Softail Motorcycles

The Softail design was born in the 1970's and is the invention of Bill Davis. Bill is a Harley rider and an engineer who hails from St Louis, Missouri. Mr. Davis eventually sold his Softail prototype in 1982 to Harley Davidson and in 1984, they began to manufacture a revised version of Bill Davis's design for the Softail, and the Harley Softail was an official member of the company's line of motorcycles. Since 1984, there have been several Harley models that feature the Softail design.

Some of these Harley Softail models are the Heritage Softail, the Fat Boy, the Deuce, the Deluxe, and the Dark Custom just to name a few. Virtually all of these bikes are equipped with the same motors, tranny's, and frame except for the deuce, which has a slightly different frame as well as choices for the wheels, forks, and other accessories. No matter which Softail model you choose to own you will almost certainly be satisfied with your Harley.

The Harley Softail gets its name from the frame design, which is intended to look like the hardtail bikes from the past. The idea is to give the bike this hardtail look while still offering the more comfortable ride you would receive from a rear suspension. With the Softail design, the manufacturer put the shock absorbers under the transmission along the long axis of the bike frame. The result of this unique design gives the rider more comfort as well as a better feel of the road without a rough ride.

Harley Davidson offers more than one choice of front ends for their Harley Softail. Models such as the Dyna and Sportster use the X-type forks that telescope and are thin. VRSC models are using a fork that is designed specifically for that line of softails, while the Harley Davidson touring models us the fatter FL-type forks, which telescope also. However, softails may use both the FL and X-type forks as well as the springer style forks that have been exclusively used on Harley Softails.

Harley Davidson does not use rubber-mounted motors on their softail models. As a result, there was a lot more vibration on Harley Softail bikes that were equipped with the Evolution engines than on the Touring and Dyna models, which do use rubber mounts with the Evo's. Harley Davidson ultimately compensated for this performance problem by using a version of the twin cam engine that is counterbalanced rather than the regular twin cams that are used in both the Dyna and Touring types.

There also other manufacturers that utilize the softail design for their road bikes, and have been very successful because of this. However, the one thing they are not is the Harley Davidson Company and their bikes are not the Harley Softail. This does not mean that their bikes are not great bikes to ride it just means that they are not American made and are not the best. That title is still reserved for the godfather of road bikes Harley Davidson.

SoftailMotorcycles.net encourages the viewer to understand offers represented on this site. The owners of this site may be paid a referral fee for any ads clicked on this site. The fees we acquire are for costs and maintenance of this site. If you have any questions, you can send us an e-mail available on the contact link.