Buell is dead. Finally.

[The Buddha]

http://www.buell.com/en_us/

Who knew that if you produced garbage and sold it for trumped up prices, and meddled with the racing organisations and get them to allow 2 X the displacement for just your bikes, you'd only last 10-12 years in the world.

BTW I thought they were making big $$$ pushing the crap. WTF happened.

Yea the Harley lump was garbage in the thing, the Rotax powered one was fuuuughly ... but HD owned KTM, why not shove a KTM one in it.

I liked the gas in frame, oil in swingarm design though, but too bad it came with a HD lump.

Cool.
Buddha.

[annguyen1981]

It's about TIME!!!!!

Honestly, I've NEVER seen one on the road. EVER.

[tt_four]

Wow, that bums me out. I love Buell motorcycles. I'm done buying new motorcycles, so saying that really means absolutely nothing to Buell. I also don't have any crazy amount of income, so at the time I'll only have one motorcycle, and since that's the case i'd only own one that's japanese for reliabilities sake. Someday if I have a second bike, I'd love to pick up a Buell if I could get a good deal on one. I know they're underpowered compared to other 900-1200 bikes in their class, but they just look like they'd be awesome to ride. They're one of the few bikes that was actually made for riding around town, and was made with it's own engine. As I've complained about before, most "naked" bikes are just decade old sportbike engines built up with cheap parts to try to sell to one more segment of the market, when their real focus is sportbikes and cruisers. Buell was completely focused on fun streetbikes, so i can appriciate that. God forbid a company actually try to make something different than what you see everywhere else. As much as I don't like Harleys, it'd be cool if they kept one of the Buell bikes and put it out as a Harley model. Even if they went back to a steel frame and shiny parts that Harleys are more known for, it'd be cool to have a sport V-twin street bike as a choice.

My best hope is that they turn into some lame brand that died out, and the bikes are selling cheap in 10 years, instead of becoming rare and selling for way more than I'd want to pay.

[DoD#i]

It seemed like a good idea ('mrkin made non-cruisers), but the execution sucked. When shopping for the bike that ultimately became the GS, I considered Buells, but the reliability (or lack thereof) horror stories abounded to the point that I ended up passing on them entirely. Presumably parts support will wane, and they will be left high and dry. It's not like HD was ever all that into them anyway...

[tt_four]

For the time being parts and service is supposed to stick around, but they didn't give any idea as to how long. I'm sure plenty of the parts for the older harley engines can be made for not too much more than harley spends to make theirs, and the newer bikes didn't even have harley engines, so hopefully those parts could still be found somewhere.

[The Buddha]

No one bought the buell now. The HD faithful, just got HD, the true sport bikers well, even if they wanted a V twin, they got jap, better and cheaper. Decades old sport motors are perfectly fine for naked's IMHO. B12, B6 and SV nakeds as well as FZ1, FZ6, CB919/599, and Z and ZRX kawi's - nothing wrong with any of em. GS too.

My question is, now that buell is part of HD what is he gonna do. Buell was a skunk, then it got integrated ... can he start another skunk ? In this economy, prolly easier to ramp up in this economy. Prolly have a true revolutionary motor - home grown ethanol/bio diesel bike that actually runs well.
Cool.
Buddha.

[The Buddha]

Yea the rotax motor buell looked like garbage. It may have run OK, but the damned radiator on the sides. Pure garbage. Just hang the bloody thing in front which is where they look the least ugly.
Cool.
Buddha.

[tt_four]

That very last buell wasn't the prettiest thing to look at. Those air scoops were just too much for my tastes. There's still either a radiator or an oil cooler, not sure which, right behind the front wheel.

The buell's before that one were gorgeous though. I know people here are pretty picky about their bikes, and if it's not a GS it usually gets scoffed at for having too much power, being too hard to work on, or whatever other various reasons I usually hear, but they still looked like great bikes. They had reliability issues, but you can't expect them to have all the kinks worked out when they sell 5000 bikes a year compared to some Japanese manufactures who sell 300,000, that's just an unreasonable expectation. Look how long Triumph has been around, and their bikes are still no where near as reliable.

