Ever since the Harley-Davidson Pan America 1250 appeared in concept form, even before it was launched, the moto-press and adventure riders figured a smaller version was coming. We saw a hint at this earlier in 2022, and now we’ve got confirmation again, thanks to Harley-Davidson’s own documents. Then Harley-Davidson launched the Nightster earlier this year, complete with scaled-down 975 Revolution Max motor—this didn’t confirm the talk of a smaller Pan America, but it did confirm Harley could very much do it, if the MoCo wanted to.

The leak earlier this year came from a screenshot of a Harley-Davidson accessory listing webpage, which showed a locking fuel cap that appeared to be made for a Pan America 975, based on the description. Like we told you back then:

In the description for the fuel cap, the listing shows that the cap is specifically designed for four “RA” models. Harley uses the “RA” designation for its Pan America models. But the devil is in the details, and the Harley catalog showed that the cap fits ’21- later RA965S, RA975, and RA 1250S models.

Now, Motorcycle.com (who also found the first leak) has found an instruction sheet for installing the accessory ’66 Collection Round Mirrors and Empire Mirrors for bikes with the Revolution Max engine. In the instructions for some markets, it’s noted that there are specific instructions “for all models except RA1250S and RA975S.” The RA1250S code refers to the Pan America 1250, so the obvious logical conclusion is that the RA975S is a smaller version of the Pan America.

If you read Motorcycle.com’s write-up, you’ll also see an NHTSA bulletin from this year. Head over to the NHTSA site, go to the “Vehicle” tab, type “RA975” into the search box, and you do indeed see three listings for an RA975 from Harley-Davidson.

What’s coming?

So what to expect?

Harley-Davidson has built multiple engine options for the same bike platform in the past. The most well-known would probably be the Sportster 883/1200 series, but the new Softail platform also offers multiple engine options for the same bike. Obviously, the smaller engine has less power, and typically the weight of both machines is very nearly the same.

It’s hard to imagine adventure riders being excited about buying a 975 that was the same bike as a 1250, but with less power. But maybe H-D will offer lower pricing, or find some way to trim weight off the bike?

Whatever the story, it seems likely we’ll see the bike unveiled in coming months, with the amount of leaked details over the past few months.