Harley FXR?

The current FXR fad is crazy! Love them or hate them, you cannot deny the fact that the FXR is arguably the best designed frame Harley every produced. The FXR saved Harley from AMF back in the 80’s and has been in a ton of movies; anyone remember Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man? Lately, an unusual amount of FXR’s have been making there way to the shop, I’ve had more in the last few months than I have in the last few years and oddly enough all were from 1992. One was a salmon color (although it looked pink haha!) it was pretty well stock with a chrome front end, 21” front wheel and 16” fatboy on the rear. The second was all-black with a fatboy front end of a 2000ish fatboy, the rear end had been widened so a 180 tire could be run, and it also had a Baker 6-speed. I thought it was pretty cool, looked like a hot rod to me, but the front had to go. We swapped out that fatboy front end for a narrow glide and a 21. I was going for that Marlboro Man look! It came out nice and looks fun to ride it has nice lines to it. Now the third FXR was truly something special. Shovelhead Joe and Josh made quite the drive for this one but it was well worth it! Not only was it 100% stock, its condition was simply immaculate. Original blue paint, mag wheels, Harley Davidson saddlebags and stock exhaust all in perfect condition made you believe this had just left the factory back in ’92! I wanted to move that bike fast; I had two other FXR’s we were playing with so a stock one could just go up for sale. I had Josh list it on Insta-gram, we thought putting the bike up for sale at 5500.00 was a fair price, little did we know, we were sitting on the holy grail of FXR’s. The amount of phone calls I received from that ad was insane, after about an hour Josh took the ad down but that didn’t stop the calls. It turned into a bidding war. I had calls from California, Mississippi, New York, you name it, they were coming from all over the US! After talking to some guys that called I found out the bike was worth 7500.00 and my price was just too low. The blue FXR was the most desirable bike out of the FXR’s I had bought. It was the right year, right paint, right wheels right everything and it was un-touched. Everyone wanted it; I wish I had ten more! The first guy that called was my buddy over at Clem’s Speed Shop here in Michigan, Danny D, he said he would pay asking price and wouldn’t haggle with me which is saying a lot for him. That guy knows how to haggle, paying asking price is just unheard of with him! This is not the first FXR I sold him, when he sees an FXR he wants he sure does find a way of getting it! We dickered for 2 hours over an FXR he bought from me months back. It was built by Tony Carlini and it was one of ten, a rare bike in the FXR world with a flamed-out paint job, it reminded me of the California Kid car. Tons of Ness parts, chrome swing arm, front end motor mounts; you name it, it was chrome. I have the original parts sheet with pricing on it; Carrlini was asking 39,500.00 bucks for it back in the early 90’s so you can imagine it was loaded with all high end parts! I guess it goes to show you how out of touch I am with the FXR world. I would have never thought that blue bike was worth 7500 bucks, it truly was a beautiful bike – a piece of history that’s just not made anymore. It’s funny I’m still learning at 54 years old but I think I will just stick to my shovels and pans! Although I’m not a big FXR guy do I think they are cool. It’s amazing what people are doing to them, the crazy wheelies and rolling burn outs. I think it’s great that guys are still working and fixing up old bikes. Are they perhaps the new Choppers?