What RPM's are we talking about?
Is it more like "stalling" or real power loss?

Stalling would probably more ignition related.
Power loss could be fuel supply related.

 

When I'd go around a corner I'd have to shift into 1st or the engine would want to lope and buck.

deedward,

You don't mention what kind of corner, but in gerneral most here will tell you that the gering on our V-Rod's is such that you want to be in 1st at anything below 30 mph, and sometimes upto 50 mph! Don't be afraid to drive it in the 5,000+ RPM range, because that is where this machine really shows its strength.

Given that the dealer agrees there is something wrong with your bike, and is investigating with HDMC, there may indeed be something that needs fixing, so the above is just my :2cents:

 

What RPM's are we talking about? Is it more like "stalling" or real power loss?

More like it wants to stall below about 2500 RPMs. Idle is somewhat rough and sputtery. Just doesn't sound right.

You don't mention what kind of corner, but in gerneral most here will tell you that the gering on our V-Rod's is such that you want to be in 1st at anything below 30 mph, and sometimes upto 50 mph!

I knew that the V-Rod was happier at higher RPMs. It's quite different than the GL1800 and the ST1300 I'm used to, but it just didn't feel right.

 

A properly running V-Rod has all the low end grunt of the bikes you are familiar with but the gearing in 1st is very tall. Still, at anything over 2000 rpm you should have no trouble pulling away with just a twist of the throttle. It sounds like the dealer is trying to make it right but sometimes these problems are a bitch to locate and resolve.

Hang in there and welcome.

 

A dealer shouldn't have to eliminate the problem by changing parts!

You really should try to find someone who knows what they are looking at, a good tech will run a diagnostic & pin point the problem.

 

Fuel flange....

 

A dealer shouldn't have to eliminate the problem by changing parts!
You really should try to find someone who knows what they are looking at, a good tech will run a diagnostic & pin point the problem.

The dealer did run the diagnostic. There are no trouble codes stored. While I agree that they shouldn't need to switch parts and try again, that's what MC is telling them to do. Of course, this takes time because MC won't let the dealer stock some of these parts for the V-Rod and they have to get approval to order them, one at a time. At least that's what I've been told.

I'm not faulting the dealer at this point, they are trying to get the problem solved.

Dan

 

The dealer did run the diagnostic. There are no trouble codes stored. While I agree that they shouldn't need to switch parts and try again, that's what MC is telling them to do. Of course, this takes time because MC won't let the dealer stock some of these parts for the V-Rod and they have to get approval to order them, one at a time. At least that's what I've been told.

I'm not faulting the dealer at this point, they are trying to get the problem solved.

Dan

Fair enough Dan, just bear in mind that there is still very little experience out there with the Revolution engine & she sure 'aint no big twin.
Make sure you don't end up paying for their learning curve.
Good luck with it :thumb:

 

So, what happened? Did they fix it? What did they do?

And the $64,000 question, what did they charge you? :broke: opcorn

 

Well, the jury's still out on this one. They determined that the engine was running too lean. They switched the ecm with their demo bike and told me it ran fine after that. Only trouble is that their demo bike's ecm had been flashed for the 16 ga exhaust and mine has the stockers on it.

MC told them to flash my ecm to make it richer. I had previously mentioned to the dealer that I was planning on putting the SE slip-on pipes (not the 16 ga) on so they said they were going to flash the ecm for those pipes.

I complained that I was afraid that even if it did run properly now, when I put the SE pipes on it would run too lean again. They said that's what they were told to do.

Of course, they didn't have the upgrade for the flash, so they had to order it. Anyway, they finally got it done and I picked it up. Now it runs too rich, duhhhh, and no smoother than it did before.

I'm still waiting on the new SE pipes to arrive so I can install them. We'll see how it runs then. My gut feeling is that I have a bad ecm and it will run poorly when I put the new pipes on (along with the air filter), but we'll see.

The dealer didn't charge me for all this. They said they'd need to figure out how to get MC to pay them for their time but as far as I was concerned, it was covered under warranty.

I don't think we're done yet, but I should know shortly. The new pipes are due this week.

Dan

 

Hope that works for you Dan. Mine ran good until I had the engine SE big bore done, with se slip fits and K&N filter done. Now it has a miss or something. It idles good just sitting there. But under power, up to about 4200, 4400 rpm it momentarily cuts out. That is a real problem because these are the 45 and under speeds in 1st and 2nd used for in town driving, slow speed turns. The bike jerks momentarily when it "misses" so you really have to feather the clutch in turns. Also when I back off the gas while pulling in the clutch, the idle drops down so low it sounds like it is going to stall, before coming back up to idle smoothly. It is going in this weekend, will have about 1050-1100 miles on the engine, about 1300 miles on the bike. Doing the 1000 mile service, and having the miss and some other things looked at (hard shifting, gears grind going into second, gas gauge is erratic).

Also having the fork oil changed to the SE heaver weight oil ($160 labor, $10 oil). Have had to do a couple of quick stops at over 50 and feel like I'm going over the handle bars the way the front end dives.

Hope they can solve the problem. After they did the mods, the service writer told me this was the first time they did anything like this on the VROD. And they had no idea what going topless was all about, said it must not be done, would hurt the bike!

I'm interested in how your problem is solved, might be useful in solving mine.

Stanton

 

The Rod has little low RPM torque and will lope and run awkward at low RPM, below 3000.
It will accelrate after a fashion from 2000 RPM but you must understand that you need to casually ease on the throttle, not crack it on or it will buck and sputter.
It is developed from a radically short stroke large bore racing engine that was designed to turn high RPM's without excessive piston speeds.
It just doesn't like to plonk around.
It's not an Ariel Red Hunter, Norton International or even BSA Gold Star. It won't just tick over like a swiss watch.

 

long shot

I had a friend once that was becoming irrational for a spell. We didn't know what was wrong with him. Some other folks he went to thought he had demons and tried exorcising him. A while later we found out that he never got any sleep. When he got sleep he was fine.
Sleep? It just wasn't part of the routine checklist.

Just curious. I'm wondering how much you weigh? If you weigh over 500-600 pounds then the ROD might be fine?