This is hilarious. I never cared for Harley’s, overpriced and technologically deficient with the exception of the V-Rod where Porsche helped them engineer a new and compelling engine (no longer sold). And the reason they’re doing so poorly is other manufacturers make much better motorcycles with many in this reasonable price range with far better engineering and technology, producing a better motorcycling experience. Harley really suffers for the same reason American car and truck manufacturers do, trying to squeeze every dollar out of their customers by ridiculously pricing their vehicles because they felt they could get away with it. And frankly I wouldn’t buy anything manufactured in India, as I had a bad experience with an Indian IT company developing software for AT&T when I worked there, and you can pull up an endless amount of Indian street vendors making food that will literally make you sick, with Indian transplants in Canada and the UK who dump their trash in public places, parks… Something is morally wrong with Indians and their many false deities and idols they worship, not to mention the raping. What this really is, corporate management trying to make profit from importing cheap components they didn’t engineer or make, stamping their name on it. It’s abusing and trampling on the Harley Davidson name by a company that can no longer produce anything compelling on their own. They deserve to go into the dustbin of history.
https://spectator.org/can-an-indian-save-harley/
by Eric Peters
Maybe the better question is: Can the new (2027) Sprint 440 save Harley?
As you may already know, Harley is hardly making any money — selling bikes, that is. The bulk of its earnings come from financing them, which is something like using a heart-lung machine to keep a body alive. Eventually, you’ve got to figure out a way to get the body working on its own again. The core problem for Harley is that Harley’s bikes cost too much — for most younger buyers — and the older buyers who can afford to finance them are getting old. The typical HD owner is well into his 50s. The thing is, motorcycle riding is — fundamentally — a thing for younger buyers. Many stick with it into middle age but inevitably, the ranks thin in tandem with the appearance in the mailbox of AARP cards.
Harley badly needs under-30 buyers who have another 30 years of riding (and buying) left to go. Enter the Sprint 440, which is a new, entry-level, single-cylinder bike that stickers for $6,000. That’s a bike almost anyone can afford; it’s a bike many won’t even have to finance, and even if they do, the payments will be less than half what they’d be to finance a Harley that costs twice-plus (or more) than that, which is most of the rest of them. (The next-least-expensive Harley is the Nightster — which stickers for $10k to start.)
Of course, there’s a catch.
The Sprint 440 isn’t exactly a Harley — if you define a “Harley” as having an engine made by Harley-Davidson. The Sprint 440’s single-cylinder engine is made by Indians — not the ones in Spirit Lake, Iowa (where Indian motorcycles are assembled). The ones in India. Harley struck a deal with Hero MotoCorp to buy the latter’s air-cooled, four-stroke singles. It’s more than just the engine (and transmission), too. The Sprint 440’s frame is also made in India — not that there’s necessarily anything wrong with that. The Indians also make the Royal Enfield, which appears to be a fine bike as well as an affordable bike. It looks British, too. It doesn’t seem to matter that it isn’t.
Maybe it won’t matter that this “Harley” is made in India.
Harley says it will be produced in America, which is a little bit disingenuous because it implies manufactured, when the reality is the components already made in India will merely be put together in Pennsylvania. Older Harley owners probably aren’t going to accept this; many are likely to sneer at the Sprint 440 in the same way that — back in the day — many sneered at the AMF Harleys.
Especially the Italian-made Aermacchi “Harleys.”
But that was a long time ago. The Harley Guys who sneered at the AMF/Aermacchi bikes back in the ’70s and ’80s are now old guys. They can afford to be purists, but Harley can’t. It’s sad that Harley can’t (apparently) cost-competitively manufacture its own entry-level bike in the United States because this is not Harley’s fault. There’s no legitimate reason why a single-cylinder, entry-level bike ought to cost so much to manufacture here that it’s not cost-competitive, is perhaps a better way to put it. There is nothing inherently expensive about an air-cooled single-cylinder motorcycle engine or a tubular steel bike frame.
The expense arises from making those things here in the USA.
Obviously, it’s not a problem for the Indians to manufacture such a bike and, not only that, to ship it to the United States (which adds cost) and sell it to Harley at a price that’s low enough that Harley can “produce” the bike (i.e., Harley can assemble the parts) and still sell it retail at a price that’s low enough to be affordable and still (we assume) make a profit on the transaction.
It’d be better, of course, if manufacturing costs were lower here, so that Harley (and not just Harley) could make things cost-competitively here, but that would take taking a hatchet to the regulatory regime (EPA, OSHA), and that’s as likely to happen as carbureted big block V8s coming back.
Nevertheless, the 440’s a good-looking bike — and it looks like a Harley, which is important if Harley wants to maintain itself as something other than what everyone else is selling — just more expensively.
It’s also simple (air-cooled, so no radiator), and that makes it like Harleys used to be. It also has some modernity, such as an analog-looking (but LCD) speedo/tach and ABS brakes and even a USB port for charging phones and such. Its 440 cc engine only makes 27 horsepower, but the bike only weighs just over 400 pounds, which means it’s got enough power to have fun on (not unlike my ’75 Kawasaki S1 250 two-stroke triple, which makes about as much power as this four-stroke single)
The main thing is that it’s accessible.
This is the kind of bike that riders in their 20s who lack the finances of riders in their 50s and 60s can afford to throw a leg over. That could save Harley — so why would anyone who cares about Harley mind that this Harley is made in India?