ALLAN GIRDLER
cknowledgments
- Introduction
- 1957. In the Beginning
- 1958. Down and Dirty
- 1959 The CH goes legit
- XLR The Best of the Brawlers
- 1765 Aimed at the middle
- 1966 They´ve gone about as far as they con go
- 1968 In another direction
- 1971 Fantastic plastic
- 1971 The Public speaks
- XR-750 Street Racer
- 1974 Things you can see things you can´t
- 1977 Born to be collected
- 1978 Happy Aniversary
- 1980 XLS-61 Basic sales boom
- XR-1000 Street racer Revisited
- 1986 XLH-833. The ecolution arrives
- 1986 Buell RR1000. Racer Meets Road
- 1991 Storz 883R The XLVh spirit lives
- Hugger no man´s land
- XLH-1200 The more, the better
- 1994 XLH this is now what will be then?
- Index
In 1957, The Motor COmpany, as they call Harley-Davidson in Milwaukee, was un trouble. The big twins were too bigm the small two-stroke single was too small, and a surge of imports had taken the sporting market from underpowered Model K.
It was time for the Sportster.
Never has a motrocycle been more aptly named. The Sportster kept the K´s best features, borrowed the improvements of the imports, threw in some homemade hot rodding and, before you could say Superbike- a term invented to describe the XLCH the Sportster was making history, setting sales and speed records, and introducing people to the sport of motorcycling and the mystique of Harley Davidson.
The history is still going on.
This book tells how, in sequience, from the circumstances and models that preceded the XL through to the 1200 Evo, with its fice speeds and belt drive. On the way, there ere in-depth looks at the race-ready XLC that began the SUperbike era (and tok even the factory by surprise), at the radical Cafe Racer and super-sport Buell, and at the price-buster XLX that taught the imports the value od the dollar.
