It's alright to pick on me because I have a Sportster as well as a VMax. Harley guys call it a Girls Bike and laugh. That lasts until we leave the first stop light or until I string them along up to 100 and then open the throttle the rest of the way. Those are big reasons why I have a Sportster over another bigger Harley ( Dog ). You here seem to target V-Rods which I am with you on. All of the kills here have convinced me that I really don't want to look for one of the Screaming Eagle Versions. Since My VMax should easily dust one of them.
This is going to be a tale of rude awakening for me and it'll answer questions I've had for quite a while. A friend has a 2009, 1200 Sportster with modifications to the intake and exhaust along with Vance and Hines ECU Mods. He and I have run his and my 1200 a number of times. He usually gets a bike and a half lead right away and maintains that until I run out of top end at about 120 mph. My Sportster is a converted 883 so it retains the gearing that's not as tall as his factory build 1200. I have intake and exhaust mods done to mine as well as a programmable ECU. Earl's is Fuel Injected and mine is Carbureted. His starts out with more Horsepower potential than mine. Mine makes up for the Horsepower difference with gearing.
We finally got my VMax and his Sportster out together. I haven't been feeling slighted on power between My Sportster and my VMax. To me they both feel pretty fast. I just haven't been able to figure out how to ride them both at the same time for a comparison.:ummm:
We didn't do the runs in any particular order but I'll try to make them logical for the purpose of making sense here.
Dead stop through a slow roll start in first gear. I left Earl every time. In his words it was like; I'd Gone to Warp Drive.
2nd gear rolling start, This one really shocked me bad. We made very short work of the road we were on. Earl actually moved out by a 2 bike lead. I was watching the tach with peripheral vision because I was trying like hell to catch him. I saw one of my shifts at 10,500. Desperate measure... When we hit about 100 mph, I began to pass, by 130 I had a slight lead on him. Not a whole lot though. If you could see the road we were running on, you'd wonder how we lived through it... The road was about wide enough for 2 bikes side by side and may have seen some maintenance many years ago.
We did a 5th gear roll on from 50. He walked up so far, I had to downshift to catch him. I cheated for the test we were doing. We tried the 5th gear roll on again from 65. He moved out front by about 2 bike lengths momentarily. I picked up between 1000 and 1500 rpm and left him behind...
All of this is very strange, My VMax seems to be running perfect. New Marks Exhaust and carbs set as perfectly as I've ever seen them.
It shows that the 1200 Sportster is by no means a standard Harley, Converting fuel into heat, noise and little else. There are odd instances where it can make a Gen I look bad even though the VMax overall is way more capable.
We never expected the results we got. We thought it would be a matter of him trying to catch me no matter how we ran. Surprise.. Watch out for running a Sportster that's already rolling, it may just catch your VMax at one of those moments you don't want to see.....
This is going to be a tale of rude awakening for me and it'll answer questions I've had for quite a while. A friend has a 2009, 1200 Sportster with modifications to the intake and exhaust along with Vance and Hines ECU Mods. He and I have run his and my 1200 a number of times. He usually gets a bike and a half lead right away and maintains that until I run out of top end at about 120 mph. My Sportster is a converted 883 so it retains the gearing that's not as tall as his factory build 1200. I have intake and exhaust mods done to mine as well as a programmable ECU. Earl's is Fuel Injected and mine is Carbureted. His starts out with more Horsepower potential than mine. Mine makes up for the Horsepower difference with gearing.
We finally got my VMax and his Sportster out together. I haven't been feeling slighted on power between My Sportster and my VMax. To me they both feel pretty fast. I just haven't been able to figure out how to ride them both at the same time for a comparison.:ummm:
We didn't do the runs in any particular order but I'll try to make them logical for the purpose of making sense here.
Dead stop through a slow roll start in first gear. I left Earl every time. In his words it was like; I'd Gone to Warp Drive.
2nd gear rolling start, This one really shocked me bad. We made very short work of the road we were on. Earl actually moved out by a 2 bike lead. I was watching the tach with peripheral vision because I was trying like hell to catch him. I saw one of my shifts at 10,500. Desperate measure... When we hit about 100 mph, I began to pass, by 130 I had a slight lead on him. Not a whole lot though. If you could see the road we were running on, you'd wonder how we lived through it... The road was about wide enough for 2 bikes side by side and may have seen some maintenance many years ago.
We did a 5th gear roll on from 50. He walked up so far, I had to downshift to catch him. I cheated for the test we were doing. We tried the 5th gear roll on again from 65. He moved out front by about 2 bike lengths momentarily. I picked up between 1000 and 1500 rpm and left him behind...
All of this is very strange, My VMax seems to be running perfect. New Marks Exhaust and carbs set as perfectly as I've ever seen them.
It shows that the 1200 Sportster is by no means a standard Harley, Converting fuel into heat, noise and little else. There are odd instances where it can make a Gen I look bad even though the VMax overall is way more capable.
We never expected the results we got. We thought it would be a matter of him trying to catch me no matter how we ran. Surprise.. Watch out for running a Sportster that's already rolling, it may just catch your VMax at one of those moments you don't want to see.....