[Gary856]

I’ve never heard anybody say that they love their small dual sport or supermotos for freeway commute.

I love riding my DRZ400sm on twisty, bumpy hilly roads – the worse the road, the more fun it is. It’s great for everything but the freeway. Steady-steady high speed cruising feels like the worst use scenario for a bike like the DRZ. Just about any other type of “regular” motorcycle works better (more high speed stability, better high speed power, more cruising distance, etc.) as a commuter on the freeway than a DRZ or a small dual sport.

For a beginner freeway commute bike, you’ll be much, much happier on a GS500 or a Ninja 500. They’re very good in the hills too, but it’s hard to beat a DRZ400sm in the hills for it’s light weight, super sharp handling, and great suspension. If you really want to get a dual sport for freeway commute, I’d check out a KLR650 or a DR650, but freeway commute is not why people buy dual sports for.

[Gary856]

I’ve never ridden a scooter so riding a scooter fast is a scary thought to me, mainly because I don’t know how they handle high speed turns and hard braking. A friend told me the rear weigth bias of a scooter makes its handling a bit different from a motorcycle. If that were true, then coming from a scooter backgroud you’d also find the motorcycle handling a bit different.

[Gary856]

Locally it seems only dealers of the more expensive makes (Harley, BMW, Aprilla, etc.) grant test rides; I don’t know if/how they screen the potential customers for test ride.

For private party this is a potential headache for both the seller and the buyer. For every serious buyer there are lot of tire kickers and joy riders who are just wasting a seller’s time, and vice versa. I’ve bought 4 bikes and I’m trying to sell my first. It’s as much about finding the right buyer/seller match as about the right bike and price.

My belief on test ride from a private seller – it’s not a chance for you to have a joy ride and see if you “like” the bike; that’s taking advantage of the seller and wasting his time. You need to do your homework before that. Rather, a test ride is for you to see if there’s anything wrong with the operation/ functionality of the bike, so you should be ready to buy the bike after the test ride if there’s nothing wrong with it. But of course, in a private party sell the only rules are what’s agreed upon between the two parties.

Here’s what I’d do when buying my next bike –
1) Go “look at” the bike first and not bring any cash (safety concerns). Looking, touching, and starting the bike should be free, but I won’t expect a test ride, unless the seller is totally cool with it and lets me. After seeing the bike, meeting/talking to the seller in person and checking out the paperwork (pink slip), I should get a pretty good idea if I’d want to go ahead with the purchase. Discuss with the seller and agree on a purchase price, pending a test ride. If we can’t agree on a price, then what’s the point of a test ride?

2) Go back to the seller with cash in hand for a test ride. If no issue with the operation of the bike, close the deal.

With my beat up GS500 I would let a newbie test ride it if I feel ok with the guy. With the newer bikes, I would only allow test ride for more experienced riders.

[Gary856]

It looks like you’re drawn to and leaning toward cruisers. When I looked for my first bike I also looked at the middle weight cruisers like Shadow 600 and V-Star 600; they seemed comfortable, stylish, and not too expensive. I had always admired sportbikes too but I knew better than to start on one. At the end I decided before I settled on a style of bikes, I needed to learn the skills, and that’s where a GS500 comes in. With sportbikes in one end of the spectrum and cruisers on the other, a GS500 is dead in the middle. It’s a perfect platform for a beginner to learn and build riding skills on – much easier to learn on and newbie friendlier than a sportbike (too crouched forward ergonomically), and much more dynamic than a cruiser (too laid back ergonomically). Plus a GS500 is pretty cheap.

If you really want to start on a cruisier, check out Vulcan 500, which is the cousin of Ninja 500 in a cruiser body style.

[Gary856]

That’s what everybody wants – one-size-fits-all, and manufacturers market many jackets that way. I started out with that notion too when I started riding last year – one jacket for year around use. But even in the temporate climinate in the San Francisco Bay area, one jacket just doesn’t work for year-round use. I feel any jacket, even with a removeable liner, pretty much has a 30 deg F range of comfort zone. So, starting from a 3-season textile jacket (good for 45-75F days), I quickly added a mesh jacket for the hottest days in the summer (85-100F +), and then a perforated leather jacket for 60-85F days. Even though my textile jacket and riding pants are water-proof, I wear another rain jacket/pants over them for better rain protection and added warmth in the rain.

By the way, it’s the same way with gloves – you’ll need different ones for hot and cold days.

[Gary856]

Before I got my first bike last year I went thru a similar phase – looking for an older Japanese “standard” – Nighthawks, Radians, Zephyrs, etc., because I thought they might be more beginner friendly due to their sensible ergonomics and power. At the end these concerns pushed me away from an older bike:

– age and reliability
– parts availability
– old tech brakes
– old tech suspension

GS500 and Ninja 500 are the more contemporary equivalent of these older bikes and work very well for beginners. Heck, even my 9-year old ’01 GS500 feels pretty dated (its design first came out in the late ’80s) compared to the newer bikes.

[Gary856]

An ’02 or older GS500. I know you want a smaller bike because you feel it’s safer, but the power of the GS500 is pretty mild and controllable even for a brand new beginner, yet it’s enough to cruise at 80 mph+.

