Norton trouble

byjefsm said:

SAD but expected...... suggest Forum readers look at yesterday's Globe article.... its on internet......a real con job from the beginning. Lots of folks including Norton employees left holding the bag.......Hopefully someone will pick up the toolling for the Atlas and bring it to fruition

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Some how doubt it as some of that tooling will be in India in the hands of Kinetic engineering PVT, read their company reports on the Indian websites. Chances are that most of the tooling has not been paid for.
He talked up UK engineering and at the same time was using Indian engineering. Maybe that is his next venture seeing as he and skinner were directors of another Norton company, Norton Motoroyale PVT.

richard-7 said:

Im in the FastEddie camp.
There is nothing much wrong with the 961 at all. If you take your brand new Norton, strip it down, assemble it with quality components like bearings and sensors and a add a few holes here and there and re route a few hoses, the bike is fantastic and over built for the HorsePower.

If they would have listened to us and many others back in 2013 and in - there wouldn’t have been as many warranty claims robbing profit. That would have been an easy start. But no. I told Simon poor quality lingers long after the cheap price is forgotten. He said they only used top quality components even after I proved him wrong. Then lied to us saying thanks and things are different now to prevent me posting anything in this forum. But continued to use the cheapest knock off products. I wonder how many nortons have fake knock off brembos and ohlins? Just saying....

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Gearbox pinions? I suspect the quality ones are still on the gear cutters shelf not far from Donington. I believe the manufacture of these was moved overseas for economy.

richard-7 said:

Im in the FastEddie camp.
There is nothing much wrong with the 961 at all. If you take your brand new Norton, strip it down, assemble it with quality components like bearings and sensors and a add a few holes here and there and re route a few hoses, the bike is fantastic and over built for the HorsePower.

If they would have listened to us and many others back in 2013 and in - there wouldn’t have been as many warranty claims robbing profit. That would have been an easy start. But no. I told Simon poor quality lingers long after the cheap price is forgotten. He said they only used top quality components even after I proved him wrong. Then lied to us saying thanks and things are different now to prevent me posting anything in this forum. But continued to use the cheapest knock off products. I wonder how many nortons have fake knock off brembos and ohlins? Just saying....

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With all due respect, warranty claims didnt fail the business.
They don’t build the bikes fast enough, cheap enough and have the dealer network and make a large enough profit. That’s exactly why their in the situation their in now.
not because of warranty or inferior part or build.

In the U.K. there were, and still are, new bikes in dealers stocks. So the bottleneck doesn’t appear to be inability to manufacture enough volume, it is an inability to sell them.

That’s where the quality comes in, stories of poor quality put buyers of in droves. It caused dealers to drop the brand, other dealers not to take up the brand, etc, etc. I’m fairly confident that if these bikes we’re fault free, dealership networks in the US would have been forthcoming.

Its not the only reason they tanked, but it’s a bloody big one.

Fast Eddie said:

That’s where the quality comes in, stories of poor quality put buyers of in droves. It caused dealers to drop the brand, other dealers not to take up the brand, etc, etc. I’m fairly confident that if these bikes we’re fault free, dealership networks in the US would have been forthcoming.

Its not the only reason they tanked, but it’s a bloody big one.

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Pretty much.
However, they didn't have to be fault free, just match the quality and reliability of other modern brands.
Like say - Harley machines.
Which are not fault free, but are considered by many to be sound, and good enough.
And we know how many Hogs are sold.

Fast Eddie said:

In the U.K. there were, and still are, new bikes in dealers stocks. So the bottleneck doesn’t appear to be inability to manufacture enough volume, it is an inability to sell them.

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You could easily say this about MV Agusta, Moto Guzzi and Aprilia (and a few others) in the US. There are plenty of new 2018 & 2019 bikes of those brands in stock at dealers - even quite a few new 2016-2017 Moto Guzzis.

Fast Eddie said:

That’s where the quality comes in, stories of poor quality put buyers of in droves. It caused dealers to drop the brand, other dealers not to take up the brand, etc, etc. I’m fairly confident that if these bikes we’re fault free, dealership networks in the US would have been forthcoming.

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Dealers do tend to get frustrated in dealing with unreliable manufacturers, particularly if they get strung along on promises. MV Agusta lost a lot of dealers over the years due to lack of reliability in getting parts. Dealers were tired of selling bikes they couldn't repair under warranty and having to deal with disgruntled customers. I believe Norton had 15-20 US dealers at one point before all but 4 gave up on them too.

MV Agusta, Moto Guzzi and Aprilia (and others) have survived not because of great build quality or reputation, but because there are just enough people out there who want something a little more unique than US and Asian brands, and because the management teams of these companies haven't made really poor (for the most part) decisions in sustaining the organizations. And have managed to get capital inflow at the right time to survive (MV Agusta). It seems to me that the majority Norton and MV owners will put up with a certain level of issues with their bikes to enjoy the products. Also, I tend to see that people who own multiple bikes (and people whose bikes are not primary transportation) put up with more issues, as they have another bike to fall back on.

Norton and MV Agusta have some similarities. New Nortons are viewed by many people I know in US as just being premium Triumphs. MV is viewed as just being a better looking Ducati. Neither Norton or MV Agusta have any real technical, build quality, or reliability prowess over Triumph or Ducati, but there are enough people who just want to try a 'perceived' premium or exclusive (read higher priced) product, and/or want something that is just a bit different than what others ride.

I've seen MV nearly fail for trying too hard to compete with Ducati by attempting to scale up volume and offer too many models. When Norton tried to scale up with the 650's at the same time as the V4, it seemed to me they were heading down a path of spreading themselves a bit thin. Bit off a bit more than it could chew perhaps.

