I Bought a New Old Harley Motorcycle, Its got Problems

if you're not wrenching on the side of

the road your Harley-Davidson I don't

know if it's really a Harley-Davidson a

few months ago I bought a brand new 1978

Harley-Davidson with zero miles and

after doing a few things to it we got it

to run but then the Dark Side of buying

a 45-year-old new motorcycle out of the

crate started to show its head the bike

had some very interesting issues because

it sat for so long but my mechanic no no

my super Mechanic Dave from Tennessee

was able to get them all fixed not only

will I be riding this bike for the first

time

but we're also going to put it on the

dyo to see if AMF Harley-Davidson was

lying to us when they said that this was

going to be the most powerful Sportster

of my lifetime then we're going to add

up the purchase price plus all the cost

of repairs I had to put into it and see

if this was a financially awful decision

or the second coolest thing you could

possibly do second coolest behind

whatever John mik is doing right now and

we're going to see if this actually

works oh god oh it's awesome let's go

see this bike so I jumped in the clous

come on

clouse pressed the button and then

pretended to leave without my camera guy

so you can see what that looks like Q

5sec

[Applause]

[Music]

Montage this might be the six maybe

fifth 40 something year old motorcycle

that I bought in a box and this Harley

started up pretty easily it wasn't that

bad started up pretty well and it idled

instantly which was very impressive but

this one had some unique problems that I

didn't foresee having I didn't know that

was a thing but I think part of the

issue was these things were never made

to sit they were never made to sit and

be inside of a a crate for 45 years then

we rode up to crusty grunt Cycles to see

my friend

[Music]

Dave there it is what's up Dave oh

what's up Sean how you doing man just

giving her a good wipe down before what

you got here good to see it man you too

man what do you think looks great that's

a good looking bike she runs great too

really yeah so one what was wrong with

it so a couple of things uh the inside

of the tank even though it had no gas

the moisture had eating away a lot of

the liner and stuff like that and

exposed the bare metal inside there and

it was starting to rust so we went ahead

and eted the inside of the tank and we

Reign the inside of the tank we replaced

the fuel line as well as petcock when we

pulled the the air cover off the air

filter it just crumbled in our hands

charged the battery up the original

battery that's the original battery

that's the original battery I changed

the fluids uh flush the brakes and then

once that all got done we pulled the

primary cover off and we realized that

the the clutch Hub had excessive play

side to side movement went ahead and

tore that down replaced that we also

found that the uh steel plates were all

warped uh so we went ahead and ordered a

a clutch set from DP brakes you think

they were warped from the beginning

because this is AMF it's very possible

it could have come from the factory

warped these things were known for you

having to learn how to hit neutral

before you came to the stop sign right I

would say that it was probably they were

probably warped from the factory okay

when this bike came out it claimed 55

horsepower I don't know about all that I

don't know about that we're going to

find that out we're going to find that

out 55 horsepower is a lot of horsepower

you know for back back then for these

old bikes yeah heck yeah oh we changed

the tires too tires were dry rotted well

cool let's um let's fire it

up that sounds awesome side note I want

to ride the motorcycle that requires

this brake right here what motorcycle

needs this and I want I want to ride it

that's for later on today I got to do

brakes on the truck all right did you

ride it yeah how's it run great man I've

done 5 1/2 miles on all right all right

I'm going to take it for a spin I can't

wait to ride it let's get her backed out

man so before I take this bike for a

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beards let's take this thing for a spin

