Thats my biggest fear when I start it and let it warm up as I get into my gear and look over the bike prior to getting on. Every time I play a scenario in my head where the bike jumps into gear while I am standing next to it.

 

Did you remove the heel shifter? The weight of a heel shifter would balance out the shifter. Mighty be a good idea to get the aluminum shifter when we remove the heel shifter.

 

I just never got the sense of putting bike in neutral at traffic lights. Glad everything worked out ok.

 

Hope they checked everything out thoroughly. Friend of mine was rear ended by another bike, damage did not look too bad, and he drove it home from mountains. Bike had a bent frame, cosmetic damage, and a bent rear axle (that they found later). Glad that you are ok.

 

How did you come across this thread from 6 years ago?

 

Maybe the bike was "posessed by a demon" and attempted to "thrust you into traffic..."

 

May be good to resurrect this old thread, the issue may be more common place now that Harley quit installing the heel shifter on touring models.

 

I love an old thread that comes back around.

My ironhead would roll right away on you if you tried to start it in gear. I was sitting at a red light with it in neutral one day when the tranny started grinding real loud like it was half out of gear and about to jump. I grabbed the clutch just before it found the cog. Mine is a 75 and has a really long shift lever. I bet the other ironhead guy who posted up in this thread had the same year bike. When I put mine in first, it bangs like a sledgehammer on a trash can.

carl

 

Was with a buddy at a light when he jumped the light and crossed a really busy intersection. I thought he was in a rush, however, the real answer was his clutch rod broke and once he was in the intersection he figure it was better to nail the throttle rather than stop in the middle of a busy intersection.


I fear the same thing happening on my 48FL so when I'm riding it all stops are in neutral (with the clutch disengaged too) to that it will take two acts of god for me to unintentionally end up in an intersection. The irony is I don't worry about bikes with cable operated clutch just the old solid rods.....

His bike was a Denvers Springer shopper with 57 pan and jockey shift with suicide clutch. and no his foot didn't slip the clutch rod was broken on the pedal end by the locking nut...

 

final destination