Whats Right and (mostly) Wrong with Harley-Davidson in 2020

Episode 247 of Law Abiding biker kicked off some thoughts. 

Harley Davidson has been in trouble lately. My knowledge and experience puts me in a particularly good place to evaluate what they've been doing right and wrong. There's much more wrong.

• I'm a biker. 25 years, Road Captain. I spend my weeks figuring how to get out as much as I can on the weekends. And during the week. And for long trips..
• I'm trained as a business consultant, having spent 35 years improving peoples business process. I have an MBA in Finance from NYU Stern Graduate School and have worked for PwC, HP, IBM, consulting on marketing, sales and supply chain. My clients included helping Trev Deeley (Harley of Canada) design processes and systems to run the firm.
• I'm very computer literate, which is a big part of vehicles today.
• I grew up around cars, dad owning a gas station from the day I was 7. I understand how engines work and can and have built cars from just a body and frame..

To keep it as short as possible:

• Harley never modernized. From engines to forks to radios and lack of GPS. My 2012 Street Glide
  
  has no usb, no bluetooth, no screen and no GPS though most have been standard years before.  You can buy Indians and Yamaha's with overhead cams and water cooling. Harley's Milwaukee 8 is a horrible attempt to have pushrods actuating 4 valves with large claw like actuators. This gets Harley the improved flow of 4 valves per cylinder, but with heavy low RPM valvetrains. Modern engines use overhead cams to actuate light high RPM valvetrains that provide both torque and HP.  Another example of going halfway, Harley water cooled the heads to keep the rider cool, but that leaves the air and oil cooled motor without enough cooling to support performance improvements, like higher compression ratios.
• Harley wants to sell you a platform and then have you spend thousands to dress it up and get the performance to where it should be. Many things you should get for your $25,000 - decent exhaust, nice real leather seats, extended bags, etc. are all extra. The cowbells on many Road Kings, the first thing you see on the bike, are cast, no chrome or black. Boom boxes still need to be manually upgraded, often at a cost when Apple and Android update apps and maps virtually automagically. Harley would sell many more bikes if $25,000 motorcycles had good shocks, nicely stitched leather seats, real bar options and good performance. Harley wants you to buy the bike for $25,000 and add $10,000 in chrome, cams and power commanders. Racks and decent windshields that fit a big
  
  rider (Indian and others have standard adjustable windshields). H-D should sell you a $23,000 bike you're proud to ride and that can get down the road. People don't do much to Diavels or Chieftans or Challengers, they come nicely equipped. The Diavel has some 152 horsepower. Harley is selling bikes with less features, value and performance. That works when the H-D name used to cause lines for bikes. When you have solid competitors like Indian, Ducati, Customs and others, you have to give people great product.
• Harley can make a beautiful, well done, nicely optioned bike. They call them CVO's and charge $40,000+ for them. The $25,000 bikes should be more like the $40,000 CVO's and they'd sell a whole lot more.
• Closely related to #1, but too important not to repeat, riders don't care if the engine has a 45 degree v and pushrods. We're past that. Our F-150's have v6's with overhead cams and turbos.
• Give us good HP and Torque out of the box and sound like an H-D. An Indian Challenger with a breather and Cams and a remap can put out 145HP. You think you can get any (non-CVO) Harley to 145hp with a $1,000 investment?
• Harley already owns the technology with an assist from Porsche. Bump the V-Rod Revolution motor up a few hundred cc's and tune to get good HP and torque and you're there. A V-Rod with good exhaust is water cooled and sounds great. I don't care if you leave pushrod tubes to make the Revolution+ look like a V-Twin, leave them empty or have them flow oil to the heads.

            Harley needs to address the old classy style, like a Deluxe or a
            Heritage but they should be built like resto-mods. Old style
            class on the outside,  new technology, 4 valve overhead
            cam power on the inside.

• Expensive. Everything from clothes to service is expensive.
• Harley is badge engineering 20 years after General Motors showed it didn't work. We have Road Kings, Street Glides, Road Glides and Electroglide/Ultras with very little if any real differences. The same chassis. My buddy got a Road Glide Ultra as a loaner, probably one of the worst boring combinations of the Road Glide fairing (which I like) with the rest of the bike being the way too heavy for me Ultra.  While Harley is investing in potential new areas, the best two bikes in the lineup, those that are the Harley name, the Softail and the Tourers are badge engineered mediocrity.
• Make an attempt to give those people that want new modern styling newer designs. Perhaps a younger or more forward thinking audience. For example, Harley Saddlebags haven't changed in years they are designed to meet that classic look, design something that flows to the back and
  
  melds with a Street Glide fender, that covers the exhaust stock, it makes for better looking ride. You can have two tourer saddlebag designs, a fresh design might actually sell to a younger generation.

Many Harley guys, particularly the new riders that should be attracted don't care about the 45 degree V and pushrods that Harley is clinging to. Its not even clear they know what those parameters are. Recently my buddies loaner from H-D here was running like crap. He let a HOG member ride it to see what was wrong and the member of the Harley Owners Group comes back with his diagnosis. "Its running on only 3 cylinders..". No lie.