[Music]

getting a chance to ride this time piece

was aw awesome I was also calmed into to

Dave who was driving the camera guy in

front of me I do this so let me and the

driver both know exactly what's going on

for everyone's safety but also mainly

for my safety so I don't get run over

and for extra benefit Dave got to fil me

in on his thoughts of this bike so don't

get scared when randomly Dave's voice

kind of Pops in

here oh man this feels

great this bike is 45 years old so if

you bought this bike when you were 18

you'd be what

63 that's incredible

ible so to compare this to a modern day

Harley the cable clutch is significantly

harder these are buckhorn handlebars

they're kind of a little uncomfortable I

thought I'd like them better but you're

supposed to grip them less like a hammer

and more like a screwdriver the braking

is pretty awful on the line of dangerous

Harley's never been known for great

breaks that's for D sure yep people say

sport Serv are for girls this sport ster

is not because I'm a pretty strong guy I

got pretty strong hand strength some

would say I've got the hand strength of

10 men and this is tough this clutch is

not easy it's a man's clutch it's a

man's clutch either that or she's a hell

of an iron

worker you got a big old hand it's

almost like they designed this lever to

take away any leverage that you may have

had well those things were designed

originally to compete against the

European market you know the bsas the

Nortons the Triumph those are smaller

framed bikes man they're not big

Harley's absolutely now you got to learn

how to ride the bike before you have to

deal with a heavy bike I call it

motorcycle balance once you have it ride

the biggest thing you can

find and then after getting back from an

amazing ride on an amazing day we had a

slate

problem hey Dave we're leing a little

bit hey Dave did the float Bowl get

stuck on you when you were driving it uh

no did it just get stuck yeah it's fine

when I was riding but then when I pulled

over so ended up not being a big deal

and it was what I suspected it was you

wouldn't really have the whole

experience with an old Harley if you

weren't wrenching on it a little bit

right even even though it's a brand new

the float got stuck down causing the

fuel to run out of the Overflow tube

this is kind of normal Harley-Davidson

stuff if you're not wrenching on the

side of the road you're Harley-Davidson

I don't know if it's really a

Harley-Davidson we jiggled it a little

bit and put it back together and then I

was ready to find out what my bill was

for all the work that Dave did I paid

15,500 $ for that bike all the work that

Dave did let's go see what I have total

so here's the two invoices we got for

you the first one that's that's mainly

all the service stuff your grand total

of1 18584 after tax and then for the

clutch plates in the primary gasket you

were at 12190 so pretty much 2,000 bucks

to get this thing Road worthy that means

I got 17500 in this bike still not that

bad but the next biggest question is

does that thing make as much power as

they told us it did let's go to the dyno

and find out and now it's time to see if

AMF Harley was telling us the truth

about how much power this bike really

made so I love Dino day although it's

generally disappointing it was

disappointing with the Orange County

Chopper bike it was disappointing with

Craig's TR Turbo Bike however it was not

disappointing with my Turbo Road King

that made an incredible amount of power

I don't know what's your guess throw in

the comment comments they claim 55

horsepower on this thing and it was

supposed to be it said on the ad in

1978 this is the most powerful sportser

of your lifetime let's go see what this

thing lays down all right so we're over

here at M&M Machine Shop in Columbia

Tennessee this is Jim we just got done

putting air on the tire and we're going

to put on the dno and see what kind of

power it makes you have a guess they

claim 55 horsepower at the wheel

probably that that's probably going to

be about right even if really

yeah so a lot of times when you put your

bike on for a dyo run the place will

make you sign a waiver in case it blows

the engine up because that happens you

know you're P you're pushing it as hard

as it can go no different than you just

you know go into red line on the street

but for whatever reason sometimes they

blow up on dinos it's rare but they

don't want to be liable for it can this

do 300 horsepower 250 250 so what he's

doing now is he's connecting some wires

so we can see the RPMs now we have 19

mil on this bike what are the chances

that it blows up we'll figure it out and

all this fun motorcycling reminds me of

one of my favorite Bible verses Proverbs

35-6 trust in the Lord with all your

heart and lean not on your own

understanding in all your ways

acknowledge Him and He will make your

path straight making sure the bike's off

warmed up getting in the proper gear

that it needs to

be and then whenever he's got the the

computer dial in he's going to floor it

and we're going to get some

numbers and just about the time we were

finished with the dyno we were visited

by a very special friend

[Music]

