[jbike65]

Very good comments folks. (see harley or Indian thread) In fact almost dead on to what I expected. I put the email out there at the urging of my neighbor. He is a long time Harley guy who also rented a Fatboy with me in Arizona. Oddly enough he had many of the same comments I did about the new Harleys. The question he had would other Harley owners notice the difference and see how things seemed to be converging with the Jap bikes. My friend argued that the Harley group was a fiercely loyal bunch of guys who could not be fooled. You all certainly proved that with you comments. Good for you!

I told you all that I was an engineer. I am also the president of a 100 million dollar company and would kill for the type of brand loyalty you guys have. From a business point of view Harley has done some unbelievable things. Not only have they commanded a premium price (economics 101 supply and demand) for their bikes they have also created a frenzy around the purchase of clothing and accessories. This is actually an old marketing trick used by companies like Disney and makes a boatload of money. Believe me the Harley guys are doing it right! All companies are about making money and anyone who thinks otherwise is a fool.

So what is my point? I think the Harley crowd needs to start practicing some tough love. I think there was only one comment that gave Indian any credit at all. I understand the comments about me. I loved the one about my lack of character. Given what I do for a living that’s pretty funny. Anyway, there are a lot of great bikes coming out on the market today. Indian, Big Dog and Henderson just to name a few. The Japs are coming along as well. This is some truly nice stuff. Harley is included in that mix. Just look at the V-Rod. Now that’s a bike designed to take market share! Sorry Harley purists but you business sense is for ****.

If I had any advice for Harley it would be this. Continue fighting nose to nose with the Japs. You are doing a great job! The place you have to worry about is the high end. Indian and Big Dog are on to something. All bullshitting aside they truly have a different feel then the new Harleys. The attention to detail gives them the feel of a custom at close to production prices. My guess is that if Indian is successful with their new motor and gets rid of some of the quality issues Harley will have a run for their money. Buy the way that’s a good thing. How cool would it be to see Indian’s and Harleys going nose to nose again! Now that’s American motorcycling at it’s finest!

Well sorry for the lecture. Keep riding those Harley they are great bikes!

 

[PHATBOY]

I told you all that I was an engineer. I am also the president of a 100 million dollar company.

I own a Mansion & a Yaht,My name ia Elmer J. Fudd!!! LMFAO
Those type of remarks only come from people compensating for a little wiener!!!
By the way,all of us here are Millionaires,we just don't need to brag.DI*KHEAD

 

[logical]

Even if what you said about your big company is true little biker boy, all that makes you is a jackass with a good job. Go play on the Indian Forum...which is probably just a chat room that somebody created on Prodigy.

 

[jbike65]

You guys just don’t get it! Here I am trying to broaden your horizions and you give me nothing but grade school crap. I am for real and my company has helped Harley over the years to make some damn fine bikes. So please don’t give me your dirtbag bike bull. With out companies like mine you would still be on the side of the road trying to get your bike started.

Try having a real discussion. Not about me or the suppose size of my d*ck. The forum is about bikes and a company named Harley. Acept for a moment I just might know a few things you do not given my experience (No, I was not tring to impress you with my paycheck, I have nothing left after my wife spends it anyway) and try to have an intelligent conversation about it. In the end I want to see Harley do very well. Jap bike producers don’t bye **** from US manufactures like me.

Try again but lets try to take it off the play ground this time!

 

[FifthGear]

I do believe that this Jbike65 boy tried to insult us Harley owners from the start. I hate it when I'm insulted and don't realize it. LOL.

Hey Jbike, Indians are kinda cool(because they are actually an evo-type powered clone). But I wouldn't own one as my only bike....and I certainly would not think they have more character than the bikes that they are copied from or the original Indians. But I'd ride with an Indian owner and ride with any brand owner if he didn't rely on me to trouble shoot the problems on his strange bike when it broke down. The character is in the rider not the bike. I would much rather ride with a man with character than an asshole on a bike-with-character.

If you really have an Indian (which I'm beginning to doubt) you are going that extra mile to try to convince others that it is better than owning a Harley. For you it must be. But I and most others here would not trade their bike for an Indian. So let it go. Enjoy what you got but don't expect my jaw to drop in awe when you ride by.

You keep talking about the Harley Davidson Motor Company as if we all worship it. I don't think that's the case. I couldn't care less about what measures or marketing against the Japanese that they do or what the Japanese are doing or what they make. Harley is making and have for years made the type bikes that I enjoy. It's not important for me to feel all warm and fuzzy with a company that makes a product that I like.

Get over what ever is bothering you about the Harley owners and their bikes. You can't change the world and saying that an American Legend like a Harley Davidson motorcycle doesn't have the character of a recent manufacturer's Indian is just plain HOG wash.

