Well I have been considering trading UP to the newly designed 15' RG from my 11'SG for the past few months. Finally got all of the finances in order, the GF convinced, and after 4 visits to my local dealership, talking about both the SG and RG, I finally pulled the trigger....and rented a 15'RGS.
All I can say is WOW!!!
After reading about all of the time and money invested in re-designing, and coming up with the Rushmore series, Harley Davidson needs to take a serious look at the competition, and while they say they spent thousand of miles and hundreds of hours i the saddle, they must be a bunch of zombies or the walking dead in the design and engineering department.
A few notes...I currently own a 2012 BMW K1600GTL, and a 2011 Street Glide (with a Klock Werks windscreen, Mustang seat, Vance and Hines Monster Ovals, and a few bits of added KuryCrappin Chrome).
I picked up the rental 15'RG on Saturday afternoon, with the full intentions of jumping onto the bike and making a Sunday early departure from SWFL to Key West, grabbing a burger at Sloppy Joe's, then heading back to the Fort Myers area the same day. I have made this 500+ mile ride several times, on both the BMW and my SG, with total mind clearing relaxation and total enjoyment of the great views from the saddle in years past.
As I got myself setup with all of the adjustments (mirror, stereo pre-sets) and left the dealership for my house in Sanibel, I was truly excited to begin what I thought was going to be a great 24+ hours on the newly designed RGS. I started the RGS special up, and thought once again to myself, the first order roof business when I pick up my new one the following week, must be the new Vance and Hines system....as she was just to silent, sitting in the parking lot and pulling out of the dealership.
Then came the first few turns thru the parking lot, hitting the brakes hard, a few tight turns both with the gas and hard brakes, so I had some idea of how this beast was going to handle, and all seemed great. Even with the size, a very nimble ride with great feel playing around in the 5-20moh range leaving the dealership area.
Then the wait at the LONGGGG traffic light to finally pull out of the dealership complex, excited to finally be on a newly designed piece of Harley engineering, waiting for the green.....wait for it....wait for it.....GREEN light hits and off I go....
Well as I increased in speed, and got to say the 35mph mark (which comes up pretty quickly), I notice the wind in my face....which felt pretty good at this point. Next light comes up, I hit the brakes and wait for the next green, still excited, knowing that first thing in the morning, I am going to be heading to Key West to enjoy a great burger and miles of water views.
Next light goes green, and I am finally off to Sanibel.....with the wind increasing as does my speed....45mph of speed, with 45 mph winds DIRECTLY hitting my upper chest level and above....60MPH winds DIRECTLY chest level and above, making me snug my half shell strap a little tighter, and me thinking WTF.
Is something not set right with the newly designed fairing vents HD has spent millions of dollars and hours developing? Is something as simple as a cheap black push button lever, not in the correct position. I pull into another parking lot mid way home, take a closer look, and they are all three set correctly...top vent is open, bottom two vents are closed. I bitterly stand in this parking lot, thinking this idiot must be missing something so obvious, yet nothing came to me.
So I jump back on this 15' RGS rental bike, and off I go, with the winds hitting my chest, face and head, being so extreme I am rethinking my doing 500+ miles on this bike, leaving early in the morning, before sunrise.
So as I am riding home, I think, lets try changing the seat over to my Mustang (salesman says it will fit), so once I get off of this newly designed wind tunnel in my driveway, I immediately pull her into the garage to commence with the seat swap. I also make a adjustment to the heal toe shifter. I then jump back on the back of this gorgeous looking black beast, fire her up and pull out of my driveway to see if she feels any better. and guess what......the wind on this ride STILL SUCKS!!!
Needless to say, I didn't take the rental RGS to the Keys the following morning. While I was so excited to both spend hours in the saddle of the newly designed RGS AND be able to enjoy another long day trip to Key West for a great burger (and the few stops along the way in the Keys, I thought to myself I'd be so so so sorry if I made this trip, getting blown away in the face the entire ride, that I actually considered leaving the new rental bike in the garage in the morning, and jumping on one of my other bikes, as I really did want that burger.
So I decided to keep things local, as I was spending $195 to ride this new bike for one full day, I should better really ride her and get a true felling of this bike, before I hand over $30k for one.
