Ever wondered why HD shut down Buell?

hmm.. have you not scene an XR before?

The_Lone_Rider wrote:

hmm.. have you not scene an XR before?

ah yes my son...
but I had not previously put 2 & 2 together & realized about HD's strategy of eliminating Buell to allow a freer reign for the XR. Apparently this is common knowledge in the US, that this was the marketing plan.
I guess you some of you know-it-alls knew all that, but I didn't.
I always hear people sayin', 'why did they shut down Buell', & wondered why as well

the new Buells didnt even have Harley motors in them, they run a Rotax donk

Slaytanica wrote:

they run a Rotax donk

We did a test ride on Can Am Spyders, in the Jan 2011 issue. They have rotax engines. FARRRKING wonderful engines.

And for such big vehicles, I still managed to do burn out from completely stationary to flat down on the throttle.

yeah the bike shop next to my work had a new buell he was impressed with it compared to the older ones
heaps faster and oddles better handling no vibration bla bla bla

Yeah different motor nowadays, but it seems the HD guys think it's the same target market as the XR. For whatever reason, they didn't want the xr to have to share the stage with the Buells.
Harley actually have a long history of that tactic. They used to try and wipe the slate clean of any competition. That's partly why no more Crocker etc. They used to go to the engineering plants that supplied the competition with parts, & threaten them. More recently it was the sound patent lawsuit against the Japanese bikes(fail).
This was a bit stranger, cos of course they owned Buell themselves. But I guess they had their reasons. Maybe the xr has a bigger profit margin per unit than a Buell?
I heard the Kansas plant is threatened with shutdown.

If you look at all the old model Buells sitting on the showroom floor you get an idea why they got dumped. They weren't selling. They were pysically too small and were no match for the Japs. I had a new Cyclone when I lived in Texas. Might as well have put on a pink dress. It didn't go down well at all but it was a lot of fun to dive pissed.
I eventually traded it for a late model Sporty.

Hey Doug's got one of those XR girly bikes.
I realy like the 1125r but they blow up too, I know a guy thats onto his third motor already. However this one's going to take some blowing up. hehe.

hah! Im glad to see u got the manual open at the right page...is that carnage outta a 1125r motor? are u the fixer man?
i wish i knew how to rebuild heads, let alone any part of the inside of a motor.
I guess maybe I should get some crappy cheap motor & experiment.

Yeah Brett this is a 1125r motor, And no I'm not doing the repairs the owner is. Here's some of the new bits. Mmmmmm nice.

Hey who said Buell was dead???? Here's there new 1190rr sweeeeet.

Yeah, Buell is still being made, but it's focus is running a race team and supplying race teams.

The xr didn't kill buell,buell killed buell harley davidson wanted to put hd on the tank when they first brought buell eric buell said no so effectively signing his own fate,in the 25 or so years they were in production they only sold around 150,000.00 bikes, not much,whereas in 1 year of xr production they sold that many,doesn't take much to to figure by those numbers why hd shut it down at our shop we have sold about 40-45 since they came out pretty good numbers for 1 model and I am just about to click over 37k on mine I ride it everyday to work and have done a few trackdays on it,it scare's jappa's and ducati's with how good it is under brakes and got a 2nd last year on it at the mother's mc raceday good bike and a lot of fun.

I pass an XR going the other way most days when i ride my sporty to work, im quite keen to take one for a thrash, they look like fun

Spare a thought for the Moco employees in the US. At York they said 'take pay cuts or we'll lay hundreds of people off & move everything to Kansas'. Now they're saying the same thing to the people at Kansas, except this time they're threatening to move everything to York...