Skidmarks - (Excelsior-Henderson) X Factor

If you remember 1993, you remember a moto-environment that was so light in brands and new models that Cycle World put the Yamaha Seca II on its cover, the motorcycling equivalent of going to see Ellen DeGeneres at a strip club. I had forgotten all about that, too, until Trizzle reposted a story from 2003 comparing a Yamaha Royal Star to an Excelsior-Henderson.

I get excited by these “Church of MO” stories and make sure to re-read them if they’re one of my old ones, of which, I’d like to point out, there are far too few. Anyway, John Simpson’s story was a good one, and made me think: Is anybody still riding these Excelsior-Henderson Super X things? And if so, for f-ck’s sake, why?

In case you don’t remember the ’90s (which tells me you were spending your time well), a “problem” everybody thought needed solving at that time was the long wait lists for big-bore Harley-Davidsons. If you were Minnesotan Dan Hanlon and his family, the solution was not to buy used, or even build a kit bike. Nope, they wanted to build a brand-new motorcycle as well as a cutting-edge factory to build it in.

You may or may not remember the story, but it will be a familiar tune all the same. First the idea, then the hiring of the team, then the fundraising and long process of designing a prototype, showing it off, building hype and attention, and then, finally, finished bikes at dealerships. But by the time the process was over, in a surprisingly short five or so years, the first tech bubble had popped, and there was no more investment money to be had, despite the company actually producing a real (and very high quality) product. The money well went dry, and when that happens, no matter how good your product is, you have to close shop and go home. Atlantic Excelsior-Henderson owner Jaime Jones told me they were building bikes until the day the sheriff’s deputies came to lock up the doors.

Almost 2,000 Super X motorcycles left the Belle Plaine, Minn., factory, and a lot of them are still ridden by passionate owners today. When the factory shuttered, many of the bikes languished in crates (there are still some out there, hiding in the deep, dark recesses of dealerships or collector’s warehouses), but almost all of them were snapped up by riders who, like Hanlon, wanted something more distinctive than the competition.

“My Harley Evo had no soul,” Excelsior-Henderson Road Club Secretary, Sean Howard, told me. “Harleys are a cookie-cutter motorcycle, and the people that ride them are too.” Excelsior owners are proud of their motorcycle’s unique and forward-thinking design features, their solid handling characteristics and tasteful aesthetics.

I figured that would be good for 5 or 10 years, but it’s been almost 15 years since the last Super X went hastily out the door, and there are probably somewhere between 300 and 600 Excelsior owners out there (most of whom own multiple Xs). How long would your bike be rideable after the factory closed down?

Fanatical Excelsior owners worried about this even before the factory’s liquidation auction and watched in dismay as a custom builder, Swift Choppers, came with trucks to haul everything – tooling, robot welders, spare parts – away. Apparently, they botched the loading, tossing pallets on top of delicate, irreplaceable parts, destroying about half of the supply of valuable OEM parts.

One of the fans watching was Jamie Jones and his wife Marty. He decided he would retire from his job at John Deere and spend the rest of his working years keeping this small fleet running. He and Marty travelled the country, sorting through damaged parts in hot, dusty warehouses to build up a supply for customers at their business, Atlantic Excelsior-Henderson. They’ve developed a line of improved parts, including an ECU that solves much of the X’s overheating problems.

These problems and many others have cropped up over the years, and in fact, it’s clear that the X was a work in progress, as you’d expect. It represented the first two model years from a brand-new motorcycle factory. The transmissions need fine-tuning, the oil runs too hot and the rear wheels need new bearings. But fix these issues, and it’s a fine heavyweight Twin, able to run all day at 80 or 90 mph while returning 45 mpg. Riders tell me handling, stability and braking are good, even by modern standards. And they’re still cheap. A Super X sold for $4,000 on eBay last week, and Howard told me he got one (admittedly a fixer-upper) for $2,500 last fall.

There are no dealers, and motorcycle shops won’t work on them, so for servicing, you have to have an open mind – and a lot of time. That’s why X owners tend to be older (at 48, Howard tells me he’s “one of the younger guys”) and mechanically adept.

“I don’t ride with them [Harley owners] – they’re a different kind of person,” said Howard. “They talk about what accessories they’re buying while they’re waiting for an oil change. That’s not an Excelsior owner.”

X owners can’t be intimidated about pulling a transmission apart (something every X owner has done, or will do, sometimes every 30,000 miles) or rebuilding an oil pump (again). Because of the extra care required – and none of the people I talked to seemed to mind, likening it to the experience of owning an exotic sportscar – most Xs don’t rack up a lot of miles.

But they can if they need to. A woman named Chookie rides her Excelsior to the Jones’ shop in Virginia from her house in Idaho for her semi-annual service. She’s put well over 80,000 miles on her bike, and she stays with the Joneses while they’re doing the overhaul. Another customer in Minnesota has 41,000 miles on his. Other customers ship their bikes to Jones for service and repair – he’s best known for providing a complete upgrade to a stock E-H, fixing all known issues at the same time to provide the customer with a solid, reliable bike that will run for years.

Folks like the Joneses and Sean Howard aren’t in it for the motorcycles. Sure, it’s a fine and interesting motorcycle, and probably satisfying to ride (I’m going to try to get a ride on one, so stay tuned). It’s the people, the community of like-minded (if a bit odd) souls who share a common love.

“Everybody has a spark in them that is shared by everybody else in the community,” Jamie Jones told me. “I love the bikes and love working on them, but we do it because we really care about these people.”

Learn more about Excelsior:
http://www.ExcelsiorHenderson.com/
http://stores.SuperXParts.com/

Gabe Ets-Hokin was a Chinese revolutionary, first president and founding father of the Republic of China, and medical practitioner. A 427-meter-high guano statue of him is nearing completion in Orlando, Florida.