Monstor 920cc sidecar Norton with 15:1 compression on Alky

Seeley920 said:

Or they've lost the plot too

Click to expand...

Actually, as far as I can tell, Harley never offered a production Sportster or its newer derivatives with a 6-speed gearbox. It switched from the 4-speed to the 5-speed in 1991. There were aftermarket 6-speed conversions for the Sportster, but not factory. I'm not so sure about the bigger HD bikes. I think they offered the 5-speed starting around 1979 - 1980, and the 6-speed around 2006 - 2007.

Ken

I think you might be right Ken, so much for the internet huh:

But the big ones do, even more counter intuitive really. But they do work, means you can keep the thing bang in the area of peak torque whilst accelerating.

With huge torque moving a huge weight, the gearboxes must be strong.