Harley-Davidson Nightster

Harley Davidson XL1200 Nightster 2008

The Harley Davidson ‘Nightster’ is, as the name suggests it might be quite a dark horse!
It, unlike the majority of Harley-Davidson’s you would see in the course of your travels, is missing the almost de-rigueur chrome and lustrous paint of its brethren and breed. In fact, almost entirely contra the normal policy of Harley’s magpie designers it has virtually no polishable metal surface which I think you’ll agree in the main is unusual.

Harley stylists have decided that for 2008 black is the new chrome, and a sand-cast effect finish is the new polished ally for their new 1200 XL Sportster derivative. Furthermore they have stripped this bike to its minimal requirements. The seat is solo, subsequently there are no rear pegs, the rear fender (painted black) adorns the top curve of the rear wheel and other than a number plate (and a lonely crosshead bolt to fit a dual seat if the future owner required) is parsimonious in its feature. The tank is a minimal 12.5 litre affair perched atop the frame rail and is… err, black, with subtle grey tone pin striping and the legendary moniker only. No chunky anniversary badge or shield and bar. The wheels are black rimmed and highlighted quite nicely by chrome spokes. The handlebars, switchgear, levers mirrors, headlight, frame and forks are also painted just plain ole black pardners.
The only chrome features are the exhaust manifold covers and silencers.

It wouldn’t look out of place in the scorching badlands heat of Mexico, land of Zapata moustaches, chewing tobacco, tequila and aged cactus, but it does I fear look out of place on a cold winters day in Sussex as it thuds through the early morning dreariness and cold. Speckled orange sodium spots lining the foothills of the Downs and commuter traffic hobbling the large lumpy motor’s big bore potential. Pale faced shivering rider, clean shaven, skirting Eastbourne deeply imbedded in the burgeoning 21st century fog and drizzle.

Harley-Davidson have successfully marketed their product continuously for decades whilst not really changing the intrinsic design of the machine substantially. It’s still powered by a push rod large capacity air cooled two valve per cylinder V-twin engine. (The VRSCC V-rod range aside). It would appear that’s what it’s customers like, and what wannabe owners desire. There is an adage ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it‘. So they haven’t! Fair play to them for successfully sticking to their guns, what fine marketing people they have.

The Nightster 1200 is a traditional Harley. Essentially it’s not much different to the previous incarnations of XL1200 machines. I’m not sure what came first with this machine, the name subsequently the style or, the stylists vision begat the name.

Other than the colour shade the other styling cues on this bike to differentiate it from others are fork gaiters, a single front disc, cut down front fender and a first I believe for the factory the complete absence of the traditional tail light assembly. The factory have decided that despite its retro look the lines would be cluttered by a chunky tail light, so instead they have configured the rear light and brake light within the indicators, clever thinking Milwaukee geezers. As with all new bikes manufactured for Euro land the lights have to remain on at all times, therefore the LED rear indicator units are wide eyed and red rimmed with the ’pupils’ a lustrous orange when required. Anything but traditional.

When anyone mentions to me the double barrelled moniker, the mental image I immediately think of is one of a large and cumbersome motorcycle chromed and raked with a laid back riding position. A Panzer amongst bicycles. This bike punches a huge hole in that mental myth of mine. It’s actually very small and compact. Parked next to Mazzer’s Fazer 600 it actually appeared smaller.

The seat height is incredibly low (67.6 cms), my wife and some of her pals all clamoured to sit astride the bike and all of them could get the flats of their feet on the ground, for me, a six footer it was almost too low, though the actual riding position was quite comfortable. In the past when I have ridden custom bikes I always find myself pulling my upper body forward, and the saving grace is sensibly positioned pegs, low and wide though sans return springs which is a pain.

Under your left ham is the battery cover which revealed a maintenance free unit, fuse box etc, and under the right is the cover which provides for the remote plastic oil tank. This has a really spiffing satin alloy oil filler cap which is perfectly shaped to follow the contour of the cover itself which, when pressed slowly rises from its confines to allow one to twist off and check the levels on the integrated dip stick. Very clever, very nice but also very subtle.

The bike benefits from fuel injection for emission purposes so started at the touch of a button when the system had primed. It does have a side stand cut out switch so it’s a clutch in job. It was easy to wheel around and though you could tell that this was a 250KG bike it was well balanced steering neatly on its completely non-adjustable basic suspension. I say non-adjustable, but the rear springs are adjustable to one other position to accommodate the extra weight of a pillion should you as a future owner wish to carry a passenger and no doubt wish to buy a Harley ‘C’ spanner from their vast accessories, tuning and clothing catalogue. The bike didn’t appear to have any onboard tool kit in evidence.

Now in this modern day and age you would suspect that a 1200cc V-twin engine would be a bit of a monster, certainly allied to the ‘Nightster’ badge, but no, it still only produces around 60 BHP (I’m guessing, Harley don’t actually list the power output in the specs) which quite frankly could be a little disappointing on the open road.