I understand the Buell's aren't everyone's idea of a great bike, but they had their following, came out with plenty of innovations, and managed to stick around for 25 years, so it's not like they don't deserve some credit. An SV1000 might be a better bike, but it really isn't doing all that well either. I rarely see them around anywhere, and they have absolutley not appeal to them. The SV650 had a large following, and suzuki is just trying to grab onto that with the 1000.

The FZ1 comes across as more of a light duty touring bike to me, I like the 919 but they're not too common, and from what I've read in reviews are a little bland, Speed Triple is cool but has the same reliability issues as buell, honda won't sell the cb1000r here, as I've already said the sv1000 has a great motor but is pretty boring aside from that. I'm a pretty big fan of the Z1000, but out of all of them, if I showed up to a demo ride that had every one of those bikes there, I'd definitely jump on the Buell first, because it just looks like the most fun. I also live in the city, and don't care to spend much of my riding time going too fast on the highway, or flying around back roads pretending like I'm on a supersport, so for my segment of the population, which I think most riders tend to forget about, it definitely looks like the most useful bike.

[tussey]

HAHA. Not surprising. When I was looking for my first bike. I actually really wanted a Buell Bell 500 or whatever it was called. Back then a google search for "Buell" brought back www.buellsucks.com as the first website. I always thought that was hilarious! It was full of horror stories. Random parts simply falling off during highway travel. Footpegs randomly falling off. shaZam! breaking all the time. Engines totaled after a floor room purchase etc etc. So I settled for a '92 GS500 w/24k miles for only $1,100. Best purchase I've ever made in my life. To this day the cheapest GS500 I've ever seen for sale was like $1,300.

Anyways, I bought my GS500 and was too scared to ride it. I ended up with a Buell Bell 500 for my MSF course (taught at the local HD dealer).

OMG what a HUGE piece of shaZam!. I didn't even know much about bikes but I know that bike SUCKED HORRIBLY.
First of all, there was a ton of plastic on it. There was a plastic shield that covered the entire gas tank. It wasn't comfortable to sit in. It looked and felt cheap. PLUS the freaking rattled like a mother F'er. Even at idle the entire frame and mirrors were vibrating and my hands and inner thighs would go numb from the vibration. I asked the instructor if this much vibration was normal and he responded, "Well it's a Harley engine! That's how me make 'em!" with a huge doofy grin. I thought, "well your engineers are retarded. I don't want my nuts being vibrated off when I ride your bike".

Never looked back. What a terrible POS.    :cry:We need a thumbs down emocon.

[The Buddha]

sv1K was too high in $ and too close in performance to the 650. It had lots of good stuff on it, like every part was better than a 650 but didn't matter. It was made 03 and 04, 06 and 07. That was it. @ 8500 or so it never sold. They slashed it to 7k-7500 and it sold out in 07/08.
Didn't help 1 bit that the GSXR 600 would outrun it easy and had more plastic and was cheaper either.

The gas in frame, oil in swingarm series of buell that was the previous generation, yea I like it too.
Cool.
Buddha.

[bettingpython]

Stuff a KTM motor in a buell... uhm you're aware that Rotax is the KTM motor maker right? The 1125R motor is a larger displacement version of the 950 or 990 adventure motor.
How many bashers here have actually ridden the xb12r or 9r which are the HD evo motored bikes? HP 103 right not impressive but at well over 80 ft/lbs of tourqe the were great machines flickable in the twisties and stable.

As for the 1125r I have not ridden one but a fellow rider is president of the buell owners club in my neck of the woods and another rider I ride with did a buell trackday, rented one and loved it... His current ride is a DUC 1098R which was his runner up candidate he got a smokin deal on it before the 1125r was released for sale.

1125r used fuel in the frame, oil in the swingarm just like the evo motored buells did, the radiators were hung where they were so that the steering geometry and wheelbase could be kept tight as possible, just like the side mounted radiators on the RVT1000R(RC51) of honda vtwin racing fame.

How is the displacement difference any differnt than what ducati whined and cried about and got a variance for on WSBK being allowed to run the 1198 against the 1000 cc bikes?

