Harley-Davidson Rocker C
CYCLE WORLD TEST
NEW BIKES 2008
CHOPPED, SLAMMED, STRETCHED AND RAKED, THE 2008 Harley-Davidson Softail FXCW Rocker C is maximum hardtail with none of the hard. No smoke, no mirrors, just sly and sound engineering.
Though the floating rear fender gives the Rocker its name, the 240mm-wide rear tire is the meat of the show. It begs a big question that’s so far been poorly answered by every maker of 240 bikes: How’s she handle?
But first the details.
Power comes via the Twin Cam 96 motor, 1584cc of air-cooled, counterbalanced V-Twin charisma, solidly mounted in the frame. Fuel mixture is by way of EFI, now standard on every HarleyDavidson. Connected to the engine by chain primary is a sixspeed Cruise Drive transmission with a very relaxed top gear.
Harley-Davidson Rocker C
Softail, hard looks, sweet ride
PETER JONE
A horseshoe-shaped oil tank is located below the seat; this one’s been ribbed for your (visual) pleasure. Braking is taken care of by single front and rear rotors. The Rocker’s stretched wheelbase and massive rear contact patch mean the rear binder plays a larger role than normal in stopping. Foot controls are as front-mount as possible without rubbing your big toes on the tire, and the handlebars are two-piece, mounted in V-risers with up and down adjustability.
The Rocker’s blinkers are LED, and a quick look at the rear of the bike shows there is no taillight, just a handsome license-plate mount on the center of the fender that unfortunately loses its good looks as soon as a plate is mounted on it.
The taillights and stoplights are incorporated into the rear turnsignals, a la the Nightster, which is why the lenses are red.
The stretched gas tank owes something to the Softail Deuce, discontinued for 2008. A gauge console sits atop, and H-D emblems on each side are half-sunken into the tank’s metal.
The frame is color-matched to the tank and fenders for all four color choices; deluxe versions of paint include subtle pinstriped flames.
Distinguishing the Rocker C from its non-C brother are numerous styling details. The C has a black powder-coated engine with chromed covers. The non-C has a silver-painted engine with Satin Stainless Metallic powdercoated covers, the same coating used for its wheels, fork lowers, triple-clamps, headlight, handlebar riser, gauge console, swingarm, turnsignals, hand controls, belt guard and oil tank. Those parts are mostly chromed on the C, though the cast-aluminum oil tank and swingarm are finished in the corresponding frame and body color.
Regular Rockers have a lower and softer seat that’s more cradle-shaped, providing excellent comfort, while the Cs have a slightly higher, stiffer, flatter Hi cushion due to the “Trick” fold-out passenger ** pad hidden beneath it. The .75-inch difference in seat heights is barely discernable but the pad shape and feel are, though the difference certainly isn’t a deal-breaker.
Harley-Davidson refers to the disappearing passenger seat-unofficially, of courseas the “get-lucky” pad. It folds out in about three seconds when a rider finds him/herself suddenly in need of transporting a passenger to, urn, your place or mine? The main seat flips up, a frame is slid up and out, flipped over and set in place, and the pad is pulled from its slot under the seat and snapped into position. Ta da! It’s recommended to practice this a few times before chancing luck. And don’t forget to have candles ready.
Where the Rockers step out from the Softail line is in the ride engineering at both ends. The steering head has been raked out to 36.5 degrees, with one degree added to the 49mm Showa fork via the triple-clamps, giving an effective fork angle of 37.5 degrees. This results in 6.2 inches of trail, longest in Harley’s stable, and a 69.0-inch wheelbase, 4.2 inches more than the Fat Boy, the last Softail we tested. Ready to ride, our Rocker C weighed 686 pounds dry.
Out back, we find that fat rear tire, 18 inches x 240mm, committed to a crazy relationship of opposites with the front tire’s skinny 19 x 90mm profile. The suspicion of this mix, as shown by innumerable customs and at least one manufacturer, is that these bikes will and must handle like a ’52 Ford dump truck...manual steering, bias-ply tires, no syncros in the tranny, last year of the V-Eight flathead....
The Rocker’s rear fender is slammed as tightly to the tire as Elarley could go and still accommodate all brands of 240mm tires, about an inch from the rubber when parked. Sure, there is at least one brand of 240 tire that claims zero growth at high speed, but H-D couldn’t take on the liability of forcing owners to use only that one brand. It also had to plan on convenience so that riders needing a new tire while on the road could use any available.
The rear fender is attached directly to the swingarm without any side supports and has an inner shell that forms a structural sandwich with the outer fender skin, providing remarkable rigidity. Harley doesn’t recommend transporting a passenger on the fender but it’s probably up to the task-though your passenger might not be.
Rear suspension is handled by a pair of shocks hidden well from view, the setup that gives Softails their signature hardtail look. The “Rockertail” treatment further enhances the rigid ruse. There’s actually 3.4 inches of rear travel available, just slightly less than on other Softails.
So, to answer the handling question posed at the beginning of this test:
Put flatly, the Rockers are an embarrassment to every bike builder-and mufacturer-that has compromised handling performance for looks. The Rocker handles so lightly and predictably it’s a shock to find that the rear tire is a 240 and not a 180-in fact, there are many standard-style bikes with 180 or 190 tires that are heavier handling.
a chopper that performs,
Turn-in is smooth and easy, and there’s a consistent feel at every lean angle, giving the rider total confidence. At no speed is there anything sketchy about that little front tire; the massive rear goes wherever the front does without complaint. Unlike other 240-tired bikes, there is absolutely no struggle, no battle of the contact patches, getting the bike into or out of a turn. The Rocker performs as a motorcycle should.
Okay, in low-speed U-turns, the bike does want to fall in, but that’s a feature of raked forks and, anyway, motorcycle dynamics don’t apply at parking-lot speeds. That said, U-turns were easier than predicted, and with a little throttle the bike stands up nicely.
So we now know that blaming wide tires was misdirected as the cause of bad handling. Proper geometry was all those tires needed. Congratulations to Harley’s engineers for doing their homework and giving enthusiasts style and performance without (much) compromise. They made a hardtail soft, they made a 240 tire handle, they made
H-D SOFTAIL ROCKER C
$19,840
