New Adventure

Well, it seems about 95% of a chance that I will be able to buy a shovel head. The year of the bike hopefully will be a 1976 FXE. It is in good shape from what I can tell just by pictures as of now as this bike is located in Texas. MY brother Cowboy said he will go get a better look at it for me.

Anyways, I am curious as to what I may expect from owning this bike? BY this I mean mechanical failures, difficulty finding parts, the WoW factor and other things.

Will I be able to get Genuine HD ShovelHead parts still or will they all need to be from the aftermarket?

As my brother Cowboy has pointed out in different thread, this bike will probably be the one that I completely break down and give it my complete attention and apply my taste too, but I do want to keep the engine HD and certain select parts of the bike HD.

Thanks...

yes what???? :rant:

I would yes to all the above,
There's a reason all us old dudes own and ride newer bikes.
Your young and you'll have to decide what that WOW factor is for you. For me it is the stock look and dependability. Although I do ride a Softtail bagger that I put together. Get the check book out!!

You might be able to get the Genuine Factory Service Manual from the dealer...maybe...you'll definitely want to find one tho(it's really funny when you go to a dealer and ask for a part for a Pan or Shovel or early Evo's for that matter)...good quality tools are a must and a box of locktite too:roflmao:With the new type of gaskets and locktite(blue) they can be pretty oil tight,but you'll still need to do pre ride inspections to make sure everything is tight,keep it as close to stock as possible and don't beat the crap out of it and you'll get a lot of years out of it....Hot Rider will love to go for rides on it with ya

So can't you high perf these out and have them last? I am not talking about a drag bike but I looked at what the stock compression ratio is (8.0:1) and would like to bump that up to about 9.5:1. Is that too much for that engine?

Yeah, you can hop em up...but remember when performance goes up reliability goes down... parts wear out faster and you are looking at a 35 yr old motorcycle...before jumping into hop up mode,ride the bike and see how you like the way it performs as is...unless you've got real deep pockets

With this bike I would do a mild hop up. For this bike I would mainly change tins, and add a bunch of custom made parts for it.. Like the struts, this one I would take the engine out to get a high polish put on it etc.

A mild hop up shouldn't hurt reliability...a 1.5 increase in CR will put more strain on your valve train... talk to some shovel guys to find out a good ratio and cam that work well together and stays reliable...the rest of the stuff you plan is cosmetic...have fun with it,just don't go crazy with the engine...that's when the problems start

I haven't completely made up my mind on that just yet. Really cool looking that I know. I would have to ride it for awhile so I can capture its true soul, but for right now, It would probably be a Bar Hopper....

I do like the looks of the stock bike minus the passenger pillion, another thing that I don't like about the bike stock is that the rear fender sits so high off of the wheel.

Check this link out, it looks like that on this bike that it has been lowered already? I am looking at the shock location and there just doesn't seem to anywhere else to go to slam it?

1976 Harley Shovelhead FXE Dyna Superglide Motorcycle by Sean of Motonit.com

I guess I missed that, I didn't read the captions, just looked at the pictures. If it has bee lowered already, probably no nee to go further. Oh yeah, this isn't the bike that I want to buy.

to get an idea about lowering it??

What??? The one that Cowboy and I are looking at is the same year and model?