purchased a (pre-owned) liberty sidecar and attached it to my 2001 flht.
1. 1st ride .pulls to left under throttle and right during braking. sidecar is equipped with disk brake and it is connected.
2. no steering damper added or change in triple trees. what should i consider?
3. what should air pressure on tires be set at?
4.what should air pressure be set for suspension?
5.should i throw a 100lbs in RIG for ballast?
i could go on, but answers here will get me going on the right track.been riding motorcycles for over 30years and now i want to share some of my greatest experiences with my children in a safe manner.......
Welcome Winder!
Did you get the car mounted to the bike properly? (car level, car tire toe'd in slightly, bike leaning out a degree or two, all set while car and bike are "loaded" with most typical loads). I don't see your location info, so is your car mounted on the left (England & Aussi) or the right (pretty much everywhere else)?
To determin proper balast for an empty car, stand on the foot peg opposite the car. Grab handlebars. Try to pick the car up with your weight. Balast the car until you can't pick up it up by leaning.
1- A pull to the left is normal under acceleration with a left side mounted sidecar since you have an asymetrical vehicle with a slave wheel dragging on that side. Deceleration or braking does the opposite as the extra weight wants to keep moving. A linked sidecar brake will stop the car from the free wheeling weight transfer but can also cause a pull toward the sidecar if the brakes aren't matched in efficiency.
Opposite forces would apply for a right hand mounted car. Either way this is easily controlled with a bit of handlebar pressure.
2- With no trail modifications tha steering damper is probably needed to eliminate nose wiggle. With Liberty's raked trees you can toss the damper as excess weight and steering drag.
3- Depending upon your loading the air pressure should follow the different recommended Harley-Davidson pressures for a Harley ElectraGlide with a Harley sidecar. Solo rider: 36 psi front, 36 psi rear & 28 psi for the hack. With passenger in the car, or 2 passengers: Front 36 psi, rear 40 psi, sidecar 28 psi.
4- Rear shocks, 35 psi max.
5- It won't hurt and will help keep all three wheels on the ground on turns into the sidecar.
6- Try setting toe-in at 3/4" to 1" and leanout at 1 degree positive (bike & sidecar loaded). you might be surprised at the result.
Lonnie
FLHX/Liberty & FLHR/TLE
Northwest Sidecars
If at all possible, take a sidecar class www.esc.org
You might also consider the book "Driving a sidecar outfit" by David Hough $34.95 from us and several other places such as white horse press.
I would get some seat time in before you start making changes, Until such time, you really do not know how it should work.
If there is any one near you who knows sidecars, you might have them take the bike for a ride to see if it is working correct. We do free saftey checks.
Changing the triple tree's will make it steer ligther. You can get tree's from many different companies including ours. Tree's will not fix a front end shake, they will however make it much easier to manage a front end shake to the point you may not notice a front end shake. If you do not have a front end shake, I would not add a damper as it makes steering harder all the time and if not set up right it can cause bump steer.
If you feel like the sidecar is going to lift on right hand turns, add ballist, you can always take it out once you have more seat time, no shame in ballist at all. In the sidecar class the first day on the range is all done with a passenger for ballist, the second day, no passenger.
Jay G
DMC sidecars
www.dmcsidecars.com
866-638-1793
jay@dmcsidecars.com
thank you all for the advice and suggestions.apparently there is a bit of confusion as to the sidecar connection.
1. the sidecar is connected on the righthand side of the motorcycle.
2.the motorcycle is a 2001 flht.
I live in hickory north carolina.if anyone knows of a shop within a couple of hundred miles i'm willing to have it professionaly inspected and corrected.
Right hand mounted cars will always have a tendency to pull to the right during acceleration and to the left during deceleration. They will NOT pull LEFT under power!
These tendencies are easily corrected with a bit of handlebar pressure.
L.
