Bigger is better-at least, that is what we want when it comes to our motorcycles. Back in the days of the 88s (last year before the '07s came out) if you were a Harley-Davidson/Screamin' Eagle purist and you wanted to take your 88 to triple digit displacement with a Screamin' Eagle hop-up kit, that meant about two days of downtime (for a good mechanic) to pull the motor, split the cases, and install a Screamin' Eagle 103 kit with the Stroker flywheel assembly and big bore pistons. In the end there was a lot of time and energy spent, and if you paid a mechanic to do it, a lot of cash out of pocket for labor. However, the introduction of the 07s with their 96ci motors cut the time it takes to get into triple-digit displacement down dramatically. Basically now all you're looking at is popping the top end off to install a Screamin' Eagle Big Bore Kit.
Now here's where things get interesting. We're not just showcasing this kit for those die-hard H-D/Screamin' Eagle fans like us. This is to show how to increase the displacement of your new 96ci motor, and still have a street legal motorcycle. That's right, with the new restrictions that are being put in place by the EPA and Area Resources Board (ARB), tampering with your motor and even exhaust can result in it being an illegal vehicle for the open road. With this knowledge in mind, Harley-Davidson has lead the pack creating EPA-approved kits and components to improve the performance of your motor. Another key factor to this kit is when it's installed by an authorized Harley-Davidson dealer, it will not impact the vehicle's limited warranty.
We stopped by Pomona Harley-Davidson and talked with service manager Chris Dyer about getting this kit installed and ended up snapping a few photos along the way.
We got started on this job...
We got started on this job by getting a base run on the dyno. To help us out with this part, service tech Chris Biles rolled the bike onto the dyno, and checked tire pressure, oil level, and temp. We got some base numbers: 66.97 hp and 83.55 lb-ft of torque. Now we know these numbers differ from others; this is what we got on our '07. We know that there are several factors involved, like different dynos, different days, weather, time of day, type of gas, and so on...this was our starting point.
Next, the bike was rolled...
Next, the bike was rolled over to shop tech Brian Breeland, who placed the bike on the lift and started by disconnecting the battery, removing the seat, gas tank, rocker boxes, air filter, backing plate, and EFI. Then he removed the heads, pushrods, and tubes, and pulled the cylinders and pistons off together by removing the wrist pin from the rods. There is a lot to remove to get to the heart of this story, so we don't want to spend a lot of time on the removal of the old parts.