About the Flattie

“You don’t own a bike like this, you have a relationship with it”  

Back around 1999 I needed a part for a 1972 Shovelhead (93" Stroker). I had already given up on going to a dealer for parts on a bike that was almost 30 years old. I walked into a local shop & saw a BUNCH of old Harleys, flatheads, panheads, even a knucklehead or three. Well over a dozen bikes. I told the guy I had always wanted an old bike like that, he pointed to one and said “That one is for sale.” I bought it on the spot, VIN 41UL1647; year, model & factory serial number, pretty simple, I think I paid $10,000. The bike was in the colors of the Seattle Cossacks, a stunt team with history back to 1938. They only run antique Harleys, nothing newer than a panhead. I was not allowed to ride my new bike away with their paint scheme, something I was happy to honor. If you’ve reached this point in my story, you have GOT TO check out their website & see them if you have a chance.

https://seattlecossacks.com/index.html    

The shop owner let me tear my new baby down in his lower shop, where the Cossacks were storing their bikes for the winter. It was a wonderland for me. As I was learning how the bits & pieces came off & went back together, I was surrounded by a virtual museum. If I needed to understand how a cable was routed, or how to mount a tool box, I just had to wander around the shop for a few minutes, my answer was just a few feet away.

A few factoids:
Since I bought the bike, I’ve had the engine out three times and I was always swapping out aftermarket for OEM parts. The Cossacks aren’t terribly concerned about “correct” machines. They work a fleet of very old motorcycles and they’re not afraid to use aftermarket parts, priority Number 1 is to keep them running and that's OK. So through time I’ve swapped out aftermarket parts as I found or could afford OEM parts. Case in point, I bought my tail light in three separate original pieces as I found them.

About the controls:
"Back in the day...", if you were going to ride someone else's bike, the first question was "What's the shift pattern?". Clutch, brake & throttle were all alike from one bike to the next, BUT the toe shift lever was either left or right side, and the rear brake was on the opposite side, for obvious reasons. And (AND), the patterns were all different, either one up and the rest down, or one down and the rest up. The variety was so common that pretty much anybody who was a daily rider was able to hop on & go with any pattern. Around 1975 the federal government standardized left side, one down & the rest up. Spoilsports.

Now, the old Harleys are ALL different:
-  Foot clutch is a heel-toe rocker, left side, rock forward to engage = "toe to go" and it stays where you leave it, engaged, disengaged, slipping, etc.
-  Tank shift, 1 forward 3 back
-  Right foot is like today, it's rear brake but semi-effective.
-  Front brake is hand lever on left. No lever on the right. 
-  Throttle is normal twist on the right side with no spring to idle. AND sometimes if you walk away while it's idling, it will slowly spool up, so stay right there.
-  Left twist grip is spark advance, more on that to follow.

I'm not embarrassed to admit, after I bought the bike I didn't shift into second for the first 5 miles. And even today I struggle with turning right or left from a stop. Out of practice, gotta hit a parking lot & practice up again.

BUT:
Once I get to rolling there's nothing like it. Miles of smiles. Both Flattie and I are very happy doing about 50 mph. At 60 and above the wind speed makes me work too hard. I have nothing to prove and that's OK, I'm too old for that macho shit. Besides, at the lower speeds I can hear the rattling & clanking & banging of a side-valve V-twin. The exhaust note is more of a soft puff-puff-puff that I can actually hear sometimes. Hey, what can you expect from 5:1 compression? That low compression was so soft, when the bike was nicely broken in, I could almost hand-start it. Oh, another thing, that engine doesn't want to pull your arms out of their sockets when you twist the throttle. It just pulls, more like a diesel than a gas engine....

About the engine:
1: When I bought it, the cylinders had been bored out enough times that they were around 80 cubic inches, from the original 74. One fine summer day I was at a stop light, light turned green, I took off, and when I shifted into second I heard a CRACK and the engine spooled down TUT-TUT-tut-tut, quiet. I looked down to my left & saw what I thought was a piece of 3” pipe, touched it and DAMN HOT OUCH SHIT - it was a hot hot piston. The front cylinder had fatigued at the base and puked out the piston, bent a couple things along the way, like the connecting rod. What was left of the cylinder was levitating over the cases, leaning right about 30 degrees and held in place by the bent pushrod covers.

2: The old bikes have a manual spark advance, you go retarded to kick it over then full advanced when you’re running. It’s the left twist grip (yes, both sides twist for throttle [R] & manual spark advance [L]). On one of the runs from Seattle to California I let the spark advance return to fully retarded at 60 mph and I overheated the engine, scored my beautiful new cylinders, it was a bad day. No fix on the road, it was U-Haul time. THAT one is on me, dammit. Later I safety-wired the spark to full advanced so it won’t happen again. It can be a bit of a challenge to kick it over, sometimes it kicks back, I never lock my knee so I won’t get sent over the handlebars by a backfire. ONE TIME, though, I did punch myself in the chin with my knee, kind of a wake-up call.

Anecdotally: back in Seattle, after getting the motor rebuilt I hopped on the bike & headed home from the shop. I didn't get 10 miles down the road and had to pull over because it was overheating again, NOT a repeat of my spark advance f#*% up. I called The Wizard, he boogied down & picked up the bike. He tore into it & called me with news that (and I quote) "Your cylinders are dry as a popcorn fart." Huh, great line but I could never really wrap my head around that. He spent some time scratching his head, and a few days later he told me the oil pump gasket was aftermarket and a bit too fat, which prevented the pump from moving the oil. I'm pretty sure it's a positive displacement pump, so any gaps will allow the oil to flow out the side = taking the path of least resistant. What's interesting to me is, the aftermarket gasket was just a fraction of a mm too fat, which, as it turned out, is meaningful.  What's COOL is that The Wizard figured it out. I can turn a wrench but to get down to that detail is way beyond my skills.

3: In Yuma, as we were getting ready to start the Mexico-Canada run, we found a crack in my engine case, maybe related to the self-destruct the first time I had to pull the motor, maybe not, doesn’t really matter. Well, what the hell, I listened to advice from the gang, decided I’ll nurse it up to Canada, keep an eye on it. Made the run, then my friends found a couple nice case halves & I had it rebuilt. 

These old flatheads are really simple machines, with the 5:1 compression the engines don't really get stressed and all that mass actually keeps the vibrations down. Everything else is built "hell for stout". Once you get the bike all dialed in, it should last a long, long time. That's my goal; get it all comfortable & settled in, then ride. Then ride some more for a long time. Wish me luck.

There are more stories but I’ll stop for now, it’s late and it’s looking like this little website will be evolving anyway.