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Rating: 
Summary: Your restoration will be more accurate with this book!
Review: After 30 years experience, I still learned a great deal about the many variations in H-D twins over the years (does have some minor ommissions on 45" models). Take a copy with you to swap meets to make sure you get the parts you need. Worth 10 times the purchase price.
Rating:
Summary: Don't even consider buying this book. Just do it!
Review: Even if you don't own or plan to own one of the models described in this book; it makes for absolutely great reading. Ever wondered how parkerizing is done? How to go about shopping for a restorable bike and what to look for? It tells you all that and much, much, more.
Rating:
Summary: 640 pages of pure Harley-Davidson
Review: If You're restoring a '37 to '64 Harley-Davidson then buy this book! It's a must have! You can find every detail in the book and an answer to almost every question You may have. Buy it! It's that simple.
Rating:
Summary: Real!
Review: Palmer's book has revolutionized Harley-Davidson restoration. Information that was once the province of a few real experts and many would be experts, obfuscated by lots of opinions, myths, and flawed memory masquerading as facts, is now available to anyone who buys the book. Palmer did a good job of using available resources to assemble, in excruciating detail, the data necessary to build these motorcycles as the consensus of the sources he consulted says they were supposed to be when they rolled off the factory's assembly line. That consensus was not always easy to reach, because, for example, the manufacturer itself used retouched photos of older models to introduce new models, and followed various other practices such as running changes, recalls, and using parts inventory from one model year into the next, that make it difficult to know, today, what was "correct" in 1938. Palmer takes us into the world defined by that level of "correctness" that demands that this manufactured product from days gone by be exactly as it was at the point of origin. We can now "know," through his book, what is "correct." More of us can be knowledgeable about the number of cooling fins on a UL cylinder, or the color, width, and placement of pinstriping, or the fact that fender trim for a particular year is polished stainless, not chrome. This is a book about building your bike to original factory specs, and it is the best available for that purpose.Of course, if you follow this book to its logical conclusion and build a correct motorcycle, don't expect to ride it. It will have decades old tires both too valuable and too aged to ride. You won't want to run it on pump gas, because it needs lead. Taking it out on the road might ding the paint, blue the exhaust, or demonstrate that your assembly procedures weren't quite up to snuff by identifying all of the points where oil can escape. Palmer's approach to the topic seems to hold that these old bikes are artifacts, not transportation. He has affirmed and strengthened a subculture within motorcycling that elevates the machine over the ride. It will be interesting to see if others, such as Kirk Perry's "Mechanics & Owners Guide to 1941-1959 Harley-Davidson O.H.V. Big Twins" will reinforce the ranks of folks who actually want to ride these old hogs.
Rating:
Summary: The Devil is in the Details
Review: Palmer's book has revolutionized Harley-Davidson restoration. Information that was once the province of a few real experts and many would be experts, obfuscated by lots of opinions, myths, and flawed memory masquerading as facts, is now available to anyone who buys the book. Palmer did a good job of using available resources to assemble, in excruciating detail, the data necessary to build these motorcycles as the consensus of the sources he consulted says they were supposed to be when they rolled off the factory's assembly line. That consensus was not always easy to reach, because, for example, the manufacturer itself used retouched photos of older models to introduce new models, and followed various other practices such as running changes, recalls, and using parts inventory from one model year into the next, that make it difficult to know, today, what was "correct" in 1938. Palmer takes us into the world defined by that level of "correctness" that demands that this manufactured product from days gone by be exactly as it was at the point of origin. We can now "know," through his book, what is "correct." More of us can be knowledgeable about the number of cooling fins on a UL cylinder, or the color, width, and placement of pinstriping, or the fact that fender trim for a particular year is polished stainless, not chrome. This is a book about building your bike to original factory specs, and it is the best available for that purpose. Of course, if you follow this book to its logical conclusion and build a correct motorcycle, don't expect to ride it. It will have decades old tires both too valuable and too aged to ride. You won't want to run it on pump gas, because it needs lead. Taking it out on the road might ding the paint, blue the exhaust, or demonstrate that your assembly procedures weren't quite up to snuff by identifying all of the points where oil can escape. Palmer's approach to the topic seems to hold that these old bikes are artifacts, not transportation. He has affirmed and strengthened a subculture within motorcycling that elevates the machine over the ride. It will be interesting to see if others, such as Kirk Perry's "Mechanics & Owners Guide to 1941-1959 Harley-Davidson O.H.V. Big Twins" will reinforce the ranks of folks who actually want to ride these old hogs.
Rating:
Summary: Real!
Review: Real Harley men with eclectic taste who take pleasure in the ancient art of tinkering on mechanical things will love this book. Don't miss the rare Harley Davidson Novel "The Second Coming Of Age" by: Vedrine
Rating:
Summary: INNER SANCTUM
Review: This is an excellent book for restorers or replicators wanting to get an in-depth, overall view, of OverHeadValve Big Twins. On the critical side, and it's hard to find something to criticise in this book; is the mention of generator testing tools (i.e; an A/C variable speed motor) to facillitate setting the amperage of the 32E generator. The A/C (alternating current) variable speed (rheostat controlled) electric motors do not exist in this day and age, or if they do where can the reader/mechanic find one? This book is recommended as a required tool, because it is stuffed full of Knucklehead technical data not found anywhere else. It is the book I reach for, if I'm trying to find out about "first year" or "last year" changes, on any Big Twins up to 1964 (1965 Electra-Glides; Four-Five & Flatheads included). - Kirk Perry
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