raked trees and damper

It is never over kill to put a damper on sidecar steering. I have at least one friend who spent about 6 months recovering from a crash that in my opinion might never have happened with a damper.
Ten sidecar rigs and 45 years experience goes into my opinion.
My opinion also says friction dampers suck. Hydraulic is best.

Phelonius

I prefer no damper unless rig headshake is uncontrollable. Slower steering, steering resistance and loss of road feedback comes with the damper.
Some claim hands off riding OK with one. I say BS on that. Keep at least one hand on the bars at all times with a sidehack.

Lonnie

Phelonius - can you tell us a little more about the rig your friend had the accident with? Do you know if his front end was stock?

Daryl

I'm with Lonnie. I've had them on all of my bikes except the Valkyrie and always took them off after a while. I prefer to fix the problem instead of cover it up.

harley flt chassis are subject to head shake [from 84 to present, the pre 84 frame is not a issue]

for solo use there is a fairly delicate and complicated procedure to adjust the head bearings to get enough resistance to lower the risk of head shake.

but for sidecars they used a friction damper in the pre 84 units - i think as a option - and a optional factory raked tree - and a optional 3 speed with reverse trans - hand shift and foot shift. however pre 84 units really could not run over 60 something for any length of time so it was not a issue.

since there are MANY theories why the flt frame can suffer head shake, but no "for sure" solutions & the factory puts a dampner on all the sidecars, specifically to address head shake - im leaving mine on.

some texts refer to it as "tank slap" search for the two terms and you will find a LOT of noise about it - its nasty - and occasionally fatal.

it appears that rear tire condition and inflation can affect it, as well as the rubber engine mounts & the ball joint links. whatever the reason for it on flt frames its nothing to mess with & checking bearings every 5 or 10k [wheel bearings and head bearings] may help.

to

After i install Power Trak I see no need for any damper. I think Power Trak is best modification i did for my rig. Do raked tree, try it and then if you feel you need it you can do damper. Most likely you will not need it.

Played with the lean .....she now tracks straight while going down the road......put almost 200 miles on here today.........

My progression for my Valkyrie and double wide Texas Sidecar was
- Sidecar - no steering mods so I could see how the unmodified steering was (had some headshake at low speed, but not horrible)
- 1 year later - Added modified triple trees by SideEffects (big help on steering effort and reduced headshake)
- 2 years later - Added hydraulic dampner to see what it would do for low speed headshake/shimmy
- End result - easier steering than before the triple trees (but not as easy as without the dampner) and no discernable shimmy.
I'm really pleased with the results

Nice to hear. I sprung for Side Effects Steerite modified triple tree for my GL1100. Not installed yet. Looking foward to trying 'em out.