I have been running a damper on most of my bikes since 1986 .I have one on my sportster and a couple of different yamaha's . I just like them . I even had one for a blata 13wr pockect bike . lol

 

You've got a lot of good riding experience behind you and I've learned some things from a few of your posts. However, you should maybe consider that you haven't seen and done it all.

In the 41 years that I've been riding, I've never experienced a tank slapper. Nor have I known anyone who has. However, that is not the only instance where a good steering stabilizer is useful. If you've spent much time on a batwing, you'll have experienced a wobble or an oscillation, caused by the design of the fairing, in some wind conditions. This is a very large fairing for a fork mount. I can't think of another bike with as large a fairing that isn't frame mounted. It catches a lot of wind. When the wind isn't coming straight at the fairing, it can/does cause an uncomfortable oscillation. This is the main advantage of a Road Glide.

While this problem isn't great, I'd consider a steering damper of the right design (small unobtrusive) for the right price.

 

ocezam, I agreed with you about batwings and having ridden behind one for about 15 years have found they catch the wind sometimes. However Mrs B and I went on a fortnight's tour with a bunch of BMWs and were amazed at how much some of them were moving around, either in windy conditions or at speed, compared with us. I came away realising that we ain't so hard up behind a batwing! The only bikes I have owned that had factory fitted steering dampers were Velocettes and BMWs and I did fit one to my MZ stroker, but have never felt the need on any of my Milwaukee marvels.

 

What you say about batwing wobble is true, it happens, but my point still stands. A steering damper will not stop this wobble, this sort of movement will not be fast enough to make the valving on the damper work.

You can see from the vid the type of steering head movement that a damper is designed to stop. If you set the valving on the damper to slow steering head movements that are much slower (eg your batwing wobble) then you will also damp inputs from the rider, which can be dangerous. If you need to swerve to miss a pot hole or something the damper will stop you moving the bars fast and might cause you to crash. No supplier is going to make a damper like that because they will get sued.

As I said you should barely be able to notice a damper is fitted if it is set up right.

Save your money and just accept that batwing wobble is a feature. Either that or step up to a King.....

 

did it take over 2 years for the first response

 

Funny guy. LOL.

 

What He said

 

I was looking at the dates also, lol. But back to the subject I'm always interested in anything that is proven to work at speed. Sometimes I ride in the three digit area (not often), and anything that would enhance the handling there would be nice. I can't see it helping with my normal riding, up to about 90 mph my bike handles just fine.

 

so far... read anything yet as to when you would need a dampener and when you would not. I do a lot of riding in NYC's pot hole'd and layered over repaired roads, so as you drive your hands are counter steering to compensate for the lumps and bumps in the road. So it would seem to me...that a steering dampener would act as a shock absorber and minimize this to some degree in as much as how shocks do. I took a look a a basic dampener that looked like a typical dog bone with a cylinder in the middle. it looked like it would do the trick, but seemed a little tight to install. need to relook the youtube video on this.

 

[QUOTE=ocezam;9710178]You've got a lot of good riding experience behind you and I've learned some things from a few of your posts. However, you should maybe consider that you haven't seen and done it all.

In the 41 years that I've been riding, I've never experienced a tank slapper. Nor have I known anyone who has. However, that is not the only instance where a good steering stabilizer is useful. If you've spent much time on a batwing, you'll have experienced a wobble or an oscillation, caused by the design of the fairing, in some wind conditions. This is a very large fairing for a fork mount. I can't think of another bike with as large a fairing that isn't frame mounted. It catches a lot of wind. When the wind isn't coming straight at the fairing, it can/does cause an uncomfortable oscillation. This is the main advantage of a Road Glide.


Just to let you know a Road glide ultra with the Pizza box in the back with one person brand-new from the factory goes into a full tank slapper When slowing down

Harley refuses to recognize the problem and the dealer says it's a known issue

I was also told that if that pizza box was removed that would allow enough weight on the front end so that it wouldn't do that.

I was told that If you over torque steering column and reduces it greatly And can possibly eliminate the problem.

It sounds to me like Harley has an instability problem

My thought is maybe because of all the lawsuits they don't want to correct a problem because that would admit they were wrong,
Or they just plain don't care because they're too cheap to spend the money and solve the problem And they figure they're the only American game in town.

If anyone gets chance to test one out on a demo ride please post it and any information you have I like to hear feedback

Other than that I really like the ride and I'm still considering getting one except that tank slapper issue it's got to be solved Somehow.