Don't have the history on these and I am fairly new to Harley. I put one on my 09 RKC shortly after purchasing the bike in April of 2009. It appears to work properly all of the time. Have ridden in rain only a few times because I am a wimp at the ripe old age of 73.

Today, the air temp (official) was 106 and the guage showed 336 degrees when I got home from a 25 mile ride.

How hot is too hot? Too hot for the motor/oil - it never gets too hot to ride...

 

No idea how accurate they are. Mine quit working after 5 months, piece of crap. Even the dealer says they are useless.....

 

I had the older one for 3 years. It finally would not read the level but the temp part worked fined and was right on the money. (checked it with thermometer and boiling water) I got one of the newer ones. The new ones are removed like an normal dipstick. Dont have to worry about not twisting to get it out. It seats much better than the old one. Just to be safe, I remove it and put my old dipstick in when washing the bike....and yes do not remove it and let it sit on the face. I think many of the older ones got a bad rap because the instructions wer very specific on how to remove it and I'm guessing a lot of people (myself included) did not read the instructions carefully. Personally, I think its a pretty good product

 

We bought one the day we bought the bike in June of '06. It's worked fine. Finally this year we had to replace the battery in it, which took the same battery as a Harley Key Fob for the security system.

It was hard to get the small Phillips screws out, however, to replace the battery.

No complaints here.

 

Wow! Unless your riding in bumper to bumper traffic that's barely enough time to get to operating temperature. I'd question the accuracy or you have other issues.

 

Don't waste your money.

 

According HD web site new ones for 11 are improved for durability so these might be better,I may give it another try ,I liked the oil level feature in mine 2 previous ones don't care for temp because I'm not going stop and blow on the motor to cool off.

 

Because Harley tells you to check the oil level hot, the best thing about this item is you can just push the button and read your oil level, rather than try and take out a hot dipstick dripping with hot oil, from a hot engine, behind a hot header pipe. Getting a reasonable accurate oil temp reading is secondary. If your bike is overheating, you wouldn't know it while riding, when you have to stop to check the temp on the dip stick.

BBStacker, thanks for the tip on the silicone. I was wondering what was used to hold the cover on, as mine has now come loose after changing the battery.

 

Please. We've been checking hot oil for HOW many years now? And if I want my temp while riding, the 3 finger, 3 second rule is always right. You'll know if it's too hot.

 

About a year and seems to working OK....Used a Fluke Temp light and was pretty close in temp readings...1 or 2 degrees off.