[Amoryl]

heh yeah well…it seems you really thought most of it through anyway

seriously though, if it’s a gas issue, and the beemer’s paid off then i’d suggest trading it in and getting a good used civic or metro or focus or the like. you hit it on the head that the “gas” excuse is just an excuse used by people who want to ride to convince their SO to let them ride. it’s more dangerous than driving a car, it takes a lot more training and practice to keep from wrecking it, and it’s arguably MUCH more fun I’m not going to say that you shouldn’t or couldn’t get a bike for commuting, but for what you seem to be looking for it doesn’t seem like the ideal choice. for point A to point B basic transportation you’d likely be better off in a small subcompact, and save the bike for weekends I view riding like I view all my hobbies/passions and really take the work mentality in reverse. Live to Ride, not Ride to Live (though I’d like to have the option of riding to work rather than driving, still I’d not replace the cage for day to day hassle.

[Amoryl]

make sure you keep us up to date on your hyosung, the only complaints I’ve ever heard about them is “questionable reliability” but nearly everyone who repeats that (like I am now) got it second or third hand. I think not much has been said because its not one of the well known brands with a long honorable history like the japanese bikes. there’s still that mentality out there that chinese, korean, or taiwanese bikes are cheap piles of garbage made by 6yr old sweatshop children banging on rocks. same as the issues back in the 70’s with everything from japan being cheap knockoffs of better american products. now japanese is synonymous with quality, reliability, and affordability. hopefully the hyosungs will be one of the flagships that’ll bring people around to korean built bikes as well.

I know Daewoo is korean and was really popular for a bit, then dissapeared, then came back…some places…is Scion korean?

good stuff’s finally coming out of places other than Japan, but it’ll take a while for word to come around is all

[Amoryl]

all of this sorta exemplifies the problem with labels. there’s sites where they label everything either sport or cruiser. sites that label sports cruiser and naked/standard, but they usually then define standards as mostly naked sports bikes, or the old CHP type bikes. another site puts naked/standards in the cruiser catagory. add to it that triumph now has an old styled naked/standard bike that harkens back to the good old days.

personally to me, the sportster looks more like a cruiser than any other style of bike on the current market. and maybe it’d look more like a standard if there were more standards being made today. but then I guess it doesn’t really matter a whole lot either way. some can call it a cruiser, others call it a standard or whatever, the truth is likely somewhere in between.

[Amoryl]

by what definition is a sportster NOT a cruiser? I mean I’ll admit that I’m not the end all know all of motorcycles….

[Amoryl]

my college algebra prof had the greatest alarm system for her truck, too bad it won’t work on a bike. 3 labs and a german shepherd in the back.

honestly I’m not sure what I’m going to do once I manage to get my bike. while at home I’m hoping to chain it in somewhat excessive ways to my jeep. but out in public…

what are these screaming disks that were mentioned?

[Amoryl]

personally i think you’ve got a wonderful idea there. almost perfect in fact.

get yourself a geo metro

[Amoryl]

also regardless of reliability and the like, as Elwood mentioned, his sportster is almost 900cc’s and is often considered a “girls bike” and is their smallest cc bike on the floor. that right there is as good of a reason to get a japanese bike as your first bike as any. time and time again it’s reccomended starting small and working up, cruisers are more newbie friendly in terms of power, but less so in terms of pure weight, so while the power of the 883cc cruiser engine isn’t near the power of the same cc in a sportbike engine, the weight is also considerably heavier, and at slow speeds where you’re most likely to dump your bike as a newbie, thats going to come into play a LOT. a 250cc is going to be a lot lighter, and more nimble at slow newbie practice speeds than any harley. and the only 250cc cruisers out there are all japanese. same with the 500cc, 650cc… for your first bike, choose the bike you feel safest on. the bike you honestly feel you’ll be able to handle and ride comfortably, not the bike you wish you could handle.

[Amoryl]

a smaller bike’ll be easier to learn on, especially if you’re a tad on the short side. the added power of a bigger bike would likely be offset by the extra amount of wrestling you’ll have to do to get it to do what you want it to do. what a speedometer goes up to doesn’t have a great deal of bearing for the most part, in my cage experience. my cargo van goes up to 120 on the speedo, I believe, but there’s no hope in hades that it’ll ever hit that speed. my old geo tracker’s speedo went to 90 and I got clocked (I was young and dumb) at 115, I’d maxed the speedo out and the car just kept speeding up. I can’t imagine a bike going that fast down the highway, the tracker was shaking like jello in an earthquake and it weighed more than anything short of a goldwing. most advice I’ve read that I’ve felt had any merit whatsoever generally advised against relying on speed to get yourself out of situations anyway. and 5 miles interstate isn’t much anyway, I’d say stick to a smaller bike that you can handle, something that you can maneuver nimbly and feel comfortable on will get you out of far more situations than raw power and speed will, and if not…well…you’re doing it wrong.

[Amoryl]

I kinda get the idea that they don’t really have the room for a dirtbike where he’s at. and the worst toy is the toy you can’t play with when you want.

one of those pocket bikes can get going pretty quick but they can also be a lot of fun. I figure as long as he’s responsible enough that you believe he won’t be taking it out when you’re not home and he’s unsupervised then it should be ok, remember as kids we could get pedal bikes moving shockingly fast too. keep him off the streets, and out of traffic, and you’ll be fine.

[Amoryl]

link didn’t work for me

[Amoryl]

wow! thats pretty badass!

[Amoryl]

95 Jeep wrangler. and after a couple more repairs I should about run out of things to replace on that old tank.

[Amoryl]

the coldest winter I ever spent, was summer in San Fransisco

[Amoryl]

make sure you get some good pics, maybe a vid or two of her in those short shorts now, before she kills herself. if you can’t have her, at least you can have a permanent reminder of what’s clearly her best asset.

[Amoryl]

welcome to the site! lots of great people here with lots of great knowledge…I’m not one of them, however.

sadly I can’t help you with the break levers, mostly I wanted to ask you how your wife’s liking the V-Star 250. as thats top on my list of first bikes to get.

[Author]

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