Also displcement is not the determining factor for AMA classification with it being owned by DMG now, bikes are classed on power to weight ratio basis. The bike get's dynoed and weighed and classed accordingly, the 1125R did not up and runaway from the 600's it took alot of hard riding to in the series this year.

Harley bought a controlling interest in KTM and Rotax so they could expand into the european market, which was a godsend for buell racing because they could finally use a modern liquid colled motor.

I for one am sorry to see Buell go, they used Erik to make a name for themselves and utilize the products in the U.S. once they got what they wanted whiich was in the euro market they did this.

Danny Eslick is also a casual aquaintance of mine and this really blows for him as well.

[The Buddha]

Buell whined and complained and is running 1125 cc against 600's. 1200 twin vs 1000 4 is close. Vs a 600 it is really a huge leg up.

The gas in frame oil in SA, HD lumped buell, yea its stable and flickable OK, what its not, is reliable or durable like a 600 or 750 or sv650 is. Still, that would have been a bike I may have bought.

1125 is a great motor, the radiators much like a RC51 are side mounted, but a RC51 has them all packaged into a fairing and it looks fine and very appropriate for the sport bike it is. The Buell 1125CR looks like someone is hiding a couple of sumo wrestlers in the fairing. And it dont have oil in the SA, its not dry sump. Gas in frame, yes. Pretty nice.

Yes buell trackday's always fun, always great, always kickass, and they never let anything wiht a CB or GSX into the track at the same time. Buell only track days ... where the fastest bike is a ... wonder of wonders, buell.

A KTM twin in a serious frame and what not will make a formidable track bike against any other make ... too bad it didn't fit in harleys image. Only thing I have against the 1125 buell is the fugly looks. The older buells looked great, but everything else was a bit off.

Loved it on a track day is just like me saying, I loved it when I saw it in the parking lot. I wont buy it still. There was a lot I liked about it, but there aint no getting around that HD lump and the 1125 fugly.

Cool.
Buddha.

[TheGoodGuy]

One good thing, FIRE SALE!!!!!!!!!

[Caffeine]

I was never much of a fan of their bikes, but I'm sad to  see it happen.   He kinda thumbed his nose at THE SYSTEM and followed his dream.   Kinda like Preston Tucker, in a way.

[birdman561]

Very sad....
An iconic bike and the only Sportbike I would have considered riding these days.
Very sad.........

[yamahonkawazuki]

Hd has been a majority owner of buell for many years now. garbage? ( only to a hater) easy to work on, doenst leak vibrate to hell or throw parts, hell my gs threw more parts than my old firebolt would, ( stillloved my gs though),  a different machine, ? for sure, ill miss em, ill get one down the road, once health alows it, ( got plans and a supercharger waiting    ) teh SC i had purchased for my sportie, removed when i sold it. will go on a buell

[birdman561]

Hd has been a majority owner of buell for many years now. garbage? ( only to a hater) easy to work on, doenst leak vibrate to hell or throw parts, hell my gs threw more parts than my old firebolt would, ( stillloved my gs though),  a different machine, ? for sure, ill miss em, ill get one down the road, once health alows it, ( got plans and a supercharger waiting    ) teh SC i had purchased for my sportie, removed when i sold it. will go on a buell

I would love to see if I could get a deal on one of those City -X 900's.....

[yamahonkawazuki]

Hd has been a majority owner of buell for many years now. garbage? ( only to a hater) easy to work on, doenst leak vibrate to hell or throw parts, hell my gs threw more parts than my old firebolt would, ( stillloved my gs though),  a different machine, ? for sure, ill miss em, ill get one down the road, once health alows it, ( got plans and a supercharger waiting    ) teh SC i had purchased for my sportie, removed when i sold it. will go on a buell

I would love to see if I could get a deal on one of those City -X 900's.....

a fun ride

[tt_four]

easy to work on, doenst leak vibrate to hell or throw parts,

Well now, it may be no harley, but from what I've seen those things still have a monster shake at idle.

That's not enough to turn me away, but it's one more reason that it probably couldn't be my only bike. Seems like a lot of work for a passenger. If I already had another bike with 2 seats, I'd be up for an xb9x, or even one of those 1 seater cyclones.

[GoateeChicken]

QUICK! Buy a Buell, they are gonna be worth poop loads now!