Bonneville America Forums Forums General Motorcycle Forums Other Bikes 883 Sportster review

I'm vsiting my brother here in Oxnard (Silver Strand), CA, and I had the chance to take his new 2006 HD 883 Sportster for a ride yesterday. In comparing it my Speedmaster, I liked some things and didn't like others.

Things I liked:

Self cancelling turn signals (How do they DO this???)
The wide clutch and front brake handles
Chrome quality
Electronic odometer
Belt drive (smooth as a baby's butt)
EFI!

Things I don't:

Power (or lack thereof)
Vibration. Lots and lots and lots of vibration.
The shifter is too close to the foot peg to easily put your toe in and out of.
The clutch and front brake handles are too close to the grips to get your hands in and out of.
The grips are too small a diameter for my manly hands.
The itsy-bitsy headlight
The footpeg placement is too high. (I felt I was riding a dirt bike.)
Neutral is a bit close between 1st and 2nd making it hard (for me) to find.

Conclusion:

My brother likes his bike, and that's what counts, since he bought it. I'll stick with my speedmaster, and when/if it ever comes to buy another bike, it'll probably be a Triumph over a Harley. If it were a choice between the Sporty and the Scambler, it would be the Scambler hands down.

Yah as long as he likes it is a great bike and it's another rider! I owned an 883 many years ago, not for long as I never really loved the bike. Prefer the 1200 but I got the 883 really cheap with 96 miles.

Doesn't Brent sell a self cancel device. Personally doesn't bother me, it's such a habit I would probably keep trying for a long time.
Hard to beat HD's superior pretty parts.
I like traditional analog.
I have the belt for my SM and love the quiet low maintenance of it.

Power definately sucks, especially power to weight.
The vibes are tough for me to live with.
Never liked the ergos of any sportsters.
Never liked the shift box either though the new ones are supposed to be the same as Buells and those work real nice, at least on the Buells.

Sportsters can be made into really fun bikes if you put some $$$ into them!

I rode a 1200 on a dealer demo ride and it was pretty fun. Very torquey but the vibration was super annoying. But then again, every V-twin I have ridden has that maddening vibration so I guess it's a love it or hate it thing. I have noticed that v-twins seem to feel denser between the legs. Probably because that's where most of the weight is, but they feel solid. Neither here nor there, just different. I didn't like the powerband though. It did not build progressively, it was just no power - power - no power, and it couldn't rev at all. Having no tach didn't help but with a redline at what, 5000 rpm?, I guess you wouldn't need one. Oh, and it scrapes too soon in corners, but then again, I haven't met a cruiser yet that didn't scrape too soon .

The OL just had to have a new 1200 Low, partly because the tank badge is likely to be a 1 year only thing because nobody likes it. It has a decent amount of power and handles reasonably well. Fact is, it could probably almost keep up with my Triumph now that it has aftermarket pipes and the intake has been opened up. It vibrates a bit at low engine speeds (as does her '05 Lowrider), but once you rev it past the point where it stops bottoming out the rubber engine mounts (around 2000 RPM) it smooths out. But, I will never get used to the air filter cover moving against my leg!
I think they finally got the redline up to something like 6200, a bit faster than the previous 5500. With all the lightweight parts in the blockhead piglets, I would have thought they'd be able to top the 6600 redline on my old 61 inch ironhead XLCH, at least with the 883.

Speaking of the HD belt drive, I saw a show on either Discovery or History channel about the Vrod factory. Seems that they use a chain drive on the beefed up screeching eagle version because it has enough poopy power to strip the teeth it of a belt. Too bad they didn't make those look like a motorcycle.

They cheated on the self canceling signals. They always used to self cancel when you let go of the button. Now, they use the digital speedometer. Seems the speedo drive is a shutter wheel (or magnetic equivalent) so they added a counter to the signals that counts out maybe 150 - 200 feet of movement and shuts off. To their credit, the digital to analog conversion to move the speedometer needle is reasonably accurate.

New blacked out sportster. Actually looks pretty cool.

http://www.motorcycledaily.com/30january07_nightster.htm

I kinda like it.

check it out.... Nightster video

At the NY MC show I sat on almost every HD there. I really like the Sportster Custom.

But I did notice the foot clearance on the shifter was too small for my man-sized feet.

I would rather have the Roadster 1200 with the twin disc front brakes.

Looks pretty nice but the left side of the bike is still missing the exhaust