Victory Magnum: Flash Harry
Look. At. Me. Yes, me! I’m on a Victory Magnum and I’m loving it. Me, the bloke who is actually a bit shy and retiring, who’d sooner have a slightly ratty and nondescript matte black bike than this Flash Harry with its loud paint, loud stereo and loud styling. Oh, and loud pipes too, thanks to the accessory ones fitted to the test bike. I’m not sure they were within the letter of the law but they announced my arrival as surely as the Magnum attracts attention.
Setting out to do this test, I imagined I’d do the professional, objective and slightly detached review. I’d have to detach myself if I were to truly get what the Magnum is trying to be, because it’s not me. At least, I thought it wasn’t me. Now I’m writing this with a grin on my face, a beer on the table next to me and a sense of sadness that I’ve just given the bike back. I want to tell you how much of a buzz it was riding this ostentatious, outgoing mutha of a motorcycle. Like a CVO Street Glide, it’s out there in a big way, but it lacks the Harley badge and the massive price tag. As for the badge, well, no one seemed to care. Those who could even tell the difference were either already switched on to Victory’s presence or were impressed that they weren’t oohing and ahhing over a Harley or Japanese bike. And as for the price tag ... yahoo!
Starting at $29,995 ride away? You betcha. OK, it’s not quite such a bargain that you’d have two, but for a big bagger with special paint, the swagger of a 21in front wheel and cachet of so much pure substance, that’s seriously tempting pricing.
The Magnum is a Cross Country without restraint. The frame, engine and bodywork are all the same as the familiar Victory bagger’s equipment, but where the Cross Country displays a degree of polite reserve, the Magnum is brash and unashamed. Forget the classy taste of the Cross Country’s nice paint jobs, and the sensible decisions that led logically to an 18in front wheel. Think Gold Coast glitz and know with absolute certainty that Tony Joe White was right: when you look good, uh baby, you feel good.
True, I’d been warned that I might not like the Magnum’s steering. The switch to a 21in front wheel with a skinnier tyre, plus a 25mm lower rear end, had spoiled it a bit, they said. But when I rode out of the forecourt of the Victory dealership in Sydney onto a packed-for-peak-hour Parramatta Road, the Magnum didn’t flop or waggle. The steering was a little more aggressive than the Cross Country was, which I quite liked, and it required more care in U-turns to avoid having the forks (which carry the weight of that big fairing) flip quickly to full lock, but in the traffic and then out on the open road the big bagger held a line nicely and was easy to point.
That makes sense, too, because the specs are almost identical. Rake, trail, wheelbase and suspension travel haven’t changed in the conversion to Magnum. Only the seat height is different, down a mere 14mm to just 653mm. It’s not like they’ve whacked a 30-incher on the front, completely slammed the arse end, compromised the suspension and gone mad on the Magnum. No, that’s up to you ...
I tried a bit of it, but failed. Letting all the air out of the rear suspension doesn’t give the Magnum that bum-dragging low rider coolness I had hoped for. All it did was ruin the ride quality. When the pressure was set well for my weight (40psi), the Magnum’s ride was of the usual very high quality you get from Victory’s tourers. It’s one of the things I always praise about the bikes, for it stands out. On the rippled and dimpled roads we love as our own in Australia, the Magnum belies its custom appearance and not only rides really well, but handles far been expected to. There’s controlled damping and good composure, the one mildly poor habit being the occasional minor twitch from the handlebars when you corner through a bumpy patch.
The excellent upside-down cartridge forks and the rear monoshock on a constant- rate linkage work really well with the rigid, high-tech frame to create a sweet-handling heavyweight. The good brakes get brownie points, too. They are not linked in any way between front and rear so have no little quirks to get used to, and they have ABS backing them up. The back brake contributes well to stopping power, but when you really need to stop hard you find yourself giving the front lever a hefty squeeze to get its full effect.
You’ll need them sometimes; the 1731cc Victory 106 donk has plenty of grunt and likes to rev into the higher reaches of its modest range. The four-valve heads with single overhead cams promote efficient breathing. This motor claims 127Nm of torque, not quite up to Harley’s slightly smaller engine, and it makes over 70hp, a respectable amount in this class. You feel it, though perhaps I felt a bit more of it because of the free-breathing pipes on the test bike. In sixth gear the engine lopes along at less than 2500rpm at the highway limit, and you can happily leave the gearbox alone to make a relaxed passing move or lope up a long hill. But knock it back a couple of cogs and the Magnum surges when you reef open the throttle, accelerating hard despite the impression of laziness the engine’s low revs like to give.
