How Does Cruise Control On Harley-Davidson Motorcycles Work?

There's a lot to love about motorcycles and hitting the open road with them. They're fast, look cool, and can bring you to a community of fellow riders, forging friendships around your shared love for two-wheeled transportation. Harley-Davidson has risen to the top of the motorcycle world because of these positives and more. As a result, the brand has innovated to ensure those who support it stick around and those who want to give it a shot feel welcome to. One of the major ways it has done this is through comfort and convenience for riders.

Throughout its over a century-long existence, Harley has made some major steps forward to make its bikes some of the most impressive and user-friendly out there. For instance, Harley has adopted two main frame types, those being hardtail and softail. The latter, more flexible variety provides superior comfort compared to its older, more rigid contemporary, especially on longer rides. Speaking of longer rides, modern Harley models have also adopted a cruise control option, making road trips easier than before. Is this among the most important moments in Harley-Davidson history? Probably not, but it was undeniably a major technological step forward.

If you're planning on taking your Harley-Davidson motorcycle — ideally one of the most comfortable out there from the brand for long-distance riding — out for a long haul in the future, here's how you can take advantage of the cruise control option.

The way Harley-Davidson designed cruise control was with the rider's comfort, minimal movement, and safety in mind. Getting it going is just as safe and simple as one would hope while driving at high speeds. It only takes a few simple steps to get set up.

1. Press the Cruise switch to activate cruise control. Once this is done, you will see an orange light illuminate on the cruise gauge face.

2. Once at a speed between 30 and 90 mph, press the Resume/Set switch to the Set position. Once this is done, a green light will appear on the gauge face after a brief wait. This lets you know that the cruising speed has been successfully locked in.

So long as you're in the aforementioned speed range, and not riding with non-specified gearing or tires that can disrupt the activation of cruise control, you should be all set. Of course, there is a bit more to know about operating your Harley's cruise control than merely how to activate it before leaving your driveway.

First and foremost, you should be advised that specific riding situations will automatically disengage your Harley-Davidson's cruise control. Braking, rolling back or closing throttle, and disengaging the clutch can all cause this, turning the green light back to orange. Thankfully, it's not hard to reset. To reactivate, you can simply use Set to set up a new cruise control speed, or Resume to continue at the previously set speed. Both of these options are done using the Resume/Set switch used to set cruise control up.

If you're looking to lower or increase the speed your cruise control is set to, those are straightforward processes as well. At cruise speed, press Set to reduce your speed by approximately 1 mph or Resume to increase it by 1 mph. Holding either will lower or increase your speed by 1 mph increments until released, at which point your cruise speed will stay. As for turning off cruise control altogether, all that takes it pressing the Cruise switch while cruise control is active. The function will then deactivate with the associated light doing the same.

With all of this in mind, you should now be perfectly well-equipped to get the most out of Harley-Davidson's cruise control function.