RE: AMC (When Harleys lost their souls)

[klonestar]

Im still trying to get used to AMC being a 'good' thing! Ya see my only past experience w/AMC is w/Harleys and you dont want an AMC Harley! (mid to late 70's AMC owned Harley D for a few years and during this time quality control went to the birds!) Some even say thats when Harleys lost their souls!

Then again I've seen more than one V8 Gremlin and almost bought one several years ago. Decided I couldnt afford the speeding tickets! It had a blown 454 in it!:shiver: It was a single seater w/seat moved back about two feet sitting on top of the rear of the tranny!

[woody]

Ya sure that wasn't AMF that owned Harley Davidson?

[Spudboy]

I could be wrong but I think you are referring to when AMF owned Harley Davidson. Quite a different company from AMC. One made cars and the other made bowling balls.

Spudboy

Edit: woody beat me to it!

[DaJudge]

AMF!

[klonestar]

Duh!!

Ok I just finished working 9 -12 hour shifts in a row ! Time for a beer and a nap!

[WB9YZU]

Riiiiight.
AMF, you know, the bowling alley guys, owned Harley for a while. It has been generally agree'd that they just about drove them out of business due to lack of innovation and quality.

AMC, American Motors Corporation, was made out of a number of smaller auto companies after WWII. IIRC, without actually looking it all up, Keyser, Willys, Nash and Hudson. In the 80's Renault purchased stock in AMC to get more exposure in the US market and collaborated with the AMC designers on a number of products. One of them was the midsized Cherokee.
AMC was the number 4 US automaker until purchased by Chrysler in 86', at which time, Chysler took Jeep, closed the auto factories, and screwed Wisconsin out of the incentives we gave them to keep the Kenosha plant running.

[mdl]

Im still trying to get used to AMC being a 'good' thing! Ya see my only past experience w/AMC is w/Harleys and you dont want an AMC Harley! (mid to late 70's AMC owned Harley D for a few years and during this time quality control went to the birds!)

It's AMF. :D

Oh everyone allready caught it.

[Bent]

Riiiiight.
AMF, you know, the bowling alley guys, owned Harley for a while. It has been generally agree'd that they just about drove them out of business due to lack of innovation and quality.


Their bungling didn’t end there, they did the same thing to Lionel Trains.

[GSequoia]

Audious Mother ----- Uhh, what were we talking about?

[dyna]

AMC would have been an improvement in the dark days.

[Sarge]

AMF is also one of the reasons HD is still around. Without the money they had HD would have gone under. The lack of QA was the push for the buyout that followed that gave us the present greedy company.

Sarge

[Tom in KY]

AMF is also one of the reasons HD is still around. Without the money they had HD would have gone under. The lack of QA was the push for the buyout that followed that gave us the present greedy company.

Sarge

Also one of the factors that opened up the import bike market. Before AMF, the forein bike makers didn't seem to try to compete with Harley. Then the Honda Shadow, followed by the Magna. Yamaha Virago and Kawasaki Vulcan, Suzuki has a big line of street cruizers now. Victory Motors? It's getting harder to distinguish the Harleys from the rest of the crowd. So many "custom" Harleys, so many variations of Harley design from the imports.

live within 60 miles of "little Sturgis" The Harleys still camp out on one side of the road and the imports have to camp on the other side. I HAVE A DREAM,, THAT SOMEDAY, ALL BIKES WILL BE TREATED EQUALLY AND ALL WILL HAVE THE SAME OPPORTUNITIES!!!

[RichP]

I had a 70 sportster while I was stationed in calif. AMF was mixed, they did upgrade all the tooling in the HD plants which it needed badly as well as modernize the production line. That said my 70 was a POS but I attribute that to employees more than AMF directly, the employees were actively trying to torpedo them becasue they did not like the corporate policies, these were all old timers.
I got real good at tranny work on it, replacing shifting forks .. All that said it was still great having a bike in calif during that time...

[Spudboy]

With respect to the original post, the V8 Gremlins were crazy fun to drive. When I was in Pensacola, Florida one of my buddies had a brand new '73 with a factory 304 and four speed. That thing would go like a scalded dog. At the time I was driving a '66 American with a 290 V8 and four speed. I didn't know it at the time, but there were less than 100 of them made in 1966. In 1967 they went into production as the Rebel. When I got it back to Idaho, my brother and I decided the 290 wasn't enough and put a built 390 in it like the later model Scramblers. Did bracket racing and car shows for a couple of years and then sold it. In all the fooling around we stripped the paint and found out that it had been severely wrecked at some point in its history. Had a different roof welded on and the front crossmember was welded to the unibody rails. It was a blast to drive though.

I've had several AMC vehicles over the years and got good service out of all of them. A few quirks, but overall good transportation.

As for motorcycles, never could afford a HD, so it was always rice-burners for me. I would love to have an older model (pre-AMF) one of these days.

Memories!
Spudboy

[Spudboy]

Dang, I misspoke. In 1967, it was the Rogue, not the Rebel that was built on the American platform.

Cheers
Spudboy

[w_howey]

I had 2 Concord Wagons. Those things were ugly, but damn they just ran. The fender tops rusted out though.

Mom had a Hornet Sport with a 304, and a T-case. Fun driving.

I owned one of those AMF/Harley Mini-bikes. Had the lights,signals,speedometer,and even liscense plate brackets. Fun to ride, but the closest I ever wanted to a Harley. Would much rather have a nice riding bike, than either an oil leaking, rattling nightmare, or an over-priced, over-hyped, bike made for Docs, and Accountants

[klonestar]

The old Harleys dont leak oil! They just mark their spot!:jester:



I owned one of those AMF/Harley Mini-bikes. Had the lights,signals,speedometer,and even liscense plate brackets. Fun to ride, but the closest I ever wanted to a Harley. Would much rather have a nice riding bike, than either an oil leaking, rattling nightmare, or an over-priced, over-hyped, bike made for Docs, and Accountants