[Gary856]

Dirt bike, of course, and it’ll be great. I’d like to do a two-day dirt bike camp too but it’s 3-4 hours away from me so finding a whole weekend for it is not that easy. Trials, on the other hand, has very little to do with normal riding.

[Gary856]

Keep your eyes up and look far down the road – that would significantly reduce the sensation of speed. Do not look down, or it’d seem like the ground and the scenery are rushing at you. This is especially important in the corners – look at the corner before you get there, but keep your eyes moving up the road so by the time you’ve physically arrived at the corner, you should be looking way past the corner already. Again, don’t look down when you’re in the corner – look at where you want to go.

The higher your eye level is and the farther you look down the road, the less the sensation of speed. At the same speed, my YZF600R feels faster than my DRZ400 because the YZF600R’s riding position puts my eyes closer to the ground. On the DRZ, 70 mph on the freeway feels like 40 because I sit so straight and high up; the sense of speed is so low it almost feels like I could run down the freeway that fast. I sometimes look down or sideways on purpose to get more of the sense of speed.

Wearing high quality protective gears is another thing that made me feel more comfortable at speed.

[Gary856]

I bought a Givi A603 windscreen for my GS500, used it a few times, played with the adjustments a lot and finally decided to take it off. It added a lot of wind noise and buffeting without giving much wind protection. A taller/bigger windscreen may work better functionally, but I haven’t tried it, partly because a huge windscreen does not look good on a GS500, and partly because I don’t ride lnog distance on the freeway on the GS500.

For long distance and high speed (over 75 mph), having better wind protection does make a big difference. You have to experiment to find the right screen size/shape for your bike and your size. Many people feel a small windscreen is just for looks, and a mid-sized windscreen (like the Givi A603) just doesn’t work well because it directs the high pressure air right at your helmet so it gets freaking loud and tiring. On the other hand, the factory fairing and windscreen on my YZF600R is not that tall, but it’s the right shape aerodynamically and it gives me pretty good wind protection at high speed.

[Gary856]

1. Video yourself doing circles and you’ll see that you’re not leaning as much as you thought you were, i.e., there’s a lot more lean angle left.

2. Find a big enough parking lot with plenty of runoff space so you don’t keep worrying about running into the curb if you get disoriented and have to bail.

3. If you go really slow (slipping the clutch and dragging the brake), you have to actually balance the bike. If you go just a little faster (not slipping the bike and no brake, just let the bike glide along with no throttle), the bike balances itself.

4. Start practicing with a bigger circle. If you go directly to a small circle, of course it’ll be hard.

5. If at anytime you feel you’re about to drop the bike, give it just a little bit of throttle and the bike will stand up and straighten out by itself. Don’t touch the front brake when your handle bar is cranked way over.

6. Turn your body and turn your head like an owl to look at your own tail, like a dog chasing its own tail.

[Gary856]

You need to understand the semantics of what is being described before claiming the physics is wrong. Like you said, this is not a classroom physics discussion.

When you sit on a bike, the bike/rider move together as a unit. When you stand up on the pegs, the rider/bike separation allows the “bike” itself to move freely and independently under the rider, which is critical in dirt riding. The combined CG does not, and cannot, change, but the “bike’s CG” (and its inertia) is greatly lowered when it’s seperated from (i.e., not rigidly attached to) the rider. The whole thing is about independant movement between the bike and the rider. Makes sense now?

[Gary856]

If you’re young and fit, you can get used to anything pretty quickly. Your muscles just need some conditioning. I found that out while riding mountain bikes. At the beginning of the reason my back and neck would be sore after a fairly short ride, but the more I rode, the less they bothered me. Nevertheless, there’s no denying that a more upright bike allows you to ride longer in greater comfort, when the ride is longer than a couple of hours at a time.

[Gary856]

The really tight slow speed u-turns take determination to practice and master. Doing it with everyone watching is the worst, so practice on your own. You must believe this – if others can do it, so can you; it just takes practice. Due to the stress involved (not wanting to drop the bike) I usually get hot and uncomfortable within a few turns. Any type of learning is not exactly fun, but the satisfication afterward makes up for it.

Doing circles are great, but I’d get dizzy quickly so I do fig-8s, except I’d do two full turns before reversing direction. Don’t worry about how small the circle is at first. Pick a diameter that’s comfortable to you, and as you go around the circle in a steady state and get used to it, you can gradually tighten the circle without much effort. Within 15 minutes of practice you’d notice the difference. Eventually you’d trust yourself and the bike enough to totally relax the muscles, allow the handlebar to go into full lock, let the bike does what it needs to do, and that turn will really tighten up. 1 hour of this practice is about as much as I’d want to before I’ve had enough of it (mentally and physically) each time.

[Gary856]

This site doesn’t seem to have a search function, which is bad, because the same questions (like what bike should I get) come up repeatedly.

FYI on insurance quote from my State Farm agent today (San Jose, CA):

– 250k (per person)/500k (per incident)/100k (property damage)
– uninsured motorist
– $500 deductable for comp/collision
– 45 year old male, clean driving record (lucky that I never got tickets the way I ride …)

’00 R1: $252.75 for 6 months
’05 GSXR1k: $289.89 for 6 months
’03 YZF600R: $177.89 for 6 months
’07 SV650: $222.80 for 6 months
’01 GS500: $170.53 for 6 months

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