#revival

Harley-Davidson officially announced the latest edition to its Icons collection with the new FLI Hydra-Glide Revival. As with past Icons models, the Hydra-Glide Revival draws inspiration from a model from Harley-Davidson’s long history, in this case, the Hydra-Glide that first introduced a telescopic front suspension to the brand 75 years ago.

Last month, we broke the news that Harley-Davidson was preparing a bike called the Hydra-Glide Revival as its 2024 Icon model. All we knew at the time was the model name, and the fact it was certified by an executive order from the California Air Resources Board with the Milwaukee-Eight 114 engine alongside several Harley-Davidson Softail models. We now have further details about the Hydra-Glide Revival, including its model designation FLI.

The first Harley with a hydraulic fork debuted 75 years ago

Harley’s been teasing us with this one since the end of its 2021 model launch presentation and now the dream is real – a limited edition Electra Glide Revival model will be the first in Harley’s new “Icons Collection.” And the Motor Co. says it will build one or two more Icons based on historic models annually in the years to come. The first celebrates the 1969 Electra Glide, which was the first Hog to wear the now iconic batwing fairing. The Electra Glide Revival model will be limited to a one-time build of 1,500 serialized examples, scheduled to reach dealers in late April, and floating an MSRP of $29,199.

Harley-Davidson‘s Q1 2021 financial report revealed more details about the mysterious “Revival” model and showed a photo of a near production version of the Custom 1250 liquid-cooled cruiser. We’ll have more on the quarterly report elsewhere, but let’s examine what we’ve learned about these two upcoming models.

Update: CARB documents obtained March 10, 2021 have confirmed the use of the larger M8 114 cu. in. motor. 

Harley-Davidson announced the bulk of its 2021 lineup in a virtual launch event last week, highlighting the updates to its Softail, touring and CVO models. The launch was different for Harley-Davidson in two ways. For one, it was held completely virtually in a 40-minute video, a necessity during a global pandemic. It was also unusual in that it was held in the middle of January instead of the traditional September. As outlined in Harley-Davidson’s Rewire plan, this looks to be a permanent change moving forward, positioning the new model launch closer to the start of the riding season.

Austin, Texas, that is, where the annual Handbuilt show coincided with the US MotoGP at Circuit of the Americas. I didn’t make it out to the GP, but I did make it to the unveiling of an exciting new BMW, onto a tour of Revival Cycles and into their shop on Congress St. (above), into the Handbuilt show, and all over some delicious cuts of Texas cow at a couple of swanky restaurants. Austin is everything you’ve heard. If you live in California and are considering the move, I recommend you do it immediately.

When I learned I was off to Austin last week with just a couple days notice, on a mysterious mission to see something BMW wanted to unleash on the public, somebody showed me a picture of the Custom Works Zon bike from Japan, “Departed.” When I looked at it I LOL’d oh ho ho!, and said no way is BMW building anything remotely like that. And especially no way on the Japanese custom’s oversize boxer Twin, complete with pushrod tubes. You gots to be kidding me.