Is the motor company listening?
Road Captain
Joined: Apr 2009
Posts: 610
Likes: 5
Personally I hope the rumors of the Nova (but change the name) Project being resurrected.
http://thekneeslider.com/archives/20...idson-v4-nova/
http://thekneeslider.com/archives/20...idson-v4-nova/
Novice
Joined: Oct 2009
Posts: 21
Likes: 0
From: Edmonton
The MoCo is in serious financial trouble right now. They just laid off 100 engineers in Milwaukee. All you will see in the next 2 model years is cost cutting and re-sourcing parts off shore. (no joke). If you notice they dropped the term "An American Motorcycle" from the Buell line about 2 years ago. This is due to the higher percentage of off shore parts in those bikes.
Road Warrior
Joined: Jul 2007
Posts: 1,460
Likes: 1
From: pasco county FL
For a business what would be the point of cheapening your product to make the same net profit? If a company made XXX million dollares a year profit selling 200,000 units or same dollar amout selling 500,000 units , just means you make LESS profit ( It is about return on an investment) so shelling out more dollars for labor and materials might mean a 10% profit OR make many less units and spend much less on materials & labor and produce the same dollar amount profit , means you would be getting a 25% return on money spent to make a profit , which would YOU rather do?)
OR to make it simple would you rather work 30 hours a week at $20/hour and earn $600 a week or work 40 hours a week and make $15 an hour and still make $600? Which is more profitable per time/cost a unit/hour?
Tourer
Joined: Apr 2005
Posts: 367
Likes: 0
From: Blue Ridge Mountains, NC
Take a Sportster, strip it down to a bare bones bike * no fancy gadgets or gizmos, minimal chrome * just an all around no frills bike that the buyer can customize himself, price it in the range of 5-8K on the showroom floor, and advertise the snot out of it to the young jap bike crowd.
Club Member
Joined: Oct 2007
Posts: 30,914
Likes: 16
From: Springfield, Ohio
The MoCo is in serious financial trouble right now. They just laid off 100 engineers in Milwaukee. All you will see in the next 2 model years is cost cutting and re-sourcing parts off shore. (no joke). If you notice they dropped the term "An American Motorcycle" from the Buell line about 2 years ago. This is due to the higher percentage of off shore parts in those bikes.
Last edited by schumacher; Oct 29, 2009 at 10:08 AM.
Road Warrior
Joined: Nov 2006
Posts: 1,699
Likes: 2
From: Deltona, FL
No, when they discontinued the FXR, they had to reserve x number of frames for police bikes. Once the police departments started buying the Road King instead of FXRP's, Harley had excess frames. Instead of just scraping them, they did limited runs of FXR's with custom options and updated technology. Good business decision.
Road Captain
Joined: Feb 2009
Posts: 595
Likes: 6
From: Detroit, MI
I agree about the FXRT it's an awesome touring bike, ugly though.
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Seasoned HDF Member
Joined: Jun 2005
Posts: 12,946
Likes: 32
From: Colorado Springs, CO
Never liked the FXR.....always saw them as a good donor for the VIN number cut out of the frame and the drivetrain.
Scrap the sporty an bring out a $5,000 softtail with the sporty 883 drivetrain.
Otherwise merge with Honda.
~Joe
Scrap the sporty an bring out a $5,000 softtail with the sporty 883 drivetrain.
Otherwise merge with Honda.
~Joe
Seasoned HDF Member
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 20,616
Likes: 4,440
From: anacoco, la
Take a Sportster, strip it down to a bare bones bike * no fancy gadgets or gizmos, minimal chrome * just an all around no frills bike that the buyer can customize himself, price it in the range of 5-8K on the showroom floor, and advertise the snot out of it to the young jap bike crowd.