First Ride: 2022 Harley-Davidson Sportster S

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Port Severn, ON — Harley-Davidson’s iconic Sportster gets new a new engine about as often as the Liberals propose tax cuts. Oh, if you go by displacement and, pardon the bad pun, evolutionary changes, there have been dozens of models designated new by Milwaukee’s (ever creative) marketing department. But, in reality, there have been but three distinct Sportster powertrains — the (even then) archaic side-valve that powered the K Series for the first five years of its life, the overhead valve version (in its many guises) that’s been the company’s mainstay since 1957, and the Revolution T that powers the first dramatically different Sportster in an eon (those 64 years of overhead valving).

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We, of course, know this engine. It already has been universally acclaimed in Harley’s all-new adventure tourer, the Pan America 1250. Indeed, I have already gone on record as saying that the Pan Am’s liquid-cooled, variable-valve-timed 60-degree V-twin is my favourite engine in motorcycling. I may have to rescind that — or, more specifically, qualify it.

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First Ride: 2022 Harley-Davidson Sportster S Back to video

The Sportster S’s version of the Revolution twin is my new favourite engine in motorcycling. Yes, I know it has less horsepower. In fact, according to Harley’s own numbers, it’s got a substantial 30-hp less, the Pan America claiming 150-hp while the Sportster S can boast but 121.

I think Harley’s fibbing. On Brooklin Cycle’s Dynojet Dynamometer earlier this summer, the Pan AM pumped out a very creditable — as in only 10-hp behind Ducati’s V4’ed Multistrada — 131 horsepower. Using the same driveline losses, that would mean the Sportster S should dyno out at 104, maybe 105 horses.

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No way this motorcycle has only 104 ponies at the rear wheel! 108-hp I’d believe. 110-hp more likely. Maybe even 112-hp. But, 104? No way.

And not only is the new Sportster S quick off the mark, its power delivery is even more fluid. Gone is the Pan Am’s (slight) wooliness just off idle. The mid-range is, if anything, stronger than the already-grunty adventure bike. Truth be told, it’s only at 7,500 or 8,000 rpm that the Sportster’s version of the Revolution V-twin — labeled “T” in the cruiser rather than “Max” in the tourer — has any noticeable paucity of power compared with to the supposedly more with-it adventurer.

And it’s smoother to boot. Seriously Harley, you should consider putting the T version of the 1250 in the Pan America. I, for one, am probably shopping a new adventure bike next year and I’d be happier with the Sportster engine than the Max. Indeed, just four short months after I declared the Pan Am’s Revolution Max engine the best in all of motorcycling, I now nominate the Sportster’s T version as its successor.

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There’s other high-techery afoot in this takeover of Harley’s icon. For one thing, the engine has all manner of mode controls — Rain, Road and Sport — that alter the traction control system, ABS functionality, and throttle response. There’s also something called Cornering Enhanced Drag-Torque Slip Control system that prevents wheel lock up from over aggressive downshifting, and a tire pressure monitoring system. These electronic nannies should promote greater safety but, since they’re pretty much seamless, it’s doubtful anyone will ever notice them.

No one will ignore instrument cluster, which is, in effect, the Pan Am’s infotainment system stuffed into a 4-inch round cruiser-like housing. It can be paired with your phone for music, calls, and, if you add a Harley-created app, navigation. It’s bright and informative, and its only real issue is that some of the information — like the odometer reading — is displayed in the teeniest, tiniest digits seen since the mouse-copy legal warnings on prescription medicine labels. Seriously Harley, I’ve got 25/20 vision now that I’ve had cataract surgery, and I can’t read the tiny font without removing my helmet and grabbing a magnifying glass. On the other, Harley get one back for making the S the first Sportster to boast cruise control, essentially using the same system and buttonry as the Pan America.

There’s also a little advanced technology — for Harley — in the running gear. No, the suspension is not electronically adjustable, but the inverted forks and piggyback single rear Showa shock are adjustable for preload as well as compression and rebound damping. Unfortunately, that’s where the technology ends and Milwaukee’s traditional embrace of everything retro returns.

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For one thing, while the fork has a sorta-kinda acceptable 92-millimetres of travel, the rear has but 37 mils. Yes, 37 mm. That’s barely more than an inch from being a hardtail. In my 39 years of testing, I’ve never seen a production motorcycle with that paucity of suspension movement. And, while the relative high quality of the components manages to keep things in control over small- to medium-sized bumps, the ride gets rough pretty darned quick when you hit potholes. Seriously, you’d probably be wise to stand up to a motocross-like crouch anytime you see anything lumpier than a train track crossing.

Except that, in another bow to Harley tradition, the pegs are the typical foot-forward controls that Milwaukee mandates are necessary for cruiser bona fides. Yes, the company is selling a mid-mount conversion kit that will decidedly improve comfort and control. But they’ve done this with a few bikes before and, thanks to limited marketing and no bikes on the showroom floor so equipped, all its attempts at a rational seating position have died quiet deaths. The company didn’t even supply any bikes with the Mid Control Conversion Kit for us to test, so I suspect their promotion for the option will be as lackadaisical as before.

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And lastly, in yet another concession to the cruiser motif, the Sportster S wear a 160/70-16 front tire. No that’s not a typo. That’s the front tire (the rear is a more common 180/70-16). As you might expect, it makes slow-speed handling rather ponderous. Oh, once you get up to speed, it will turn, if not quite as accurately as, say, a naked bike. But negotiating slow-speed turns is a little like herding a high-speed wheelbarrow around hairpins; you’ll eventually get round, but there’s a lot of steering correction involved.

In the end, I suspect that the Milwaukee traditionalisms will dampen the Sportster’s reception. On the one hand, Harley points out that the Fat Boy wears the same front tire. On the other, the Sportster’s new engine is much more Ducati Testatretta than Milwaukee-Eight. Ditto for the seating position and the short rear wheel travel. Loyal one-percenters may not mind such performance-sapping compromises a bit, but I think any hopes that the Sportster S will conquest sales from other marques went out the window with the silly front wheel.

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So, the question then becomes is what is the Sportster’s purpose. Is it supposed to attract an all-new clientele to the brand like the Pan America? Or it just a fop to traditionalists to prop up recently-flagging Sportster sales? I suspect it’ll pass muster on the latter, but fail miserably on the former front.

And that’s a tragedy. Harley could have just revamped its current Sportster platform, satisfying the die-hards and then building a really crispy street fighter with (its now cancelled) Bronx running gear and wowza Sportster S styling. That would have set the motorcycling world abuzz, and attracted the same new kind of new clientele that the Pan America is.

If Harley does surprise and it has a naked bike in the works, then perhaps this is all part of a larger, grander vision. But, if Milwaukee has no plans for the Revolution in the cruiser segment beyond the Sportster S, what a waste of the best motor in motorcycling.