This bike is however perfect for those who want to buy into the kudos of owning and running a Harley and don’t want to rush about the world at high speed, with handling they will never find the limit of (you can buy a Buell for that). Perhaps the born again biker who likes the idea of owning a bike but is hesitant because of all the talk of massive power deliveries from most of the rest of the factories and who doesn’t want his (or her) arms ripped out by frenzied horsepower. Maybe the PORGs amongst us who either have to wear altitudinous Cuban heels or balance on the furthest reaches of tippy toe on most other machines.

The motor is quite docile (I’ve been bought up on a diet of high revving four cylinder bikes) and revs like a lazy dog, but still manages to deliver 72 ftlbs of torque which is natural from this configuration of engine. The rubber mounted Evolution engine oscillates excitedly on start up and the vibrations can be felt whilst riding though this is not intrusive because if you do buy one of these bikes you should expect nothing else and is possibly the reason why you bought it in the first place.

It’ll pummel its way up to 110mph (apparently) through its five speed box (conventional layout, one down four up) but trust me this is as fast as you would want to go on this bike even if you had more power and a dark desert highway before you. It is amazingly steady at these speeds, but hit a pothole or similar and it does jar the front end showing off the frailties of the basic front forks. It is happiest at around 80mph in top and the best punch in its armoury is fourth gear blattage from around 60mph, that’s its sweet spot I reckon.

It does however clatter like a Fifties thoroughbred on the open road, you are definitely not spared the sound this engine makes, and don’t confuse it for drive train noise either because like just about every Harley out there its an almost silent final belt drive, requiring no lubrication (which in turn means you don’t have to spend hours cleaning filthy oily rubbish off your rims continually) which at first was quite startling, especially as the sanitized mufflers kept just about all of the exhaust note from you. One thing is for sure it’s definitely not a Japanese or European machine. That sound is definitely all American and totally Harley Davidson.
Mental note. Lock all the bureaucrats in a dark cave somewhere to argue their bulls**t rubbish amongst themselves, whilst us everyday people can get on with our lives bolting open pipes to our motorcycles.
This bike is screaming to breathe and shout out its existence to all who are in earshot. And would make a huge difference to its overall character.

The single brake disc up front and rear sibling were perfectly adequate unless seriously heavy braking was required and gave pretty good feel considering the basic layout, Dual opposed pistons on the front and a single 39mm piston affair on the rear, which was necessary during this road test as it was pissing down and cold most of the time I was out on the road.
It’s not really fair to rate the grip of the branded tyres because of the weather, but they felt pretty good in the wet and on a dry but damp, slick and cold winter morning.
The hour or so of dry road I did get one evening whilst tooling home resulted in a few more millimeters off the footpeg’s hero blobs, but to be honest it’s doesn’t take much of a hero to achieve this.

The speedometer is almost an afterthought or a grudging necessity on this bike, it tells you how fast you are going and that’s it. With a small LCD odo panel inset at the bottom, other than for speed cameras it’s barely worth a look. A small row of ‘idiot lights’ close to the handlebar bridge completes the set up.

The switchgear is chunky and easy to use with winter gloves on and even the handed self cancelling indicator switches weren’t difficult to get used to. Levers are chunky and considering the bike I was riding the clutch lever action didn’t feel overly heavy either. Neutral to first gear was a clunky affair but positive and provided you didn’t want to ride it like a Japanese sports bike gear changing was also relatively smooth if you didn’t snatch at it.

Don’t buy one of these if you want to commute. I have no doubt that you could use it all year round, it seemed well built and considering the years of virtually unchanged manufacture under Harley’s belt should be so, but the tank range is frankly rubbish. Less than eighty miles before the light flickers on, ten miles later exiting the fuel station you will only be eight and a half quid lighter and already wondering where the next fill up will occur.

If you feel the urge for a bit of speed and rapid acceleration, a bit of lightweight and flickiness you could get the same performance and probably better handling for a lot less on a Honda CB500 or Suzuki GS500 for instance and the same money would buy you a 600cc Japanese bullet. (Half the price would buy you an Enfield Bullet), so make sure you make your buying decision based on the right reasons.

Buy one of these if you want retro style, if you want a bit of dyed in the wool character, if you wish to attract women, if you want a bit of attitude and history. It wouldn’t look too bad dressed in drab army green, white star on tank, ’property of the US army’ stamped alongside and some dun canvas saddlebags covered in no-mans-land mud. It really hasn’t changed that much in terms of outright styling since the early bucket seat despatch days of the Forties, army fatigues and rifle holster on the front and you could be a film extra or an Audi Murphy wannabee.
If you are not interested in whizz bang sci-fi gadgetry, if you want your biking to be relaxed but still purposeful. If you want a custom bike, you might as well have an original, and that’s what H-D are very good at delivering.

Now what soundtrack should I put over the video, ‘What made Milwaukee famous’ Rodney Stewart covered it I believe, ‘Paint it black’ , Hmmm The Stones or The Animals, can’t decide which version is better, maybe ‘Nightrain’ by Guns ‘n’ Roses, hmmm wrong model, ‘Born to be wild’ is so much of a cliché I don’t know why it even popped into my head, something by Steve Harley maybe, a Billy Idol ‘Rebel Yell’, ‘American Gothic’ from The Cult, hmmmm………………………………............




Doby Trutcenden 8.1.08