So to keep it simple, I will just list my few complaints I noticed in my 24+hours on the RGS.
1) Windshield on this newly designed touring bike SUCKS!!! With all of the money and hours invested in the new design of the Rushmore project, how in the F*$& could Harley ignore what I am sure EVERY individual (unless they are shorter than 4') have noticed in riding this newly created bike?
2) Infotainment system....The quick selections of pre-sets on the stereo are a tad unfriendly. Have to use the right hand control, instead of the stereo left hand controls to change from one favorite to the next. (I know this is petty, and I'd probably get familiar with this as time passed and never look back).
3) GPS....who designed this portion of their system? When entering via the keyboard, its in alphabetical order, not the qwerty style that every other gps unit and smart phone keyboard is....really???
4) GPS....the map when in nighttime mode SUCKS!!! Example....my street shows up while sitting on bike out front of house, zoomed in to see about a 1/2 mile radius, and it's name does not appear, yet the street over shows it's name. When driving out of my neighborhood, only about every third or fourth street displays its name (not a problem when I know the neighborhood, but when a GPS unit is really needed, like when your not on your own F... street, street names are kinda important.
5) GPS.... Riding on a local 4 lane major road thru SWFL, and this road has the appearance on the map as does every other street....the are all little thin white lines, no able to differentiate one major road from side streets.....they ALL appear as thin white same sized lines, no matter what the zoom level selected on the map. another WTF moment!!
6) GPS....POI setup. I select for a few POI spots to display on the map (Gas stations and then banks). ALL that shows on the display, no matter how you adjust the screen zoom, is a stupid blue dot. No gas station or bank logos (like my BMW Garmin unit does or my 14' Ford F250 GPS display does if POI's have been turned on. Now this isn't a issue when you know where you are in your local area, but travel to a never been before destination, and finding a gas station or bank, or other POI on this GPS unit would be impossible by only viewing locations on the map display, as all that you can see are BLUE dots!!!
7) HEADLIGHT .....Most of you probably haven't experienced this on a bike, but since I have, I must share. Yes...the technology is currently in use, and it works GREAT too. imagine a adaptive headlight on a motorcycle.....really!!! It's on my BMW and it makes the cornering on this bike while coming home or running out someplace after sunset so much safer and comfortable for a rider. I didn't think about it until I was riding around on the RGS saturday night. Harley could have made this a option on this bike, and others, and I know I would spend the additional thousand or so dollars to have it. As once someone has ridden a bike with the adaptive technology, its amazing!!! (If your not sure what I am referring to, take a look at the BMW motorcycle K1600 site and their adaptive headlight info...it's amazing and has been utilized for years now and with great success.
So my Harley Davidson test ride for 24+ hours has confirmed one thing for me.....and that is I am still searching for a TRUE touring bike, one that has been truly designed with the rider and passenger in mind, and that doesn't jump so quick into the market, that they leave out some of the most basic of things. Touring bike=Bike capable of highway speeds without blowing the helmet off its rider.
Who designs a new touring motorcycle where the wind above 45mph wants to blow your face and head off??? If you re going to respond to this with "buy a new windshield"....for $30K+, couldn't the manufacturer of this newly designed touring / highway cruiser installed a windscreen, that well.....screens the rider from the wind!!! Really, why should anyone expect a newly designed road cruiser motorcycle to be ready for the highway, unless they change the damn windshield before planning on getting on the highway? They might as well make the fuel tank optional, and force the buyer to purchase one of those before they can take the bike for a ride.
Who designs a new bike Infotainment system, which includes GPS, yet can't get even the most basic map features used in the other GPS units on the market (I am not sure if they attempted to write the code and mapping on their own or if they partnered with Garmin), but it looks like they tried this on their own, and it totally SUCKS!!! If your going to do something, do it well, don't try doing everything, as most of what you do will be subpar. Build a damn motorcycle, and leave the GPS system to those who know GPS systems.
So the search continues for a great bagger or touring bike. that can deliver the muscle sounding rumble of a american classic motorcycle, with the quality and engineering of something the europeans understand and do when designing and building a bike.
