A little background, many here have seen me write that I am no stranger to Harley or motorcycles in general. Riding or modifying them. Started riding at age 5 and my first hands on modification was at 11 with my 250 Can Am motocross bike (wish I still had one of those!).

In 2010 I purchased a new Ultra Classic, this was my first venture into the full touring world. From the beginning myself nor the wifey enjoyed the ride this thing provided. The old Heritage was better and even an old '99 Intruder I had rode better than this $20k+ touring bike! Even small road transitions would jar your teeth and after 2 or so hours the wife's back was aching like crazy.

So over the past 2 years I have modified and experimented, first playing with the air pressure, then I went to Harley 12" shocks. Then I tried the homemade air ride with car shocks, back to the factory 13" with on board compressor for adjust on the fly. No dice, still a crappy ride on the *** end. Went with Progressive mono-tubes on the front end and that solved all the issues up there. Back to the rear, changed shock oil, tried this, that and the other until I got sick of experimenting!

Enter you guys on this forum, almost constantly commenting on Howard of Motorcycle Metal and the Ohlin shocks. Very familiar with Ohlin from my race days and know the quality of their product so I finally contacted Howard. What a great guy to deal with! Howard has probably forgot more about suspensions than most people will ever know so I took his word and went with the #3-#3 shocks.

Even though I knew and understood the shock setup procedure, I still called Howard for him to walk me through it. I learned something! Most Harley mounting points don't exactly line up from top to bottom. Mine was no different, almost a 1/4" difference on the left side!

With everything installed and setup on Saturday following Howard's initial recommendations. Did a quick around the block then yesterday we headed out on a 200+ mile Patriot ride.

First thoughts from me and the wife.

HOLY ****!!!!!!!

Never have I made any one single change to a bike that resulted in this much difference! On the way to the ride we took some of the roughest roads we know. Roads we usually avoid because of the patches and lack of maintenance. Almost all of the rough spots were GONE! And the ones you did feel were just a minor blip. Bridges that did feel like a bucking bronco are now smooth and you can hardly feel the expansion joints. Abrupt road changes are still felt but in a controlled manner. Ride AND handling are much better.

After about 8 hours of riding on a combination of back roads, highway and interstate we arrived back home with the wife having no back pain at all which is a very good thing!

If you don't like the ride of your touring bike, call Howard. Use his recommendations, get your own Ohlins and let Howard talk you through the install and initial setup.

Then RIDE and ENJOY!

Yes, Ohlins are quite expensive and you can get cheaper but you won't have the level of customization for what YOU need, or the support that Howard offers.

In my opinion, Howard is a God in the Harley Touring world!

 

Oh man, you got me thinking about mine now. I just replaced mine a few months ago with the new stock ones. Although they are 100% better than my old dead ones, I still feel the bumps and such way too much. Thanks for sharing.

 

Been thinking about putting Ohlins on my RK. What is Howard's contact info? I may be giving him a call this winter.

Thanks
Phil

 

Motorcycle Metal all Howard's information is in there.

 

Thanks, I was just searching around the forum and found his info... He will be my call when it comes time to purchase.

Phil

 

Do you have the part nr?

 

I'm running the Ohlins #3-#3 with the monotubes up front too , I am very happy

 

I'm running #3-#3 based on Howard's recommendation. Howard has a build sheet you fill out and uses that to build the shocks.

 

Thanks!

 

I have been looking to upgrade my shocks for a while and finally decided to go with the ohlins. Got my #3 #3's from Howard as promised last Friday. WOW, I am very happy, I should have done this right when I got the bike. Very quality product from a guy who goes out of his way to make sure you understand how a shock performs and what to expect and walks you thru the whole install process. The only down side is you will realize how much the stock front end dives now that you have a real performace shock out back. I am going with the harley premium ride front end will have it installed in a couple of weeks. That will have to do until Howard perfects his latest venture.