16" front wheel or 17", tubes or tubless, spokes to clean or cast wheels, hard, soft, leather, fiberglass, functionality or astyle - enough with all of that. Hows this for the deal clincher?

If you run a 2 into 1 on the right side only the left fiberglass saddlebag holds beer and ice much, much better than leather and plastic bags or whatever other facackta arrangement you would have to get by with.

 

Actually, there is one more important thing to consider - the color of the bike you want. I'm not one that likes to wash mine more than once every other week or so. As such, I wanted a silver bike to better hide the dust. Unfortunately, HD only made the 2009 RKC in silver - which is why I bought a classic. I do like the whitewalls on it - think it makes the bike look real nice, but will admit that the thought of not having a tube is appealing as well.

I recently bought a brand new set of hard bags for my ride. While the leather bags look larger and wider than the hard bags, I've found that I can carry more inside the hard bags. Another nice thing is that if you change the air pressure much in the shocks, the hard bags make this far easier to do without taking the left bag off as they open from the rear to the front rather than the opposite way with the leather bags.

So if they they make the color you are looking for in each model, then it basically comes down to bags and tires/wheels as everyone else has pointed out here.

Oh yeah, one more thing. If you get a RKC and decide to put hard bags on it, you'll want to switch the stock basket-weave seat. It's too wide and will rub the paint off the back of the hard bag lids as you open/close them - but you'll probably get a different seat regardless of which bike you get.

 

I think we are two in the small minority that prefer the sticker to the badge

 

Classic all the way. The bags expand and the bike just looks better in my opinion..

 

Threads getting long so what's one more opinion. I was going to get a standard the whole time for one reason, hard, lockable bags. However, when it came time to pull the trigger I couldn't get over how much bettter the Classic looks. With that said my white walls never looked better than when it was in the showroom and the spokes are a bitch to clean, but I don't regret buying the classic at all. In fact, I don't know how I ever thought about buying a standard. Put the classic and standard side by side and the looks of the classic win every time! If it makes a difference, you can buy a lock kit for your classic bags. The kit isn't cheap, but welcome to the world of Harley!

 

I chose the FLHRC because I like the look of the saddlebags better. I think it's a matter of personal taste. You are going to have to look at it and ride it, so you are the only one that matters.