Indian Chief
Indian Chief
New Rides 2002
The new engine arrives just in time
DAVID EDWARDS
TIME TO CHECK SENSIBILITIES AT THE front door. See, I happen to own a 1948 Chief, a “real” Indian, apogee of marque, possessed of the most distinctive silhouette in all of motorcycling. Skirted fenders, doughnut tires, girder fork, sprung solo saddle, robust sidevalve V-Twin-arguably the ultimate American highway cruiser.
So, it came to me to test the 2002 Indian Chief, noteworthy for its new proprietary motor, the 100-cubic-inch “Powerplus,” long-promised replacement for the S&S Harley Evo clones that have powered the Chief since its “resurrection” in 1999.
You may remember the history. Two groups were vying for rights to the Indian trademark, tied up in bankruptcy court. The judge overseeing the affair wanted to be shown motorcycles. One group offered up a beautiful, highly engineered but non-running mockup; the other party's bike made noise and moved under its own power-never mind that it was basically a kluge-job Harley clone onto which skirted fenders had been hung. Such subtleties were lost on the judge. The runner got the rights.
Forget for a moment the fact that what we had here was a fake H-D motor in a fake Indian chassis, the end result was simply not a very good motorcycle. Its frame, the usual Softail-copy fare, was a dreadfully weedy structure. Suspension, cornering clearance, brakes were all severely sub-par, too. Oh, and let's not forget ergos by Vlad the Impaler. All this for a mere $26.000. Gee. what’s second prize, two new Indian Chiefs?
Company officials promised improvements were on the way. In the meantime, they commenced production in a converted grocery warehouse located in beautiful downtown Gilroy, California, self-proclaimed Garlic Capital of the World. After a good start, though, the saturation point for five-figure sortaIndians was reached. Bikes sat in the warehouse unsold, layoffs ensued, things looked bad.
Enter Frank O’Connell as CEO, a straight-shootin’ bike nut with a track record of big-business turnarounds. With him came $45 million in outside investment, and suddenly the new Indian is back in the game, with a revised business plan, new hires and this thoroughly reworked Chief.
How reworked? Try an all-new frame with large, square-section backbone, cast swingarm pivots and transmission mounts, and a single front downtube. Gone are the under-engine shocks, replaced by a midships-mounted monoshock sourced from KW in Germany. Also missing is the Hog-like underseat "oil bag." Engine oil is now held in a flat tank beneath the tranny. The same Korean supplier provides the front fork, but an Indian suspension engineer (who also happens to ride a Yamaha Rl) dictated the calibrations. And, yes, those are Brembo calipers front and rear.
INDIAN CHIEF
$20,000
Ups Big improvement over previ ous "kitbike" bodge-up Sidewalk spectators still love the look Harley-ridin' pals don't have cool Chief's-head running light
Downs Needs still more detail improvement (cheesy horn, Harley aftermarket switchgear, floorboards, etc.) Too much air around engine Big Man-sized; inseams less than 30 inches need not apply.
On to the really big news, the engine. This was very much a collaborative effort, Indian working first with Thunder Heart Performance, a small Tennessee engineering outfit, to scope out the basics, then moving on to VePro in Britain for final design stages and durability shakedowns. Lotus Engineering got in on the act, too, performing sound and emissions testing here in the States. The new motors will be built in Michigan by PAS, a joint effort between automotive players Roush Industries and Uni Boring.
The engine still relies heavily on the familiar two-valve Evo Harley for its basic architecture. The bottom-end has been gussied up with a gerotor-type oil pump and new covers, but it still contains a fork-and-blade crank assembly. The cylinders still sit atop the block at a 45-degree spread, and the tappet blocks and pushrod tubes are straight out of someone’s H-D catalog. Bigger jugs, though, up from 1340 to 1638cc, and much rounder in shape, emulating the old flathead Chiefs. The carb and air-cleaner get flipped to the left side of the vee, just like Indian intended. Add black powdercoat, highlighted fins and polished, fluted cylinder tops, and you’ve got a handsome-looking piece. An all-new engine, no, but probably enough to distance the Chief from clone accusations in most people’s eyes.
Belts out some decent stonk, too, slightly stronger than a Twin Cam Harley in both horsepower and torque on our dyno. Take off the EPA-pleasing airbox (every body else will), rejet
the 42mm Mikuni, let the exhaust system breathe just a little, and things get even more interesting. A second bike so-modded topped out at 87.6 horsepower with a stout 100.8 ft.-lbs. or torque-right in there with Honda’s oomph-intensive VTX1800.
We snagged 300 road miles on a late-prototype Chief Deluxe, enough to ascertain that this is a dramatically improved motorcycle, with power, brakes and handling up to snuff with the rest of the retro-cruiser class. And here’s good news: The new motor’s cost-savings, plus better deals with outside vendors, will allow Indian to drop the price tag to right at $20,000.
Our admittedly non-production models were returned with some problems-a snapped sidestand bolt, a missing motormount nut, loose coil cover, minor oil drippage and sheared starter-motor teeth, the latter a result we’re told of misalignment, since rectified. Production Chiefs will have slightly altered exhaust internals and heat shields, which dyno man Hoyer could have used during horsepower pulls (“The thing set my pants on fire...no, really.”).
Anyway, we’ll withhold final judgement until we sample a production bike, but here’s the bottom line: No longer a novelty act, Indian can now get on with the business of becoming a legitimate motorcycle company.
