Photography by Kevin Win...
You've heard it all before: Americans believe bigger is always better. This attitude led to the relentless engine-displacement creep we've winessed over the last several years. With the advent of Triumph's 2.3-liter engine crushing the competition, manufacturers were forced to look elsewhere for places to one-up one another. Victory Motorcycles has always, to its credit, marched to a different drummer. When the development folks put their collective heads together on how to improve their motorcycle line, they looked beyond the ever-more-massive engine to the aftermarket to see what modifications were popular with bike owners. Being an American manufacturer led Victory, naturally, to take a gander at what that other big American marque's aficionados had grafted to their bikes. Two things caught the company's attention: The pro-street style cruiser with a massive rear tire and stretched-out profile currently in vogue and the aftermarket six-speed transmissions mounted on domestic V-twins. Perhaps this was an opening for an industrious OEM?
Whatever route Victory took to create the Hammer, it was clearly influenced by the custom market as interpreted by a major manufacturer. Customizers are willing to endure the compromises of everyday rideability inherent in bringing their vision to life, but manufacturers have to do the development to make it work in a variety of circumstances.
In the grand scheme of things, simply adding a sixth cog to the gearbox must have been a tempting change to the already refined Freedom V92 engine. Instead, Victory threw in several improvements, making the Freedom 100/6 an all-new engine. First, the displacement bumped eight cubic inches to 100 cubic inches. While a "mere" 1634cc may not sound that impressive to jaded spec-sheet jockeys, it would have been considered pretty dang big a couple of years ago. The enlarged 101mm bore and unchanged 102mm stroke account for the increased cylinder capacity. Compression gets bumped to 9.7:1. The 100/6 engine retains the 92-incher's air- and oil-cooled status as well as the SOHC, four valves per cylinder and hydraulic valve adjusters. The cams were shaped to broaden the torque curve. Spinning those cams are new, quieter, hydraulically adjusted cam chains. A 10mm-narrower crankcase and smaller sump drop oil capacity to five quarts and allow the chassis to narrow a bit. Fuel-mixing duties are handled by a pair of 44mm throttle bodies and new EFI fuel maps tuned with torque in mind.
The new transmission retains the same ratios for the first five gears as the previous Freedom engine's. Departing from the 1:1 ratio on the fifth cog, sixth gear is a true overdrive with a 0.864:1 ratio. Those who still remember high-school math will realize this translates into a 13.6 percent reduction in rpm, resulting in a drop of 450 rpm at 75 mph. So you can expect the engine to spin at around 2900 rpm at 80 mph. Sounds like a nice, loping pace, doesn't it?
The quality of Victory's transmissions has improved exponentially since their introduction. Long-term Motorcycle Cruiser readers will, no doubt, remember Art Friedman's description of gear changes sounding "like someone hit the crankcase with a hammer" (December 1998). Well, that awful noise and excessive lash are long gone into the annals of Victorys past.
The Hammer's style will thrill some riders and offend others. According to Victory, it was inspired by other motorcycle classes—including sportbikes—so cruiser traditionalists need not apply. Regardless, you have to admire Victory's devotion to detail, starting with an attention-getting color palette and a color-matched headlight shell. A V-shaped handlebar draws the pilot's eyes to the instrument cluster that features both a speedometer and tachometer. The six warning lights are embedded in a chromed panel on the triple clamp. The high-beam switch has a flash function, allowing you to quickly cycle the light to attract attention. The seamless, sculpted tank wraps around the leading edge of the seat while a seat cowl covers the pillion, giving the bike a solo seat appearance. Cleverly, removing the seat cowl is as easy as pulling three pins out of rubber grommets. Similarly, removing the entire seat only involves removing the Allen bolts hidden behind those grommets. The taillight is frenched into a chopped rear fender. In fact, the bodywork's lines appear as a unified series of curves from the tank's leading edge to the fender's rear. The Hammer looks aggressive, even if you can't see its monster rear tire.
And then there's the massive rubber. The Hammer is the first production motorcycle to sport a 250-series rear tire. Why did Victory want to tackle the challenge of such huge skin? Just take a look at the Hammer from behind or—even better—from slightly to the right side of the rear. The thing is 10 inches wide, putting many car tires to shame! The Hammer's bright colors may get people to look at you when you pull into your favorite watering hole, but the otherworldly rear tire will make them walk over mouths agape. If you don't like attention, this isn't the bike for you. However, fitting a tire of this magnitude to a bike can't help but affect how it works in the real world. How well Victory civilized the...uh...unique handling characteristics of the American-sized carcass is the real story of the Hammer.
