The General Motorbikers Discussion Thread

If nothing else, it should be interesting to see what he defines as 'better'.
 
Thoughts on the 1980 Honda CX500? My friend's dad just picked one up for next to nothing and is in the process of finding parts for it.
 
To be honest he hasn't got much taste in bikes, his only requirements are manual trans, headlight, street-legal and a cruising speed of 55mph.

I know absolutely nothing about dirtbikes, dualies yes, dirt no. Is he making a mistake by trading the Honda? I told him doing a dualie conversion on a dirtbike would be too much of a PITA.
 
bartboy9891 said:
Thoughts on the 1980 Honda CX500? My friend's dad just picked one up for next to nothing and is in the process of finding parts for it.
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Not bad bikes, a bit heavy, didn't sell all that well in the US but did okay. The CX650 is the same bike and chassis with a bored-out engine. Water pumps tend to go out at inopportune times, so pre-emptive replacement is called for (and the new Honda pumps last much longer).

freeferrarisdonotexist said:
To be honest he hasn't got much taste in bikes, his only requirements are manual trans, headlight, street-legal and a cruising speed of 55mph.

I know absolutely nothing about dirtbikes, dualies yes, dirt no. Is he making a mistake by trading the Honda? I told him doing a dualie conversion on a dirtbike would be too much of a PITA.
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No, the CR wouldn't make for a good on-road bike. Too small and mixing two-stroke oil would be a PITA.
 
Spectre said:
Not bad bikes, a bit heavy, didn't sell all that well in the US but did okay. The CX650 is the same bike and chassis with a bored-out engine. Water pumps tend to go out at inopportune times, so pre-emptive replacement is called for (and the new Honda pumps last much longer).



No, the CR wouldn't make for a good on-road bike. Too small and mixing two-stroke oil would be a PITA.
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I thought so. With the on-road gear installed it would be too slow as well.

Ever been to Union Salvage lately? They take trades, so he might be able to scrape together an almost-complete bike if he swaps both the KE and CR.
 
Nope. I don't make all that many trips to Houston - and when I do, I'm usually driving something where sticking greasy motorcycle parts in the trunk is a bad idea. :D
 
Spectre said:
Not bad bikes, a bit heavy, didn't sell all that well in the US but did okay. The CX650 is the same bike and chassis with a bored-out engine. Water pumps tend to go out at inopportune times, so pre-emptive replacement is called for (and the new Honda pumps last much longer).
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Yea my friend was saying it weighed around 500lbs. How much does a newer Honda water pump cost?
 
Should I be getting more than 40mpg (US) 50 mpg (imp) 5.75L/100km 17.5km/L?

I never ride with fuel economy in mind, but when you consider the bike...

is only 400cc
makes about 55hp
has VTEC yo!
only has less than 200kg (plus rider) to haul around

you'd think that it might do better than something like a Suzuki Splash, which...
is over 1200cc
makes about 88hp
has to haul around over 1000kg (plus driver)

I'm sure I could get much better numbers, and that the bike is more funner and faster than an econobox, but it just doesn't seem right - given that the bike is so light etc I should be able to ride flat out and still beat the little cars.
 
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hansvonaxion said:
Should I be getting more than 40mpg (US) 50 mpg (imp) 5.75L/100km 17.5km/L?
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Well, my own findings when checking real-worl consumption figures (on Spritmonitor) were that pretty much all bikes roughly around the 500cc mark would use somewhere around 5 l/100km as well.
My Beemer is the same,
650cc,
34hp,
~200kg,
and average consumption of 5.5l/100km.
So you're not out of the ordinary with your figures.
 
Yeah I had a GS650G Katana (shaft drive) and funnily enough I got pretty much the same figures, 5.7L/100km riding nearly 5000km with the bike loaded to the hilt.

It's crazy how fuel efficient these new cars are now, mind you after driving a rental recently I believe they've started tweaking them (couldn't get the thing to kick down no matter what) for pure efficiency with no thought given to drivability.

I could drive 4 people somewhere distant and use less fuel than I could on a bike, doing the same speed.
 
If you're in the States and looking for a liter sport bike, there are some crazy good deals this week on the 08' CBR1000rr.

http://www.southernhonda.com/default.asp
$6983.00USD
That is cheapest I've seen thus far, and is located in Chattanooga, TN, but several other dealerships are running similar sales elsewhere throughout the country.
 
To keep the thread interesting, here's a question: out of the big Japanese four (Honda, Yamaha, Kawasaki and Suzuki) which do you think is best? Not referencing cars or quad-bikes, just sportbikes, cruisers, standards and dual-sports.
 
Well, I can't really make any sort of judgement about "best", because I just have way too little experience to make any call like that.
But, when only looking at the current range, I actually prefer Honda, because compared to the other three they've kept their styling overall rather conservative - which just looks better to me. Suzuki is the king of ugly, Kawasaki is a bit better, but still bad, and even Yamaha has way too many "challenging" designs for my taste.
Although I have to say, I hold some special respect for Yamaha, since they're the only ones of the J4 to offer enduro-style dualies over here. I'd love to have a WR250X... if it weren't so mindblowingly expensive, that is.
 
freeferrarisdonotexist said:
To keep the thread interesting, here's a question: out of the big Japanese four (Honda, Yamaha, Kawasaki and Suzuki) which do you think is best? Not referencing cars or quad-bikes, just sportbikes, cruisers, standards and dual-sports.
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Pretty much everyone acknowledges that it's Honda. We actually had this discussion further up the thread. Hondas aren't always the fastest, but they do last the longest, have the best parts availability and break the least by a large margin. On top of which, engineering or build mistakes are far less common and generally less serious when they do happen than the competition. Generally, they have the most friendly/most forgiving handling in class as well.

Sure, you can get a faster or better handling bike from Yamaha or Suzi/Kawa (remember, they merged) - but it won't last nearly as long and if you make a mistake it might kill you.
 
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Spectre said:
Suzi/Kawa (remember, they merged)
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Out of curiosity, do you have a link for that? I've never heard of that before, and all I could find so far is that they apparently worked together in some way on a few bikes.
 
Spectre said:
Sure, you can get a faster or better handling bike from Yamaha or Suzi/Kawa (remember, they merged) - but it won't last nearly as long and if you make a mistake it might kill you.
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Honda always seems to put their bike exactly right for the Swedish insurance system too.. :p But their sports-bikes are not as good as the others.. And speaking from my own experience, their engines (high performance) doesn't take punishment very well either.. But they do make some damn good bikes.
 
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The consensus here (and anybody please correct me if you disagree) is:

-Honda: biggest dealership network (in fact bigger than all the others combined), best parts availability, bikes last forever if taken care of, handling and behavior suited to most riders (read: newbies will have a hard time finding the limit and weekend racers will have plenty of fun). Downside: sometimes bikes are too "middle-of-the-road", bordering on boring.

-Suzuki: Best engines. Can be punished to hell and beyond. Overall quality is good, but parts are expensive.

-Kawasaki: The most "German" of japanese manufacturers. Good bikes, but not great bikes. Parts and dealerships are almost nonexistant.

-Yamaha: second best. Bikes for nutters who wants performance over anything else. For experts only, otherwise it will rip your head off. Good dealership network.
 
You forgot the traditional Yamaha electrical nightmares and terrible Kawa gearboxes. More or less spot on, though.

Oh, one more - Suzukis have great engines but their handling envelopes sometimes have enormous holes in them. (TL1000S, anyone?)
 
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