Voodooo said:

With all due respect, warranty claims didnt fail the business.
They don’t build the bikes fast enough, cheap enough and have the dealer network and make a large enough profit. That’s exactly why their in the situation their in now.
not because of warranty or inferior part or build.

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Oh if course I know this. Its just a small part of why they were loosing business. Ripple effects. I cant count the amount of emails I've received stating how much they’ve shared their bad experiences with friends who would have purchased a bike if they weren’t known for issues. Its truly sad. All we wanted, all everyone wanted, was to promote Norton. Thats all I did. For free because I believed in them. SG was great with us. It stopped once I received the emails from Simon stating im causing them too many problems from my AN posts. Then seeing his replies to emails slandering me. These are emails sent to me from Norton customers who thought I should know how Simon feels about me. And even had a few private emails from ex employees telling me how Skinner talked about me and felt about us. Thats when is all stopped. Thats when I stopped caring about Nortons success. He told many lies to SG about us to protect his fuck ups. Too bad really.
Thats where i’m coming from. I truly hope the Norton name continues and I can once again promote because I want others to enjoy an amazing machine. They really are amazing- once dialled in. And sadly- its not difficult to dial one in. But this should be in the factory not the owner. Especially at the price point.

Its hard for me to describe how angry I am ! My favorite motorcycle company is going belly up. I planned to drive my bike forever and now I have to worry about breaking something I can't get a part for. When I read about some of the things that happened with the pension and all of that it makes me even angrier ! How could Stuart let this happen to all of us ???

richard-7 said:

... I wonder how many nortons have fake knock off brembos and ohlins?....

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This one caught my attention - any tips on what to look for?

I agree with Richards comments, anyone who has asked what i think of my 961 has been told that it is a good design poorly executed. I might have posted this before but my tank pad reflects this thought.

This threads been the busiest thread ever. Sad it has to be a topic of ending.

I was critical of the continued lack of quality because I thought it would wind up like this.
Now that it's here I feel sick for all of the people who lose out, employees and bike owners.

Glen

BritTwit said:

Pretty much.
However, they didn't have to be fault free, just match the quality and reliability of other modern brands.
Like say - Harley machines.
Which are not fault free, but are considered by many to be sound, and good enough.
And we know how many Hogs are sold.

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but without much of a dealer network, they did have to be better!

richard-7 said:

Oh if course I know this. Its just a small part of why they were loosing business. Ripple effects. I cant count the amount of emails I've received stating how much they’ve shared their bad experiences with friends who would have purchased a bike if they weren’t known for issues. Its truly sad. All we wanted, all everyone wanted, was to promote Norton. Thats all I did. For free because I believed in them. SG was great with us. It stopped once I received the emails from Simon stating im causing them too many problems from my AN posts. Then seeing his replies to emails slandering me. These are emails sent to me from Norton customers who thought I should know how Simon feels about me. And even had a few private emails from ex employees telling me how Skinner talked about me and felt about us. Thats when is all stopped. Thats when I stopped caring about Nortons success. He told many lies to SG about us to protect his fuck ups. Too bad really.
Thats where i’m coming from. I truly hope the Norton name continues and I can once again promote because I want others to enjoy an amazing machine. They really are amazing- once dialled in. And sadly- its not difficult to dial one in. But this should be in the factory not the owner. Especially at the price point.

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I suggest that we continue to build a list of key components and who made them for Norton, to hopefully help to source them in the future, just in case it folds for good.Would you be up for partly managing that Richard?

Putting jokes to one side & With all this smoke & mirrors malarkey , sharp practice & slight of hand its just dawned on me with all this distraction that From today I’m living on a small island 20miles off the coast of Europe ,just amazing what havoc this country of like 700 miles long cause can create & now back to the debate , we could all dress up in black at our next 961 meet which I like to think will be b4 Easter , I’m at the London excel bike show on Friday 14th February if anyone else is .

"Thats when I stopped caring about Nortons success. He told many lies to SG about us to protect his fuck ups. Too bad really."

Dare I say it as a German but this saga reminds me of a supposedly frequent excuse from the Third Reich: "Der Fuehrer weiss nichts davon" ("The Fuehrer does not know about it") which was given as an excuse for all the atrocities going on.

Oh yes, Garner knew exactly what was going on! He is, unfortunately, anything but stupid and most probably runs intellectual rings around Skinner (Whom I have never met). But he managed to always give the impression that was most favourable for him and to turn everything to his advantage. A perfect con.

Garner hates people with whom that does not work and who see through his show. That is why he fervently and openly voiced his hate of Andover Norton and myself.

Even a bystander could ask the basic questions. How much profit do you make on each unit? How many units do you have to make to break even? How
many units can you make in a year? How many can you sell? What are your warranty costs? And of course, what is your overhead, your loan and tax costs?
He had a ton of goodwill but that apparently was squandered. It does sound a bit like the BSA story doesnt it?

I believe we read in school that during Russian's revolution it was the same
story "If only Little Father knew about this".

All those questions were asked, the answers given were lies but believed.

Lies or silence... the question of how many produced was asked numerous times, directly to Norton personnel, but only silence, or vague none comital statements were received.

With the churn in staff I would suspect the employees would not really have an appreciation of what numbers were made. From what I can gather the numbers would not be large from the suppliers that I know once supplied or processed for them prior to some of it being moved abroad. The UK export guarantee figures suggest the numbers would not have been great, you can see online what he had guaranteed against each foreign importer or supplying dealer year on year. Some of the figures amount to just few bikes for some destinations.

Onder said:

Re;
He had a ton of goodwill but that apparently was squandered. It does sound a bit like the BSA story doesnt it?

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It sounds like a good book on how NOT to run a factory!