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Message started by oldNslow on 02/29/20 at 08:40:06

Title: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by oldNslow on 02/29/20 at 08:40:06

They're done. Even though they don't know it yet.

https://www.thestreet.com/investing/harley-davidson-ceo-matthew-levatich-resigns

Levatich is an idiot, so good riddance.

Unfortunately he was replaced by this dooshbag:

A frickin SNEAKER expert !

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jochen_Zeitz

The board of directors:

Troy Alstead Starbucks
R. John Anderson Levi Strauss
Michael J. Cave Boeing
Allan Golston Melinda Gates Foundation
Sara L. Levinson Digital entertainment
N. Thomas Linebarger Cummins
Brian R Nicoll Chipotle’s
Maryrose T. Sylvester GE
Jochen Zeitz.

Look at where these folks came from. Think any of them has ever ridden a bike.

Too bad. I like Harleys. I ride one.

Oh well. Another iconic American Company will go tits-up because of stockholder greed and stupidity, Not the first or the last, just the latest.

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by Serowbot on 02/29/20 at 09:50:12

Harley dealerships are coffee mug and t-shirt boutiques nowadays.
A sneaker expert seems appropriate. :-?

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by jcstokes on 02/29/20 at 15:04:23

A very difficult situation, from what I read here, the US motorcycle market is saturated with used, good condition Harleys, and the beer bellied, balding, bearded 50 plus year olds aren't buying. The under thirties seem to be uninterested in that type of bike. The group in the middle can buy a coffee and T shirt in a variety of places. It would take a massive culture and design shift to make a bike suitable for the Indian and Chinese markets. Is reliability still a negative with some HD product, I've heard that said on this forum? These directors obviously have wide business experience, however, they should be sent forcibly to an MSF course and then a months commuting on a SMALL Harley.

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by srinath on 02/29/20 at 15:19:33

Weirdly, I have 20-25 pieces of motorcycle related crap (yea mugs, t shirts, pens, caps etc) and the singular IMHO most stellar piece of bike swag I have is a Suzuki boulevard pen. Nice steel pen, open the cap and write, close it and it closes with a nice click pen, all metal, and it has a jotter type refill with a spring on the bottom. Excellent pen, excellent all around, no moving parts, no plastic parts and simply put, plonk down $2 and get a brand new lease on life refill.
HD crap is garbage, so is nearly everything else motorcycle related. That pen bought ~2004-05 is simply my favorite motorcycle related device ever that isn't bolted onto a motorcycle.
Has a shoeii RF 1000 hayabusa branded helmet I liked for a log time though. Not its crapped out, so the pen wins.
Cool.
Srinath.

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by pg on 02/29/20 at 15:42:50

And Indian sales steadily consume more of the market share every year. HD will really be dire straights in a few years if things don't turn around for them.

Best regards,

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by Matchless G11 on 02/29/20 at 16:01:01

734D4C40524E4F210 wrote:

Is he the one who killed Buell?

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by oldNslow on 02/29/20 at 16:51:03

Quote:

Is he the one who killed Buell?

Levatich ? I don't think so. He became CEO in 2015. I think Buell was gone before that.

The sad part of this is that there is nothing wrong with the motorcycles Harley makes, the people who make them, the dealers who sell them, or the people who buy and ride them.

Harley could easily survive and thrive as a smaller company with realistic sales expectations, manufacturing the kind of motorcycles that they are good at, and that there will always be a market for. BMW and KTM sales have increased in the US in the past few years as HDs have been declining, and they are touted as successful. But BMW and KTMs unit sales are minuscule compared to the numbers of bikes that Harley is still selling, even though Harley is perceived as failing. That's the way the publicly traded corporate world works.

So Harley is done IMO. Look at the resumes of the members of the board. A few years of steadily declining quarterly earnings reports, whatever the reasons, combined with that corporate board who don't understand the core business, very likely don't care about motorcycles at all,except as widgets to sell, and are only focused on share prices going up, up, up forever, wont let the company survive.

The board members will take their huge salaries, shovel bullsh*t to the stockholders at the annual meetings, and walk away as soon as the vultures are done stripping the last shreds of meat of off the carcass.

I think that's a shame.

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by MMRanch on 02/29/20 at 16:57:52

You may be right oldNslow . I know a bunch of guys who think HD's are the only bike there is or should be. I tease them regularly about their Monster Machines ;D . Some of them can actually keep up when we get into the twisties , but most don't.