Try to be a little nicer in your posts and less insulting. You started with the insults so don't act as if you are a little nice boy being jumped on by the Harley bullies. LOL

 

[Guest]

Jbike, what's your point?

I'm pretty sure a Shelby has things a stock Mustang doesn't, and a Cars and Concepts minivan has stuff Chrysler didn't think of. It doesn't bother me that an Indian (or any of the other low-volume 'boutique' manufacturers you mentioned) has things a Harley doesn't. You rode one Harley, once, and condemn the entiree marque on a list of Harley fans. Whatdja expect, roses?

We bought Harley's because we like to ride. When we're a 1000 miles from home and need a framistan for our ride we like to have a dealer in the next town, not 2 states away. Seems to me that folks who buy custom-builts or boutique brands don't seem to put a lot of miles on them, unless they have a truck full of parts and tools following them around for when the seat falls off or the head bolts strip themselves out (ala Jesse James on national TV ...). How many miles have you put on your Indian?

If you thought a bone-stock fuel-injected FatBoy was too smooth and civilized for you, how 'bout trying a carbed Dyna, or better yet a 1200 Sportster? How 'bout trying one with the 'Harley tax' (air cleaner, pipes and rejet) paid? That or more is what most of us ride.

BTW, what's your company's name? Maybe we'll buy something ... Of course, I'd be surprised if you mentioned your company's name here. I'm pretty sure H-D would not take to kindly to one of their vendors ripping their product in a public forum frequented by customers ... sort of like the president of Bendix complaining about how crappy Chevy's are to a Camaro club ...

 

[logical]

This dirtbag bike bull commentor has his batchelors in mechanical engineering, masters in management and works in automotive product development. I tore into you because I don't like people showing up in our happy little group and making their first post some kind of semi-clever little mind game trying to stir up the pot. The schoolyard crap was a natural reaction to the smart-assed way you barged into this forum.

And by the way, Harley continuing to improve the ride, handling, reliability and comfort of their products does not make them "trying to turn Japanese". From 100 yards away most of today's Harleys look like they did 40 years ago which is just fine with most buyers. I don't see harley rushing out to look like Japanese bikes. even the V-rod deserves a little more credit than being called a japanese clone. To call it that misses the whole point. It is about creating a product for a segment of the market that they currently aren't strong in. It doesn't change what all their other bikes are.

Go broaden someone else's horizon.

 

[Straydog]

Your first post was irritating. Now you are becoming humorous. Thanks for lifting our spirits!

 

[FifthGear]

LMAO!! You know Jbike65, the more I went back and read your post the funnier it got. When you said that there are great bikes coming out on the market like Indian, Big dog, and Henderson, you wern't talking about Excelsior Henderson that filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy and was forced to lay off 101 of it's 116 person work force were you? LOL. I would think that a president of a 100 million dollar company so closely related to motorcycles as you say would at least be aware of such things. I really wouldn't expect you to know much about bikes themselves though.

You talk about tough love and that we should be praising other brands of bikes. Are you kidding? This is a Harley Davidson forum. You want us to just ramble on about how great some other brand is when we couldn't care less? If you are not getting the proper encouragement and pats on the back for a good choice in bikes on a forum for your brand, don't come here spewing spit wanting us to congratulate you on your smart bike purchase decision. You made the choice....now you got to live with it. LOL

 

[guido]

Tough love? Did I read that right? WTF?

jbike65,you are entitled to your opinion,just drop the "Holier than Thou" attitude.We don't care what you do for a living.

Folks in here like riding Harley-Davidson motorcycles. Seems like a simple enough concept to me. What part of it DON'T you understand?

I truly hope you enjoy your Indian,let us enjoy our Harleys, ok?

By the way, I ride a 95 evo powered FLSTC, hardly Japanese like in any stretch of the imagination.

As far as Indian, Big Dog,etc, time will be the ultimate judge my friend!
guido

 

[guido]

I almost forgot jbike 65, Thank You for trying to broaden our horizons.
You did a bang up job insulting all of us in this forum with that comment!


By the way, welcome.
guido

 

[fourhour]

This may be ironic, but if we just ignore him, he'll go away! Logical, I recognise you from f150online. We've seen this **** there also!

 

[skydoc]

jbike 65 is just flame bait folks. There are a lot of folks on this forum that could give his academic credentials a run for their money, myself included, so he isn't impressing anyone. Seeing how this is tax time and all, he just gave me a painful reminder that the more you make, the more you pay out to the tax man, so more isn't always better. He has no idea who the members here are or what we bring to the table. Obviously, this MORON hasn't figured out the common bond here, WE LOVE HARLEYS! If I wanted to "broaden my horizens" I would search out other boards that cater to the other "horizen broadening" crap. Because I'm middle aged and a grandfather (x5) I don't think I can stand too much "horizen broadening". Oh wait, whats that I see outside the window? A break in the weather. Guess I'll go for a putt on the scooter and "maybe my horizen will broaden as I ride

 

[logical]

FourHour-

That's me alright on F150, although I was just there for the first time in months last night. What truck do you have? You aren't one of those Lightning guys are you?