so 44 horsepower 42 foot PB of torque

that feels right to me we're riding the

bike somewhere between 10 and 15% loss

of like through from the engine to the

powertrain a lot of times when they give

you a a number they give the highest

number that's to the to the crank you're

going to lose some through the chain

through the wheels and all that stuff so

I'm not a math wizard but I I think this

a little more than the the the normal

percentage drop so I think they may have

been overestimating the power on the

bike well we can tell too the bike needs

to be tuned up okay and just having your

tire pressure down 7 or eight lbs can

can change your horsepower reading four

five horsepower wow so it's it's pretty

sensitive so then maybe it is maybe it's

a little closer than I thought maybe it

is pretty close to that 55 but they

claimed that this was the most powerful

Sports of my lifetime now this magazine

article was written before I was alive

but I got another sportser that I think

actually is the most powerful sportser

of my lifetime let's go bring it out so

I backed off the 78 and then brought in

the big guns this is the Sportster s and

Harley-Davidson claims that this thing

is sitting at 120 horsepower and up

until recently this would have been the

most powerful motorcycle hardly ever

made other than the pan Amica and other

than their new CVO bikes you might

remember this bike this sherf 2.0 this

is the bike that Craig tried to trick me

with when his tri-turbo sherf bike made

like 30 horsepower and my nitrous

powered sherf bike made 100 30 something

so AMF Harley was actually pretty close

not that far off and they were fairly

honest of the horsepower on this let's

see how new Harley-Davidson is as far as

I know I've never seen a video of anyone

putting one of these on the dyno to

really test it out and this is a

completely stock

bike and that's when the problem started

I was so excited to see what this bike

would make in terms of horsepower that I

didn't even stop to see if it even

worked because like every Facebook

Marketplace ad I've ever read says it

ran when I parked it I got to be honest

with you I'm really hoping this thing

run cuz I haven't heard it run in like

maybe a year so cross your fingers so I

put a battery jump box on it assuming

that the reason it was unresponsive is

because a dead battery but that did not

help but when we put a multimeter up to

the battery it read 12.8 volts which

should be enough to turn on the gauges

but still nothing completely

unresponsive so then I resorted to

calling a Harley-Davidson dealership to

see if there was a master fuse and good

news for us there was and he told me

exactly where it was but death fuse was

not bad so now we're back to square one

after messing with this thing for about

an hour we still had nothing I guess

we're not getting this thing to run or

make any dyo power all right well guess

we'll get this thing off of here I guess

that is the uh most powerful Harley of

my lifetime I going to make zero

horsepower so the AMF Harley beat out

the new Harley in raw horsepower I don't

know how that happened or what's wrong

with that one but in the past couple

months I sold off all my trailers except

for my big flat bed trailer uh trailer

Swift because I have one getting built

for me in Indiana I'm told it's like the

coolest trailer I've ever seen and I

can't wait to see it so they told me

it's ready let's go get it all right so

me and my buddy Brock we made it to

where

Indiana somewhere Indiana we an ATC

trailer they built a

trailer for bikes and beards and uh

we're going to go see it Brock's going

to be the uh the camera guy I'm the

camera guy yeah I I forgot to tell you

but you're the camera guy now let's go

find this uh trailer it should be pretty

cool like should be I'm pretty they sent

me a couple pictures of it I've never

seen a trailer like this before I can't

wait let's go see it I'm excited should

we just walk in like whatever door so

ATC if you don't know stands for

aluminum trailer company or as the Brits

say aluminium

aluminium I don't know where to go hey I

don't know where to go I'm looking for a

man is there a boss man around here

where's the front at be all way the

building can we walk through the

building I can walk all right yeah my

next trailer needs to be that so we went

to the wrong building so after going to

the wrong building we finally made it to

the right building where we met with

Jeff but before we saw my trailer I