I've got a Harley story that says a lot about Harley :

So , my first Harley was a 2004 1200cc Sportster in Roadster form. It was Quick and power to weight ratio was good. But ,...
I had a really hard time keeping up with the Savages in the mountains.
So , I ran it like a Jap Bike (2-4K rpm -- up and down the rpm scale) to keep up best I could.
Well , it wasn't long before the the crank-shaft and the primary drive worked loose.
I discovered several things while fixing it:
The splines were 95% gone.
The Crankshaft itself was made out of Doe-ball-steel with Case Harding.
The Splines were straight not tapered , so there was nothing to tighten up too/against .
..................

I grabbed a welder in one had and a dremel tool in the other and rebuilt the splines with a slight taper on them and tapered the front primary drive to match.
Well it worked good after that , but , the more I thought about them idiots using Case Hardened DoeBall Steel on a crank-shaft the more pissed-off I got . I bet the main shafts in the transmission are made of the same stuff !
.......................

Bad engineering ? Well , perhaps Harley aren't made to run like the Jap's , Italian's , Indian's , Brit's , etc , build their bike to run like.

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by oldNslow on 02/29/20 at 17:47:56

Quote:

I've got a Harley story ...

There is a guy whose online name was "crusty" on the xl forum who blew his engine while on an out of town trip. When his came loose it took out the bearing on that side and wrecked the case. Bunch of other damage too. I don't recall the whole story. His was a 04 or 05 1200 Roadster with pretty high mileage and he did a lot of interstate highway riding. He wound up replacing the engine with one from a wreck.

My Sportster is an 04 so when I read that guys story it gave me the willies. You just gave me a relapse. :P

Almost 25K on mine - it's an 883 with a stage 1 - and no issues yet. Fingers crossed.

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by MMRanch on 02/29/20 at 18:55:42

Hay oldNslow , just don't run it like a Jap bike and all should be well ! ;)

Now you know the 883 has a lower geared primary than the 1200 does ?

Yea the 883 red lines 5th about 118mph and the 1200 red lines more like 140mph. Maybe that lower primary drive will save you from stressing everything but the back tire ? ;D

A few years after selling the Roadster , I got to missing my Sportster then I came across a low millage (3K miles) 2007 fuel injected 883 XL , and bought it. I kept it till it started weeping oil --- about 50,000 miles .
Well , after having them both : I developed the idea that Harley built the 883 and got it perfect ... then as an after-thought put them 3.5" pistons in it.
My belief is that they screwed it up when they did. The 883 was a lot smother , and the power level of the 3" pistons seemed more in tune to the strength of the crank shaft too. ::)
...................

I've got Guzzi's version of the 883 now and love it. Its about 120 lbs. lighter and 10 HP more. Its called a V-9 (853cc) Roamer (55hp).
The newer version is called V85TT (853cc) and has almost double the HP of the 883.
I think your right - Harley is in Real Trouble ! ::)
https://bikez.com/motorcycles/moto_guzzi_v9_roamer_2018.php

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by oldNslow on 02/29/20 at 19:20:07

Quote:

just don't run it like a Jap bike and all should be well !

My 2006 S40 actually get run a lot harder than the Sportster. More long trips . More miles on the expressways. It's got bags and a windshield on it so it's my traveling bike.

The Sportster spends most of it's time on 45-60 MPH country roads and around town. I'm hoping it will last as long as I can keep riding. :)

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by pg on 03/01/20 at 14:27:39

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwud-2RKwA0[/media]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwud-2RKwA0

Just an 8 minute history of HD.

Best regards,

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by Gary_in_NJ on 03/02/20 at 06:22:00

Harley's demise was it's success. In 2006 it had profits of $1 billion. In the years before that it's profits exceeded $500 million. It's darn-near impossible to rescale an organization...and investor expectations...to "normal" times. The drive for more, the 2009 market collapse, and shrinking customer base - all conspired to make the HD of the 1990's & 2000's a certain failure.

Had HD taken the vast profits and resized the business while at the same time developed products for the future, it would be a successful yet smaller company. Now it will die of it's own weight.

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by Bokobob on 03/10/20 at 06:07:12

Went to a very large and fancy Harley dealership yesterday and was amazed at how many parts/accessories of bikes are painted black as opposed to chrome in Harleys up until now. Crash bars is one big example...exhausts are another....I realize "black" is a craze to some extent these days among all manufacturers.....My take is it is to cut production costs by eliminating chrome and calling it "style." I also saw NONE of the very small bikes that have been introduced in the past few yeas. But what main impression lingered in my mind was the style of the bikes which I would describe as "Everything you wanted in a bike in 1960." The antiquated style of the parallelogram shaped saddlebags as being the most glaring example.

Title: Re: Stick a fork in Harley Davidson
Post by pg on 03/10/20 at 16:23:23

Here you go, a brand new Harley for $649, no kidding!

https://www.harley-davidson.com/us/en/motorcycles/electric/electric-balance-bikes.html

Best regards,