One for John

[mrblanche]

[jdm124]

Purty, ain't it! Thank you.

I think that the Ducs have become very reliable over the past ten or fifteen years, surely better than the H-D.

[mrblanche]

I used to keep a running tally of broken-down bikes by the side of the road, and HD was 9 to 1 over any other brand. But in recent years, it has leveled out and HD seems to have greatly improved their reliability.

[jdm124]

I used to keep a running tally of broken-down bikes by the side of the road, and HD was 9 to 1 over any other brand. But in recent years, it has leveled out and HD seems to have greatly improved their reliability.

I don't know a lot about the H-D and can only guess -

Until relatively recently they were essentially machines out of the 1930s and could not be expected to run at high speed for the long haul, that is, they would probably shake apart. Maybe it was the 60 deg V-twin, maybe bad motor mounts maybe ??? Perhaps the engines are now better balanced and I'm pretty sure that the belt drives help.

The Ducs are 90 deg V-twins with chain drives which in my experience are super smooth.

[misterdecibel]

The Ducs are 90 deg V-twins with chain drives which in my experience are super smooth.

Precise control of the valves probably doesn't hurt the smoothness any, either.