If a pure racebike isn’t your cup of team, perhaps this homologated street version suits you better! As noted in the seller’s description, these would have never passed emissions here in the states so they sold 50 of them in Poland to meet the AMA regulations of the time. But you don’t need to travel that far as this one is in North Carolina. With just 153 miles on the Stack digital readout and recently refreshed from storage, this would be a jewel in any serious collector’s showroom. The buy-it-now is set at $75k and the current bid (reserve not met) is $41k as of Sunday afternoon. Less than 3 days remain on this one.
dc
1994 Harley Davidson VR1000 for sale on eBay
from the seller:
Stunning and RARE Harley Davidson VR-1000 with just 153 miles. The bike has just been through a comprehensive service and runs great. It comes with a full service tool kit and helmet. I bought this Harley as part of an impressive Harley collection which consisted primarily of older race bikes. There were also several street bikes and a drag bike. I must admit, this VR-1000 has left us scratching our heads and wondering what we have.
We know that a street-version was built as required by AMA rules to homologate the racing machine. The road-going VR was made in a run of 50 examples (all that was needed to homologate), but they were never sold in the USA. US emissions laws were prohibitively strict and would have required a lot of fiddling to make the VR road legal stateside, so it was homologated for road use in Poland (And only Poland). AMA rules don’t specify where the machine needs to be road legal. Reportedly, they sold for circa $50,000 when new.
Now, where this gets interesting; this bike sat in a static collection for several years, so when I got it, I took it to a local motorcycle guru to get it running. He was looking for parts and was in contact with a Harley Dealer who reportedly purchased the majority of the left-over spare parts from Harley Davidson. When my guru described the bike to him and told him the serial number, that dealer suggested that he’d known of, or heard of, two US bikes built for the street and that this could be one of them. I can tell you that when you switch the bike on, the display says “V3.01 HD_ROADUS 06/07/94” and there’s a sticker below the instrument cluster written in English (not Polish). Also, I found a magazine article from 1996 about a California dealer who raced VR’s and had a street bike in his own collection, which indicates that there were road bikes in the US. This Harley has a clean, clear and valid Maryland title, which we have in-hand.
By the way, check out more background on these in a fantastic post Mike did a couple years ago: https://raresportbikesforsale.com/what-could-have-been-1994-harley-davidson-vr1000/
dc
Harley makes performance bikes? i thought they outsourced that to rotax?
jimbo: Harley MADE a performance bike. Pay attention, dude. This bike was made in 1994.
I think the last generation buell bikes and the new ebr bikes all have rotax engines but this is the only “official” HD performance bike I am aware of. Of course, since the engine was designed by HD in conjunction with Porsche and Rouche racing its a bit of a hodge podge…too bad they didnt continue with this effort, it would be cool to have an HD sport line…instead they took the money and did stupid stuff like buying MV agusta, which was one of the all time worst business moves.
Dallaslav and Sixthgear, But you forgot to mention the ’83-84 XR-1000 and V-Rod. Harley’s sales literature claimed these are high performance motorcycles. I guess, compared to Harley’s other models, LOL.
harley davidson = performance the same way my grandmother having wheels = wagon
🙂
Sounds pretty good, but I just cant handle the sewing machine noises that come from a harley engine and their gear boxes are complete ass.
Lots of interesting cars and bikes in the back round. How about the XR 750, now that Harley has some racing cred.