Up Front

UP FRONT

The Warriors of (East) Troy

MARK HOYER

REMEMBER THE VIDEO MESSAGE FROM Erik Buell posted on the Buell Motorcycles website when Harley-Davidson shut the company down in October, 2009? Erik’s downcast eyes, subdued tone and crumpled demeanor? Forget it.

I flew to Wisconsin after we awarded the EBR 1190RS Best Superbike honors in our Ten Best voting so I could personally deliver the message to Erik Buell. I also looked forward to the opportunity to tour the facility and sneak a street ride on the bike.

EBR is in the same East Troy, Wisconsin, building as when it was Buell, just a smaller (but growing) portion of it. There is no grand entranceway or fancy sign on the door, just a few cars in the front parking lot on this rainy day.

How EBR remained in the building is an amusing anecdote: “I bought one of the CNC lathes and one of the mills when the equipment was being auctioned off after the sale, then rented the space around them so we didn’t have to move them!” More clever engineering from Erik Buell...

The photo you see below was everybody who was in the building at EBR the day of my visit, and it is most of the people who work at the company. I got them all together in the lobby there with the various iterations of Erik Buell’s machines—from the RR 1000 Erik himself is leaning against to the latest EBR 1190RS—under the auspices of taking a group photo. Which I did. But I also wanted the opportunity to congratulate the man and the people at EBR who made the bike happen, and who will propel the company to grow and evolve.

The energy and enthusiasm in that industrial building was impressive. The simplicity of the process they are currently engaged in is also pretty attractive. Sure, the budgets are small and the office space bare-bones (desks, low partitions and prototype parts here and there), but when it comes time to get something done, it gets decided. And it gets done.

Indifferent or sometimes apparently hostile corporate structure? A parent company that doesn’t necessarily understand your segment of the market or what your brand should be trying to achieve? Layers of bureaucracy deflecting effort at forward motion?

Gone!

Out in the factory, bikes were coming together. Engines arrive from Rotax, get completely stripped for their change to 1190RS spec, etc. There was a tidy area for fabrication, an EBR-made oven for cooking carbon-fiber parts, and all the other bits and pieces that make up a motorcycle business. Bikes were being readied for shipping.

The machine I was most interested in was the carbon-fiber-clad test unit that had been ridden by our own Steve Anderson at Road America for our exclusive first ride (CW, August). It was parked near the back door, ready for a spin on the roads around the factory. Tony Stefanelli, a designer and engineer at EBR who also was a main cog at Buell Motorcycles, was going to be my wingman on his 1125CR.

The 1190RS was great on the road. The fork action was fantastic, steering was light and quick, but the chassis showed excellent stability. Throttle response was crisp and power impressive, with that aggressive-yet-manageable nature highly tuned V-Twins are famous for. Within the limitations of our ride on drying roads, it felt like a world-class streetbike with a racy edge. An American Ducati, but lighter, shorter and, well, American! Can’t wait for the budget version I’d expect to run in the BMW S1000RR price range.

There are, no doubt, many more battles to come for EBR. But having seen a smiling Erik Buell and his crew in their little factory in Wisconsin firsthand, I can tell you they are ready. To borrow the old saying, what has not destroyed them has made them stronger.