[QUOTE=slughill;19103646] I’m in a small town in Ontario about 45 min from Detroit.

Probably the the best place to see and shop many early bikes near you is the Wauseon National ( AMCA meet)
Unfortunately it’s been cancelled due to COVID-19
Attending since 1994
very disappointed

Have owned 2 80” flats and 2 rigid pans
all of the above advice is spot on

 

Stock rocker clutch and tank shift are not that difficult to operate. A properly adjusted rocker clutch pedal stays where you put it - all the way engaged, all the way disengaged, or anyplace in between. That makes coming to a stop pretty easy, whether you make it into neutral or not. Once stopped, you can easily find first gear, adjusting the throttle while applying light pressure until it just slides into place.

And heed the advice about the brakes because compared to even early HD banana caliper disc set-up, they suck. If you want to get an approximation of how poor the old drums are, crank your latest & greatest up to about 75 and try stopping in what you think is the normal front and rear brake distance. Do it a handful of times in quick succession so you heat everything up and brake fade becomes scary! There is where the drums brakes are! (Just kidding, but not by much.)

More pain than learning the clutching and shifting is the mechanical advance distributor. Mess it up on a start and it might just let you know that you screwed up. Painfully... If I was getting an old Flattie, Knuck, or Pan to do a bunch of riding on, I'd probably go with a later auto advance distributor, maybe even with electronic ignition. I'd also dump the 6v system and at least put in a late model generator with a solid state regulator, replacing all the lights and the coil.

I had the very next-to-last FLH to roll off the line with a 3-speed and reverse transmission. It had the rocker foot clutch and the hand shift lever was attached to the left front frame downtube. The lever was in a gate, similar to what would be on the tank of an older model. I removed the gate as it caused wear on the shift lever. Had to put a piece of leather in place of the left tank emblem as without the gate the lever touched the tank. Upside was that I never had to adjust the shift linkage because there was no gate. My dad ordered it with the 3&R transmission and the bike was delivered in Dec 1977, and was what was called an early 1978 year model. It took me a few minutes to get used to the foot-n-hand operation, then it became my bike for about 240,000 miles.

 

Your Uncle's bike in 1956:

My bike on Thursday:

 

That’s so cool architect. She’s a beauty.

 

that’s great advice, thanks for you input pococj. Appreciate it. And everyone else’s. this is such a good place for info.

 

I have been think about getting an older Harley with suicide clutch. I was wondering if any body know when the last year mechanical advance distributor .
I didnt realize how much different they are from modern Harley . syncho into first gear and throttle return would be a challenge for me
Thanks and sorry if this is the wrong place for this.

 

Interesting reads all! Keep sending advice and comments. I always thought it would be cool to have an older bike as well.

 

I've ridden with a group of 12-18 of them numerous times. Haven't noticed any difference other than bypassing (when we can) a town with a lot of stoplights. My Shovel is foot shift, and usually the newest bike in the group.
As far as being original, don't sweat the small stuff. It's better if it's a runner. One of the guys put disc brakes on his Pan. He rides it a lot, and fells safer in today's traffic.

 

Definitely on my bucket list in the near future.
Love hearing the story’s. Keepem coming.

 

1964 was the last year for the manual advance on Big Twins.