With its distinctive taillight...
With its distinctive taillight and rear fender and massive tire, the Hammer is readily identifiable from the rear.
Riding the bike will tickle your sensors in unusual ways—at least until you are accustomed to it. The first turn out of the parking lot is an eye-opener. Something feels funny. The bike doesn't respond as nimbly as a more traditionally shod cruiser would at low speeds, and it feels like it wants to go straight. Press on a bit and you'll realize the Hammer simply needs a firmer hand at low speeds. If you have the room, ride some circles in the lot to see that it turns just fine—but with more effort and a different sensation.
Out on the boulevard, much of this sensation disappears. The Hammer is more responsive to handlebar inputs once above walking speeds. You may notice the bike's tendency to self-center on the wide rear tire after a maneuver such as a lane change, but it feels more like what you're used to. The strange feelings will return, however, once you move onto some more moderate turns. When the rear tire's contact patch is on the flatter portion of the tire, its tendency to self-center remains pretty much the same as when the bike is straight up and down. Moving onto the transition to the sharply curved sidewall initially exacerbates the feeling of wanting to continue in a straight line. While the Hammer needs to have slight pressure on the inside grip to maintain its line in turns, the pressure required is greater at this transition point. Lean the bike over farther onto the sidewall and the pressure required to hold the Hammer on line lessens but doesn't completely vanish.
The second cornering component of the Hammer that'll mess with your gyros is the wide rear tire, which actually raises the rear ride height as the bike leans over onto the sidewall. When you first start riding this fat 250 rear tire, you'll think something isn't right. If you've ever been on a train at a stop in the station when the train next to you begins to move unexpectedly, you've already experienced this kind of sensory disconnect. Your eyes (particularly your peripheral vision) tell you your train has begun to move, but your seat sensor says it hasn't, leading to a moment of vertigo as your brain sorts the signals to see which is right. With the Hammer, your hands say, "OK, I told this bike to turn," while your butt says, "Hey, what's going on back here?" Just give the bike its steering inputs and it'll go where you tell it to. After a while you'll learn how to process the new information. Cornering will again become second nature, requiring as little thought as a more traditionally shod cruiser—only with that slight, constant countersteering required to hold the bike on line. Changing lines midcorner is no problem, but you shouldn't be surprised to see the Hammer widens its line easier than it tightens it.
Victory spent much of the Hammer's development time working with Dunlop on the massive 250/40ZR18 Elite 3 rear tire's design. While all motorcycles depend on air pressure to maintain tire profiles, the Hammer, with its unique cornering requirements, is even more susceptible to the vagaries of underinflation. During our testing, this became apparent when two riders complained the bike wouldn't turn and required a heavy hand to steer—so heavy, in fact, it often led to overcorrecting. While healthy debate about bikes is common at Motorcycle Cruiser, we rarely have such marked differences in opinion on a bike's handling. A day later, the culprit, a four-inch nail in the rear tire, was found. Since the pressure wasn't tested before the nail was removed, we don't know if the pressure dropped a few pounds or not, but we suspect as much. (Victory acknowledges the Hammer is sensitive to tire pressure and recommends 36 psi and 38 psi front and rear, respectively.) Another potential contributing factor to the questionable handling could have been that the bike had been ridden to the West Coast, and consequently had a fair number of interstate miles on the center of its rubber. Which begs the question, how does the Hammer behave as the carefully designed tire profile is altered by the tire's center wear? Unfortunately, our limited time with the bike prevented us from gathering a definitive answer. A few days riding in the rain did tell us something, though. The Hammer works great in the wet until you try to lean it over more than a moderate amount. At that point, the tire begins to squirm on the wet pavement, sapping even the hardiest rider's confidence. While the bike never did anything evil, it certainly felt on the brink on more than once.
 Previously seen only on sportbikes,...  Previously seen only on sportbikes, the passenger-seat cowl (which is removed in this photo) is unique among cruisers. With the cowl removed, the pillion saddle offers a decent perch for a passenger. Because of their excellent functionality, the ugly rubber grommets used to mount the cowl bothered us less with time. | | |