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[FLSTFI Dave]

Why should they try to improve, reading all the bikes you owned, sounds as if you have more money than common sense, if you keep buying them they wont try to improve much.
Myself i've owned 2 harleys, an old evo, and my 2007 se ultra. The evo never gave me trouble, the 2007, thats another story, and there will not be a 3rd harley in my life.

Do the math, I average 25K a year on a bike, and my wife closer to 30K.  Other than her Heritage which in just under 3 years had just over 80K and trade was not enough for us to let it go we trade every two years, bike under 50K.  Funny story on her Heritage, the stator went out, two miles from the dealer.  21 month old bike, 53K on it.  New Service writer looks at the bike writes down mileage and tell me its around 500 for the new stator and labor.  I said nope, under factory warranty.  He said I ride the hell out of the bike, I said nope rode it once its my wife's.

Cost me 5K to go from her 13 Street glide to a 15 Road Glide special.  I figure 2500 a year is not bad.  Over 25K miles a year.

Usually costs me 6500 to get a new CVO every other year. 

07 was first year of the 110, way high number of issues. 

A friend tried to trade a 5 year old bike with 110,000 miles on it, they told him to keep it, and they would take 1K off a new bike.

Again why I trade before 50K, unless I plan to keep the bike until I can no longer ride.  Makes economic sense to me.  This also means the bikes are traded when the warranty is up, so I do not buy extended ones.   My wife and I both love to ride.  This is our bond and something we both love.   My 06 truck just hit 60K three weeks ago.  I have traded 5 of my bikes with over 45K on each in that amount of time.

[JCZ]

Well you your wife gets her money's worth out of her bike. 

I've always been of the mind set that I have to ride it to get my money's worth (14k miles since xmas....just under ten months....when I brought it home from Chip & Nancy's).  If you don't ride them, then they're just expensive garage jewelry. 

I know what it was like to ride an old flathead, panhead and shovel head before the evo came out.....haven't forgot those days.  And never rode near as far as I do now.  However, the MoCo has dropped quality control and just one example is crank run out.  They keep loosening the standard to keep the stock holders happy.

[FLSTFI Dave]

Well you your wife gets her money's worth out of her bike. 

I've always been of the mind set that I have to ride it to get my money's worth (14k miles since xmas....just under ten months....when I brought it home from Chip & Nancy's).  If you don't ride them, then they're just expensive garage jewelry. 
.

I fully agree.  We both got our 15's in Sept of 15.  She has just over 30K on hers and I have just over 27K on mine, and we each have another bike we ride.  We do almost all our traveling by bike, and take at least four trips a year, or more.

[BigLew]

I really think the advertising monies that HD spends is all about trying to sucker a new generation of riders into the big black deep rat hole that we are all in. Would I buy a new bike, not sure but I don't think so. Pretty happy with mine, but there is not much left on her that is stock. Fixed all of the issues with higher quality parts from somebody other than Harley. To be honest I don't much care what the motor co does. I'm in this rabbit hole because I chose to be. When I bought my last bike I wasn't planning to keep it stock so I never really thought about what was going to go wrong. My plan is to develop a good relationship with my local dealers and wrench turners. I know most of us don't like the current status of the Motor Co but its now big business, things will never be like whatever the good old days were like. I think the 110's have a few issues that I wish they would fix, but that would mean they would have to admit there is a problem. I do think HD is very forgiving on warranty and sometime it takes a little longer to fix because we are constantly changing things on the bikes and expecting not to get caught or acting like it shouldn't matter. Well that's just stupid. Lets see go buy a new Bmw M3 and change the cam and springs, remove the cats and replace the mufflers and retune the brain. Then have a warranty issue and expect them to fix it at no charge. I can tell you how that will end up.

BigLew