It’s deceptively quick and you’ll realise afterwards that you’ve piled on a lot of pace without noticing it. It punches out of tight corners or long sweepers with a thrilling buildup of speed, and goes on past 160 to somewhere close to 200km/h before the end.
The only trouble with speed is the wind buffeting that grows with it. My test bike had a non-standard curved screen fitted, not the squared-off one it usually comes with. I can’t recommend this one, which badly shook a full- face helmet and wasn’t a lot more pleasant even with my shortie lid. Turbulent airflow seems to be a problem for all trendy short- screened baggers, and this one’s not going to improve things. If not for that, you’d sit on this bike all day. Like me, some of you will get an ache in your lower back from the armchair riding position, but I’d be tempted to try some of the accessory ape-hanger handlebars to see if they alleviated it. Ape-hangers are all the rage on custom baggers these days, and in this context they don’t suffer the problem of turning you into a windsock, thanks to the fairing’s air-blocking effect. The seat is any bum’s best friend and I’d sit on it all day. The footboards are long for legroom flexibility and they’re adjustable to increase it. There’s no nasty vibration, just lovely big-twin pulsing, and the wide batwing fairing keeps your hands warm and protected.
It also houses a loud, clear stereo system based on a 100W, six-speaker setup — a big upgrade from the Cross Country. You can upgrade it further at extra cost, befitting the custom bagger scene. Would you? Only if you’re serious. I liked the sound quality, which held up as fast as 100km/h or so despite the short screen and buffeting. The volume goes way up — higher than I ever needed on the road. There’s a Bluetooth link in it plus a USB plug in the pannier complete with a pouch for your music player. The control buttons on the left switchblock are small but are actually easy enough to use with thick glove on.
Other good things include the 12-volt outlet in the dash, the generous size of the stylish panniers which hold about 80 litres of stuff in almost watertight security, and the standard cruise control that works very well. I still think the six-button switchblock for the cruise control looks like a cheap add-on, though.
You only need one hand to open and close the panniers, which of course are top-opening ones. The engine drinks about 5.6L/100km on average, though I did get one tankful to do 5.0. With 22 litres of fuel on board, range is quite OK.
So the Magnum turns out to be a practical and worthwhile touring bike, something a road rider can be pleased and proud to own.
I guess the thing to celebrate is that now there’s a touring bike for the extroverts among us, something that doesn’t cost as much as a CVO Harley yet comes with a paint scheme in bright, shimmering contrast to the staid colours of most of our touring bikes. I mean, compare the grey, grey or grey “colour” schemes of BMW’s 2014 R1200RT line-up against the kaleidoscopic colours of the three Magnums. It’s like the convent or the cabaret.
And it corrupted me. Like I said, I thought I was not that kind of guy, but it didn’t take long for the Magnum’s visual volume to turn me around. That’s when I looked even closer and saw how nicely the front wheel was finished, with its arty spokes and polished highlights. The way the glittering paint and lightning-bolt stripes play on the three dimensions of the bodywork is beautifully effective. The treatment of the full-colour dash, along with the classy blue and red lighting of the instruments, is a highlight. There are also subtleties in the design that boost the whole picture, especially the sculpting of the batwing fairing. And you can’t help loving the long, tall Victory taillight.
When you have such a successfully customised bike blended without compromise into a tourer with great performance, you can’t go wrong.
MAGNUM X-1
The Magnum X-1 brings the mother of all motorbike stereo systems to you. This limited-edition model not only doubles your music whack to 200W with 10 speakers, it lifts the custom treatment with a smoked LED headlight and its own intricate paint scheme. Victory claims the stereo is 25 per cent louder than the H-D Street Glide Special’s system. It’ll cost you five grand more than the regular Magnum.
BETTER THAN YOU
It had to happen on a bike as flash as this. I sat in traffic on the Magnum, wearing my back open-face and a black bandana over my exposed face, for I was waiting to turn onto the freeway and the road out of town. I noticed something in the corner of my eye, and looked left to see someone taking the piss.
A tattooed, tall, long-haired bloke made hands-high motorbike riding gestures at me, all while wearing a comical set of glasses that made him look goggle-eyed. And stupid. His coloured tats came up his neck, but somehow he failed to carry off the prison look. His friends in the car were laughing.
I knew what they laughed at. A non-outlaw on a custom bike. Yet they couldn’t know I didn’t really own the Magnum. And I had the last laugh.
After all, I was looking at a clown in the back seat of a girl’s little hatchback, and the girl who drove it looked a bit scared that I might react badly. I pissed myself laughing, disappointed that my bandana prevented the twit from seeing I was laughing at him, not with him.
The lights changed. He was driven onwards into the burbs in the back seat of a buzzbox. I turned right onto the open road on a motorcycle.
