No More Wings Built in the U.S.

[gwtriker]

No more Wings built in the U.S.

Did you all know, Wing production in the U.S. was going to be stopping soon?

[]Local News


Mmmm! back to Japan Wings, will it make a difference I wonder?

[DJS]

hope the workers don't do what harley workers done after they thought about losing their jobs,took yrs to get back the confidence of harley reliability, if at all

[W7AX]

No more Wings built in the U.S.

Did you all know, Wing production in the U.S. was going to be stopping soon?

[]Local News

Mmmm! back to Japan Wings, will it make a difference I wonder?

It surely will. They likely will be better but far more pricey....

Here's the article:

Honda of America Manufacturing Inc. on Wednesday said it plans to discontinue motorcycle production at its oldest U.S. plant next year.

The company, an arm of American Honda Motor Co., will stop production in spring 2009 at the 450-employee Marysville Motorcycle Plant, its only North American motorcycle producer. The plant's employees, part of a 13,000-worker base at the company's five production plants in Central Ohio, will be moved to other operations as motorcycle production is shifted to a new plant in Kumamoto, Japan. Motorcycle production at a plant in Hamamatsu, Japan, will also be consolidated at the Kumamoto works.

Executives said Wednesday the company hasn't finalized plans for how it will discontinue operations, indicating a shutdown or phase-out of production hasn't been determined.

The Union County plant last year turned out 44,000 Gold Wing touring and VTX cruiser bikes, and makes about 120 a day on average.

Honda's Marysville and East Liberty factories also assemble the company's flagship Accord, Civic and Acura TL cars, and the Element, CR-V and Acura RDX light sport utility vehicles. Those factories turned out about 701,000 vehicles last year.

The automaker said the move to end motorcycle production at its oldest U.S. plant, opened in 1979, comes with a stronger focus on bolstering its North American auto production operations. The company has invested $11 billion in its North American auto production operations since 1979, including $800 million in Ohio since 2001. Two plants are under construction in Indiana and Canada.

Honda's motorcycle operations buy parts from 38 suppliers in Ohio, 11 of which are motorcycle-related-only businesses. Spokesman Ed Miller said most of the motorcycle-parts-only suppliers do less than 10 percent of business with Honda, but one, a small operation he wouldn't identify, is exclusively devoted to supplying parts to the company.

Of the $18.8 billion Honda spent last year in buying parts in North America, less than 1 percent went to its motorcycles, he said.

[CyberVet65]

A lot of folks are hoping that the quality will improve on a level with the Honda vehicles.
I suspect that part costs will increase and the cost of a new Wing will increase significantly.
Chet

[unforgivenracing]

I will state something here only because I cannot resist. <br />
1st, I realize this is old news, and this was bumped from a february posting in referance to a interview in American Motorcyclist. <br />
<br />
I, as did many others went to what was being refer to as "the last homecoming"<br />
<br />
The bike production is going back to china in time. The workers will be phased into the automobile production areas of the marysville plants. The actual time when production of the Wing in the US will end, is still not known. It currently sounds as though it could stay around until spring of '09.<br />
<br />
If things stay as they are, they would be stupid not to move to a plant out of the US. Odvious reason, No import tax, cheap labor. <br />
<br />
It's election time.<br />
Enter a new President with plans of ending the Free trade bill, that is taking away our jobs....They may change there minds.

[Administrator]

<div class="bbcode_container">
<div class="bbcode_quote">
<div class="quote_container">
<div class="bbcode_quote_container"></div>

<div class="bbcode_postedby">
<img src="images/misc/quote_icon.png" alt="Quote" /> Originally Posted by <strong>unforgivenracing</strong>
<a href="showthread.php?p=4858#post4858" rel="nofollow"><img class="inlineimg" src="images/buttons/viewpost-right.png" alt="View Post" /></a>
</div>
<div class="message">I will state something here only because I cannot resist. <br />
1st, I realize this is old news, and this was bumped from a february posting in referance to a interview in American Motorcyclist. <br />
<br />
I, as did many others went to what was being refer to as "the last homecoming"<br />
<br />
<font color="Red">The bike production is going back to china in time.</font> The workers will be phased into the automobile production areas of the marysville plants. The actual time when production of the Wing in the US will end, is still not known. It currently sounds as though it could stay around until spring of '09.<br />
<br />
If things stay as they are, they would be stupid not to move to a plant out of the US. Odvious reason, No import tax, cheap labor. <br />
<br />
It's election time.<br />
Enter a new President with plans of ending the Free trade bill, that is taking away our jobs....They may change there minds.</div>

</div>
</div>
</div>Didnt you mean going back to Japan?