• Hi everyone,

    As you all know, Coffee (Dean) passed away a couple of years ago. I am Dean's ex-wife's husband and happen to have spent my career in tech. Over the years, I occasionally helped Dean with various tech issues.

    When he passed, I worked with his kids to gather the necessary credentials to keep this site running. Since then (and for however long they worked with Coffee), Woodschick and Dirtdame have been maintaining the site and covering the costs. Without their hard work and financial support, CafeHusky would have been lost.

    Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been working to migrate the site to a free cloud compute instance so that Woodschick and Dirtdame no longer have to fund it. At the same time, I’ve updated the site to a current version of XenForo (the discussion software it runs on). The previous version was outdated and no longer supported.

    Unfortunately, the new software version doesn’t support importing the old site’s styles, so for now, you’ll see the XenForo default style. This may change over time.

    Coffee didn’t document the work he did on the site, so I’ve been digging through the old setup to understand how everything was running. There may still be things I’ve missed. One known issue is that email functionality is not yet working on the new site, but I hope to resolve this over time.

    Thanks for your patience and support!

Quality issues?

S

StefanL

Husqvarna
AA Class
I consider myself to be a careful consumer and hardly ever purchase anything without reading reviews or testing the product, if possible.

I was about to purchase a WR300, but I am not sure about this choice anymore.

Reading about the modifications to the 2012 WR model range, I can't help but wonder why Husqvarna had to reinforce the frame near the steering head on most models. Would they really do this if it weren't necessary? Did frames show signs of metal fatigue in previous years?

Apart from that, there was a recent newspaper article that made me wonder if there is not a general build problem with the Italian Huskies.

Sima, the French motorcycle importing company, accounting for the largest sales volume of Husqvarna bikes worldwide, has decided to stop importing Huskies. When interviewed, the CEO answered (litterally translated from French): I am very disappointed about the build quality of Husqvarna in the recent couple of years. I was expecting the Germans (from BMW) to show more discipline and offer solutions to correct the problems. As there are no solutions, I cannot put my company and my dealer network in jeopardy.

The original interview (in French) can be read here: http://www.moto-station.com/article...eric-fourgeaud-sima-je-ne-veux-pas-subir.html

This is a clear statement and I think I have no choice but to consider purchasing a different brand now. This is sad in a sense, because the WR250/300 are the only bikes left that are suitable (without aftermarket parts) for large riders. I have had one Husky before (a 1975 MIkkola Replica CR360, I was 16 years old back then). Even though the crankcase broke (an issue known to the Swedish Husqvarna engineers), I liked the roughness of that bike. I'd love to have another Husky, but I do expect to receive a quality bike when I pay 7000 Euros.

Not trying to spread negative publicity, but am looking for your comments, please.
 
It's my understanding that the WR250/300 has not changed much in 3 or more years (which seems to be what most are complaining about). I have an 09 and really like it and have had zero trouble out of it so far, and yes it is tall man friendly which is why I prefer it over my GasGas EC200. Since the WR250/300 hasn't changed much and hasn't been having problems, thus the current design seems to be proven, it appears the the French CEO may have another agenda hiding behind these complaints. I'm very curious what others will post here.

Great thread!

:popcorn:
 
Your loss Stefan. You'd probably be happier with a KTM.

The French? Really...? the FRENCH? :lol: I keep waiting for the French to build a dirt bike... well... not really. :p
 
I would say the importer has another agenda. France is not the largest sales area for husqvarna either.
 
krieg said:
Your loss Stefan. You'd probably be happier with a KTM.

The French? Really...? the FRENCH? :lol: I keep waiting for the French to build a dirt bike... well... not really. :p
Click to expand...
Ha Ha the new French dirt bike is going to be named the "Slug Eating Surrender Monkey".
 
A couple huskies did crack or break just under the steering head, but so did a whole bunch of KTMs and Japanese bikes.
I interpret additional re-inforcing on the new frames as a good thing, not as a bad thing.
 
i say go for it man, i dont have one but i havent seen very many complaints on here about them either. everyone that has one loves them from what i can gather.
 
I don't know how far you would have to drop to snap a head frame on the WR250/300, but to do it the cracked head frame would be the least of your worries. I have years of abuse on the bigger WR's(245 riding weight) and have yet to experience any kind of fatiguing of the frame or any other part for that matter. Buy with confidence and then go ride as much as you want for years with very little needed maintenance.
 
StefanL said:
The original interview (in French) can be read here: http://www.moto-station.com/article...eric-fourgeaud-sima-je-ne-veux-pas-subir.html
Click to expand...
There is a lot more to that article than what your concern is (quality):

As you know it, BMW repurchased Husqvarna in 2007. 3 years ago, I obtained a territorial franchise agreement with one limited duration.
...
Yes, BMW decided to adopt with the importers and to assemble subsidiary companies. They also make the same thing in England and in other countries.
...
I sent there is 6 months a letter of breach of contract at BMW with a one year notice, by saying that I stopped on July 15, 2011 if I did not obtain a contract from 3 to 5 years to ensure the perenniality of my network, and if I could not have an eye on Research & Développement to ensure me of the quality of the products.
...
They want to re-examine well the contract but with obligations which are not acceptable.
...
I am an independent boy, this why I chose to be an importer. I am not ready to become a subsidiary company.
...
What made it possible to make progress your activity in 2010?
One did not exist 4 years ago on the market of the quad and today one is leader. I think that it is a great success, which is due to the fact that we are not only importer but also Co-manufacturer with factory TGB.
Click to expand...

Sounds to me that he wanted to be the importer and they would not let him.. and he was attempting to dictate contract details which BMW did not agree to. In addition it appears he is happy being co-manufacturer of some quads.

Though I may have gotten the wrong impression, the translation was through bablefish..

Regardless, I would never decide to by, or not to buy, an item based on one article...
 
Coffee said:
There is a lot more to that article than what your concern is (quality):

Sounds to me that he wanted to be the importer and they would not let him.. and he was attempting to dictate contract details which BMW did not agree to. In addition it appears he is happy being co-manufacturer of some quads.

Though I may have gotten the wrong impression, the translation was through bablefish..

Regardless, I would never decide to by, or not to buy, an item based on one article...
Click to expand...
BINGO! Give this man a cigar... ding ding ding ding ding ding ding. Way to call it Dean. :thumbsup:
 
my local bike shop sponsored a rider on a 2009 cr125, he managed to crack the frame twice in a season.
He said it was the best handling bike in the field at the time.
I think it has been documented elsewhere that there was a bad batch of 2009 cr125 frames but have not heard anything about any other models.
people always crave change even when its not warranted.
 
There were some reported frame issues on 09-11 125s but I have never heard of an issue with the 250/300 bikes. I think if you look at the forums (where even minor issues are reported) you won't see much for the 250/300. In some cases no news is good news.
 
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