HARLEY BARELY BRAKES A SWEAT
THE FACTS
Here’s a riddle for you, up there with the sound of one hand clapping, why is the slower car always in front of you and why was there only one Monopolies Commission?
And if drag racing is about going really fast in a straight line, and the fun of bikes is going really fast around corners, why on earth would you come up with a dragster-style bike for the road?
That, apart from the voices in my head telling me the aliens still had Elvis, was my main thought as I plonked myself onto the seat of the FXDR.
Start up, and the air filled with a strangely un-Harley sound from the whopping 1868cc lump below the tank: a bass note of that familiar syncopated beat, but thanks to balancer shafts without the accompanying vibration, and overlaid with a smooth but dangerously aggressive purr.
If it was a person, it would be James Bond. Connery, not Moore.
Pull away, and progress is satisfyingly swift, with that dangerous purr from the exhaust segueing into a lusty snarl.
Below 1,600rpm, the engine moans and chugs, but from then on, it pulls cleanly all the way to 5,600rpm, at which point a rev limiter taps you on the shoulder and tells you to stop being a hooligan.
Braking, with two whopping 300mm discs up front and four-pot calipers, hauls in even 303kg of bike with smooth aplomb without needing to touch the rear brake.
So far, so good, until you come to a corner. With a 240mm rear tyre as wide and flat as the M6, long wheelbase and lazy fork rake, cornering is a languid waltz rather than a jazzy jive.
It’s a shame, since the engine is great, and apart from the handling, it’s like the love child of HarleyDavidson’s splendid Breakout and the equally splendid and much missed V-Rod.
If you’ve got lots of money and you like blasting away from the lights and waltzing around corners while whistling Dixie, it’s the bike for you.
For the rest of us, the elephant in the room is the Ducati Diavel. The FXDR is £19,855, which makes it the most expensive bike in the Softail range by almost two and a half grand and it’s not as good as the cheaper Breakout or Heritage Classic.
And the cheapest Diavel produces 152bhp, goes around corners a million times better, and is only £15,995.
I know which I’d buy, if
I had money. Harley-Davidson FXDR 114
Engine: Power: Torque: Colours: Black, Cornering is no fun