I bought a Liberty sidecar, serial # 00006. I called Liberty, and Pete told me they have no instructions or parts, to mount or service these cars, LOL,,so I am on my own here. These early cars were made to fit early Heritage only. Later cars have different mounts for different bikes. I bought a 1998 Heritage to mount it on.
I think 99% is there that is needed to mount it,,,I think. There are fittings on the ends of all 4 mount points, and staring at them, they make sense ,,sort of.
Top front- single bolt thru the cross brace running between the downtubes below the neck. -----I have to drill the existing hole out for a .50 bolt. Bolt that came with it is waaaay to long. I think a spacer is missing here.
Bottom front- 2 welded brackets that bolt on the downtubes where they curve and start up towards the neck. (They resemble "rockers", that run on valves and pushrods)----- Looks like I will have to take the jiffy stand off, and relieve the plate where the brake master cyl bolts on since it hits that bracket.
Top rear- single allen bolt that goes into the same hole where the seat mount bolt goes on the side.-----Easy one.
Bottom rear- fancy, milled, heavy 2 piece split bracket. ----- have to study this one more. I think that I will have to take the exhaust off, and mill the "bolt boss" off from the exhaust mount bracket, where it mounts to the frame, and replace that milled off part with the heavy bracket. That will put the bracket between the frame and exhaust bracket, clamping to the frame while being a spacer to the exhaust bracket.
I hate to start milling and drilling without knowing I am right. Does anyone have experience with the early Liberty cars, or have installation intsructions for them I can copy?
I also have decided to buy the Liberty tree. Will it change things if I mount the car with my stock tree, then install the Liberty? Will I cause myself double work (adjustments)?
Seems to me that d'Lynn's is an early Liberty on a Heritage. You might give him a shout and maybe he can shoot some photos your way and answer your questions. He's in Chelan WA. I don't think he's on this board very often but you could get to him through his web site www.chelanrally.com. Good luck!
With the Liberty trees you can add 1" pvc spacers to the fork springs to replace the 1" road clearance you will lose (if you feel the need to).
Lonnie
I fiddled and messed around for a few hours this morning. I shoved, pushed, pulled, craned my neck and twisted my self into a pretzel. The thing I learned that is important,,,,to fit the sidecar,,,,,remove the body! It was easy on this Liberty. A person to hold the allen wrench inside the car on 8 bolts, and 5 minutes later the body was off. Now I can get to everything. This is the place where the trap is,,,,watch out. You will see other things you could do,,a spec of rust here, paint peeled over there,,,you start getting deeper.
After I took the body off,,things were clearer. Soooo easy to work on the mounts. I decided now is the time to change the exhaust, since I must cut the exhaust mount brackets. Why do it twice?
I need an exhaust that goes all the way back, and I would of course, like a performance gain if poss. By the looks of the mounts on the sidecar, the pipes must go between the axle and frame to leave room for the HD hard bags from a Tour bike on top and the car mounts on the bottom.
The confusing part: This car was on a heritage before, but the mounts are a long way off from fitting my bike.
Any suggestions on which exhaust?
well, it looks like Vance % Hines makes a nice clean, simple, straight exhaust that can be quiet or loud. Any bad points on them for a sidecar?
edit: I ordered them. I found pics with them mounted on Heritages. Looks like they will work. I will have to wait now to get them to continue on my sidecar mount project.
I'll be back......
The Heritage frames have evolved from the first models just like the Liberty sidecars have. The earliest Libertys had Harley type frames with the extra mount.
Is that a Repro TD in the background?
L.
yea, my wifes hobby car,,(which means "another project for me" in english)
So which mount is the extra one?
