Polaris-owned Indian has been teasing their all-new motor for months now; this past weekend, they finally unveiled it.
Those who were hoping for a throwback to Indian’s straight-four history, or maybe something modern and water-cooled, were all disappointed. The new Thunder Stroke motor is an air-and-oil cooled 49-degree 1818 cc V-twin, making more than 115 ft.lb of torque. It’s true, though, that it takes a lot of engineering just to get a motor like this past EPA and other government regulatory bodies these days.
Fuel comes from electronic sequential port fuel injection and electronic throttle control. There’s three camshafts and a forged crankshaft, pushrods, and two valves per cylinder with hydraulic valve lifters to reduce maintenance. Compression ratio is 9:5, and the transmission is a six-speed constant mesh unit with helical gearbox.
[…] since the 1950s; Polaris, the latest owners, bought the company in 2011, and they’ve been teasing their new bikes ever since. Now we’ve had a good look at the bikes; here’s what they’re all […]
[…] is upon us, and while we’re still waiting for Indian’s new motorcycle to be named (they unveiled the motor last month), we do have some details about the new bike, in an exclusive CMG […]
Better looking than the Victory engines, which I would have to agree with some other comments I’ve read is just too tall to look good in a cruiser type bike. Pushrods keep the head size down, and should be more than adequate for the kind of RPMs that an 1,800 cc narrow-angle V-Twin is likely to spin to, as well as making hydraulic lifters easy to implement (hopefully). Not that I’m likely to be buying an Indian, but I think I have some understanding of what’s important to the cruiser crowd.