I've never quite gotten motorcycles. I understand some of the appeal, but to me they're the loser in a comparison with safety.
Today, I took our guest to the Harley Davidson plant where they build the bikes. I was, shall we say, outnumbered by people who believe in Harley Davidson. Intently. The gift shop sells all sorts of things with the Harley logo. I think that if it occurred to them, they'd sell colostomy bags with the Harley emblem.
Not to say that the factory tour wasn't mildly interesting -- it was about the same as the tour I got to take of the GM Hydramatic Transmission plant, decades ago. Which is to say, massive, noisy, and full of hulking machines. But a little of that goes a long way. Five minutes into it, I really wanted to ask questions that they would have found rude, such as --
What is a Softail, anyway?
Does Custom Vehicle Operations mean 'these are hand built; the others are mass produced?" and, if so, are the CVOs better in some way?
Why, if the original company was one guy named Harley and three guys named Davidson, isn't the company called Davidson-Harley?
But I doubted they'd answer.
2 comments:
A softail has suspension for the rear wheel. A hard-tail doesn't...
You rely on the seat having a couple of springs, instead. Although I do know one guy who rides a hard tail with a piece of plywood for a seat. He painted it black, which might provide some cushioning...
Wait, I could swear I saw a colostomy bag with the HD logo on it... HD have, over the last couple of decades, worked very hard at making "Harley-Davidson" a lifestyle choice. You can, quite literally, buy HD branded underwear. Ducati try to do something similar, but the comparison ends there. Ducati *is* a lifestyle choice. You choose to be poor when you own such a machine... Nah, owning a Duc is a bit like owning a Ferrari (so I've heard; I only know the "owning a Duc" bit); owning an HD machine is a bit like admitting you wear jeans.
The CVO is a partially hand built machine. It gets some special treatment at the factory. Let me put this way: HD produces more CVO bikes for the US market than all of the bikes Ducati actually makes and sells worldwide. Special? Sort of.
There's an interesting history out there of HD; if I ever come across it again, I'll try to remember to let you know the title. I tried to read it, but not being very interested in HD machines, I didn't get through it. (There was a competition, with a new 2010 HD machine as the prize, at a local library. It was sponsored by the local HD dealer. One of the librarians asked me to buy a ticket; I declined on the basis that I didn't want to take the chance of winning the bike...)
Hope that explains it!
I love bikes, but I think you knew that. :-)
I did gather that there is a blue-collar ethos about the bike (though I know that many riders are, in fact, managerial and technical types). The tour guide (who was TERRIBLE) asked who in the group rode. As many of them had Harley TShirts, he got an enthusiastic response. Where's your bike, he'd ask. One guy said Over there, behind the bush. Oh, the guide replied, a Honda? Hilarity ensued.
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