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Ural in Media
Local shop revs up Russian motorcycles
When Alan Bond makes trips to Kroger he gets stared at and asked a lot of questions. That's not because of the way he looks (over 6 feet tall with a body resembling a tree trunk), but because of his vehicle.
No, he doesn't drive a classic cruiser or expensive sports car, he rides a Ural (pronounced "yurel") sidecar motorcycle.
Not only does he ride a Ural, he fixes and sells them with Terry Crawford, 58, the owner of Crawford Sales Co. in South Lyon.
Urals are Russian motorcycles with sidecars that were first produced for the Red Army in World War II. In the mid-1950s they began to be produced for civilian use and were brought to the United States in 1993. They are still made in the same factory near the Ural Mountains (hence the name) as during the war.
"Virtually all the Urals we sell here have sidecars," Bond, 48, says. The only exception is the Wolf, which was created to look like Urals that Russian motorcycle clubs had customized.
Bond, a retired Redford police officer who has ridden cycles for 32 years, met Crawford when he needed service on the Ural he bought last year. He hung around the shop so much, he says, that Crawford started putting him to work.
How Crawford came to selling Urals starts with how he came to riding them.
Crawford says he had been interested in and worked with street rods, scooters and motorcycles for years, but got into Urals about five years ago when his grandson, Rajeev, was born with medical problems. "I wanted to have something special to do with him," Crawford said, and a Ural with a sidecar for Rajeev to ride in was just the thing.
From there he began selling parts for and servicing Urals, and in February of this year started selling Urals. Since then he has sold about 14 or 15 of the bikes.
"We're not selling thousands a year," he says. "It's a special type of motorcycling. It's a slow-down, old-style type."
They do, however, have high sales of parts. "We're the number one (Ural) part-selling company in the country and we stock more parts than anywhere else," Bond says. They've sold parts nationwide, and as far away as Alaska.
Most of their sales of Urals have been in the metropolitan area, Bond says, but they have sold a few out-of-state, and attributes those to their reputation for being around longer than other Ural dealers.
Crawford carries all six types of Urals sold in the United States, and says that they all sell about equally. The exceptions being the Wolf, which they sell the least of, and the Tourist, which they sell the most of.
"(The Tourist) is the bike for if you want to get into it and not spend a lot of money," Bond says. As a comparison, he says, a Tourist costs a little over $8,000 while a Harley-Davidson with a sidecar costs over $30,000.
Aside from the cost, Crawford and Bond give plenty of other reasons why someone would buy an Ural.
For one, having a sidecar means more comfort for passengers. "A lot of wives and girlfriends don't enjoy riding on the backs of motorcycles, but they enjoy riding in sidecars," Bond says.
A sidecar also means one can take non-human passengers for rides.
Marshall Coleman, of Stanton, rides his puppy, a bulldog, around in his camo-green Ural Gear Up. Coleman bought the bike in March and uses it almost daily for going to work or to pick up groceries. Wherever he stops, he says, he gets at least two people asking him about the bike.
"The reactions are something that I wasn't quite ready for," he says.
Another reason people like Urals, Bond says, has to do with maintenance.
"Urals, compared to the average Japanese machine, are very simple and easy to work on," Bond says. "Anybody who can turn a wrench can work on one of these."
One other advantage that comes along with having a sidecar is not having to balance the bike. Crawford says that a lot of people become interested in sidecar bikes when they get older because then they don't have to worry about keeping the bike balanced.
Aside from all these reasons and other qualities (such as a reverse gear) that make Urals distinct, the main reasons they are special, in the end, are the simplest.
"They are good machines, they look nice, they run better than they have even before and they're fun," Bond says.
June 24, 2004
Jonathan Bardelline
South Lyon Herald
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