 

[HIPPO]

I don't know yet where you are coming from, but if most of what is stated were true, to a large degree you would still be missing the point.


Being poor doesn't make you dumb, and viceversa. Many of the points made about the MOCO are absolutely correct, but you seem to forget that most of the guys that have been riding for a while have plenty of good old horse sense or they would never have made it.
Sure we buy the bike, because that's what we ride, but that's the only money the factory will ever see from us, once the bike rolls out of the showroom they will never see it again. Even wealthy people eventually get tired of paying $300.00 for what in reality amounts to an oil change, smoke and mirrors and PR and paying in some instances up to $100.00 an hour for labor that could not even command a fraction of the price without the logo attached to it. They eventually figure out that the chick with the nice chest or the dude with a bowtie may look good but sure as hell isn't going to fix the bike.

We go to great lenghts to learn and help each other in order to become self sufficient, and the internet gives us a great conduit to do this. We deal with aftermarket companies that give us engineering and value for our money.

The people at the factory are not stupid, they are very good at marketing and they even have very good engineers. They are very aware that an ever larger number of even new owners is getting an education on how to properly maintain and repair their own bikes, and virtually no one trust the dealers.
If you are half the engineer you claim to be, you would have realized that all the state of the art engineering, particularly in electronics, that goes into the bikes these days is not primarily to improve the product, but in ever more monopolizing the repair and aftermarket.
Guess what, there are some of us that may not even have a job, but we are just as good as the engineers at the factory and perhaps even you.
So, that's my story.


Now, why would an engineer that has done design work for the factory and presumably would have better things to do knock them on a public forum.

I think that if you want to play and have an adult discussion, you should put your cards on the table.

 

[fourhour]

Logical: '98 Lariat is my ride. Would rather have an F150 Harley Edition than a Lightning! May be coincidental but I think F150online went downhill when they forced the Lightning owners to post in the General Discussion section! IMHO. And we both know there have been some posts like this there too that can get downright redundant. Why do people who don't own a Harley (or Ford Truck) post in these boards? Maybe a criteria for joining should be completing the ownership section with the proper vehicle and if left blank or wrong, reject the membership application. They can lie, but the admin has the ability to remove the post from the board whenever he/she pleases. Anyway, I just joined last weekend, but let me be the first to welcome you back .

 

[JimmyK]

"I told you all that I was an engineer. I am also the president of a 100 million dollar company ..."


Hey I saw that commercial! No, no...damn that was hair Club For Men....****


Yea, I'm the guy who made the comment you liked so well. For the record, while I admit from a business perspective (Forbes most admired), The MOCO is on target, however, they have forgotten their roots.

Why do I ride a Harley? Because the people that mean something to me do. I love being with the people that mean something to me and shareing with them that which they love.

Harley Davidson is a dying breed bike. When they turned their backs on those who stood by them in exchange for the rich bastards that have no soul, they made a big mistake.

Loyalty goes to the grave. Fads and todays "thing to do" are replaced by some other toy.

Your 100m Co in business is total trade value? There is a vast difference between net worth and paper transactions. You can do a total of 100M in sales and have an associated cost of 99.95m. While you can still brag at having a 100m Company your net worth won't buy the beans around the campfire in Blazing Saddles.

Like I said, there is something very basic to man that you lack.

I kind of feel bad for you in a way. Nahhhhhhhh I feel bad fro yer wife


I have NO loyalty to The MOCO. Mine is with my brothers. If you are ever in Texas look me up. I'd be happy to let you continue your survey at that time.

 

[HIPPO]

You know, bro, you might be closer to the truth then you think.


The whole thing is too elaborate and coherent to come from a little kid. Mixing some accurate information with a bunch of fluff to attempt to make the whole credible is one of the oldest tricks in the book, ask the government. LOL

Maybe this dude works for the MOCO, maybe he actually owns a company that is being squeezed out in the way I mention, and maybe he even works for Indian and is trying to sell a bike.

Maybe he even has read SunTzu, blahahahahahahahaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!!!

 

[LarJon]

Hey jbike65,

Found a nice site that says it all for me ! You definitely need to check it out.

http://www.silverraven.com/fy.htm

Regards from Northeast Texas,

LarJon

 

[Bruce]

LarJon,

I loved that site.
I have a list of people who will be seeing it in their mailbox very soon.