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Use Police Department Harleys

Randall K. Wilson

Randall K. Wilson

Junior Member
Do folk save a lot of money when they buy a used Police Motorcyle? I think this are often traded in at HD dealerships when various municipalities want to refurbish their cycle fleet. In the area where I live the Police Motorcycles look kind of simular to a Roadking. They have NO Tour-Pac, a solo seat, and knobs on top of the saddle box lids instead of the normal latches on the front/side. Of course special lights and sirens so they can pull you over and give you a ticket.

I have never been interested in one, but just wondered if folk buy them very cheap?

Has anyone on the forum bagged a former H-D Police Motorcycle?
 
Like anything else, there are good ones and bad ones. Used ones, and abused ones. Many are maintained by the dealerships, under programs set up thru HD, and are well taken care of.
Advantage of the newer ones (2007 & up) is the fact that they come standard with ABS and a 103 inch engine.
 
you can get them DIRT cheap....13k for a 2 year old loaded bike with 10-15k on the odo....

I wouldnt want one though, As an ex motojock from Dallas, i can tell you the bikes are heavily abused. Ran hard often, and left sitting running for a long time in the heat....there is a reason most police forces use the kawisaki's or beamers including Dallas.
 
I have always been told to stay away from them as a result of hard starts. They sit until they have a victim, and then it's balls to the walls with no warm up. This happens constantly and is one of the hardest things on a HD motor. They start them and immediately get on them hard in persuit. Nothing wrong with HD but they are abused and are dirt cheap for a reason. Don't buy one. Read your manual, one thing they say is ALWAYS let your bike run for a minute to warm up and properly lube itself, even on warm days.... how often do you see an LEO do that while chasing down a speeder?
 
The greatest amount of wear on any internal combustion engine is during the start. I've never seen a woman, and lately darn few men, give any of their vehicles a proper start and warmup sequence.
They turn the key, and as soon as the engine fires, it's in gear and moving.
HDs are no more special than any other internal combustion engine, and basicly are about on the same technology level as your lawnmower.
This is NOT the space shuttle we're talking about here.
I stick with my original reply to this thread. There are good used police bikes and bad ones, just the same as any other vehicle. An awful lot has to do with where and how it has been maintained.
There's plenty of folks out there with lots of good miles on used police bikes.
And, as stated, there are some equipment advantages to buying 07 and later bikes.
 
The State Police where I work on the PA Turnpike use Harleys and as much as they get put through their paces, they are also well maintained by the department. I wouldn't think twice about buying one of these if I was in the market for this kind of bike. It would be a good choice and great way to save some money.
 
Used Police Department Harley Transformation

Taking the discussion of used Police Department Harleys (aka Cop Bikes) into a different discussion... For the sake of this discussion... If a party were to buy a used Police Harley for say $13K (per HDSlopoke), and then the party had a desire to transform the bike to say more like a Roadking, Streetglide, Electraglide etc. In other words they would not want the Cycle to have any association with that of its past long arm of the law history. IS, it possible that in order to acheive this goal a person could spend more on the cycle that if he just went ahead and bought a used cycle that was not a former Police Harley? Especially if you got into repainting the cycle?

I looked inside of the rear hard bags of a former Police Harley and it has some kind of indentation for a Brake thingy on the outside taking up some of the space which would have normally been in the bag. Does that mean a person would have to leave those bags on with those big knobs on top?
 
Our local PD lease their Road Kings from Mears Motor Company. They used to lease from the local HD dealer. But Mears has a better rate and covers all the maintenance. What's funny about it is, the bikes go to the HD dealer for service.

So not only did the HD dealer loose the contract, but now they have to service the bikes and get paid a reduced rate to do it!
 
SledDog said:
Our local PD lease their Road Kings from Mears Motor Company. They used to lease from the local HD dealer. But Mears has a better rate and covers all the maintenance. What's funny about it is, the bikes go to the HD dealer for service.

So not only did the HD dealer loose the contract, but now they have to service the bikes and get paid a reduced rate to do it!
Click to expand...

That sounds about right!:small3d023:
 
I think if you want to start modifying the police motorcycle to make it something else, you are probably better off spending more money up front to buy the model you want cause changing out saddle bags etc. will add up really quick. By the way, that bulge in the saddle bag is probably for the ABS controller.

I'm a LEO and our police vehicles are maintained second to none, especially our motorcycles as safety is a primary concern.

It would also help if you know what type of service the motorcycle was primarily was used for.

Motorcycles used for highway patrol typically have a much easier life than a city police bike does a lot of starting and stopping and might sit idling in an intersection with the lights on for hours at a time...

There are some good deals to be had but get the motorcycle checked out by a competent technician who knows Harleys before you buy. If it looks good, buy it , clean it up, and then ride the wheels off it! :devil
 
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