooled Harleys matches this. They are one of the more fuel efficient bikes that I have ever ridden, even though they are heavy....and in some eyes outdated.

This is true. Sportsters get amazing mileage for their displacement- 50 to 55 mpg is pretty common for 883's. (To compare, my 800cc Bonneville gets 45mpg in mixed riding.)

883 nothing. My 1340(80ci) gets 50 hwy all the time. I've gotten close to 60, maybe more.