Best bike in the world this week
Worst Bike in The World This Week
When You Got That "I Just Bought A New Bigger Bike" Feeling
Send emails to contact@nocomotopodcast.com, it doesn't have to be important.
Best bike in the world this week
Worst Bike in The World This Week
When You Got That "I Just Bought A New Bigger Bike" Feeling
Send emails to contact@nocomotopodcast.com, it doesn't have to be important.
Okay, welcome to the historic episode 30 of the no Comodo podcast. I'm your host motogp, and with me is your other hosts swigging. Yup, let's talk bikes. All right, so moving into things here early on, I want to do yet another listener updates. I want to recognize that we have one as far as I can tell, just one single lonely listener in New Zealand and I'm going to speak directly to you. Thank you. And you know, if you can recruit some others. I know it's difficult. It's not a hugely populated country. I mean, you know, you're not in the middle of nowhere but I mean geographically you're kind of in the middle of nowhere. How many miles do you think it is from New Zealand to Australia on the ocean roughly? It's, it's a ways. It's not Hawaii to like la, but I mean it's, it's, it's, it's out there. You know what's definitely not Hawaii, it's la since that's half the Pacific. This is true, right? But it's a little bit ways. You were flying the flag for your island, your country, and you know, while you're not as statistically huge portion of the continents, listeners, you are important in your area. So keep it up with you man. Alright. And then I noticed some listeners coming in from Farnam, which is south west of London, not too far from Crawley or Horley, which are some places we know very well and I want to say there's like three or four listeners that have popped up there. Right? And I can't help but imagine that these are probably guys that James used to race with way back in the day, you know, like, I just imagine these guys have been just amazing conversations with each other like, oh yeah. So we went to Crawley, we saw the new Jack reacher film, you know, you know, like, yeah, 10 thought it was right. But I thought it was brilliant. Well good. You know, I love the free will to speak there. Yeah, yeah. We're going to be riding bikes. This weekend's gonna be Brill. Um, so that's important. And then, uh, but whilst you know, UK definitely thumbs up with a new listeners still trailing behind all the commonwealths what are you doing? I'm about ready to get my union Jack Tattoo removed. Okay. You were seriously letting me down here. Uh, you know, we've done a lot of talk about uh, what a serious motorcycle culture it is. You know, uh, you got to live up to your end of the bargain. Let's get some more recruits. Candidates kicking your ass. Australia's kicking your ass. And you know, whilst our only New Zealand listener isn't necessarily kicking your ass and numbers, I'm pretty much comes through on every episode now. So it was definitely up there and enthusiasm. So let's get your. We've already warned you to get your shit together. You K now on notice. Alright. Alright. So moving on, um, email. Okay, we got to, we got an email from William here in Louisiana who I'm not sure how we're going to be able to link this picture, but you're, you're the tech guy so you can figure that out. So we asked you guys for suggestions on the worst bike in the world. Well, we got this from William, which he's in Louisiana. He calls this a Cajun trike. This is a facebook market place add that he's put up for us. Oh, where do we start? So this looks like a early nineties. Suzuki, Katana, sevenfifty, all of the body work has been removed except for the very back end of the tail with the brake light and the grab bar. It has the remiss fake carbon fiber for into one exhaust on it. It's actually the exact same exhaust that, uh, we have on the monster that we got. It's got a painted red rim. Uh, don't know why I guess to match the grab Bar, all the other body work has been removed, including the tank and then affixed to the front of it is the front half, not even the front half, but the front wheels and body work of some sort of four wheeler atv.
Speaker 2:Okay. In order to fence me about this bike more than anything else, it's the fact that this guy has clearly gone to a lot of trip. Oh yeah. To to put the front end of a trial of a four wheeler on the spike to turn it into into some weird off-road canem bullshit thing and yet he couldn't do the most basic mod that would make this better, which is to go dark side and put a car tire on the rear wheel. Yeah. Because having rounded tires is going to do nothing for you on a three wheeler.
Speaker 1:No, I've seen a lot of bullshit trike conversions, a lot of them and seen a couple on the level of how bad this one is, but I've never seen one done quite this way. And the Cajun trike is the perfect way to describe this is, you know, the, the Katana mixed with a four wheeler. I mean that's. So, that's so special. Brand of white trash in every direction forwards and backwards. It's absolutely wonderful that way. What I'm, I'm kinda curious because it looks like the gas tank on this is neither the gas tank of the Katana or the four wheeler. I mean, it could be the gas tank from the four wheeler, but I don't know why it was bothered painted black then rather than just being the original red color. That's a little interesting to me. Um, I'm wondering what the works. No, no, that's a gas tank. Look at the screw cap on the top and that's just a rice, but is most of that, of what we can see there. The gas tank. And they just took the cover off of what covered the airbox and the gas tank. I believe the year there is no air box on this contraption. These carbs are just breathe and easy. That's what I think is happening here. So I'm worried about like, you know. Okay. So all right. They want 1650 for this piece of crap. Right. But it should be optimistic in Denver. Would be optimistic anywhere because this can't be road legal because it doesn't have lights. Right? So it must be for off road use, but there's no drive to the front wheels. So you're relying on the standard motorcycle sport road tire for off road grip. So this, you know, if this was, like you said, if they'd put the car tire on the back and it was a chunky off road tire, something. Okay. You've got some sort of really weird contraption. I mean it's still useless off road because you know, how you deal with ruts and things, you know, you've got three, three wheels tracking on the ground. It's useless but whatever. But this is neither good on road or off road. So I'm super confused and there's no way it's road legal because it doesn't have lights, it doesn't have turn signals. It, it doesn't have a lot of basic things that you need. I'm pretty sure 90 percent of Louisiana legality or road worthiness don't really apply. Yeah. I'm guessing the guy that built this probably plays a little fast and loose with just the status of his driver's license and general. So illegal. The vehicle is on. Probably doesn't play real big into what's going on. But yeah, we're going to find a way to just post this in the show notes because there's really not much we can say except wow. But um, thank you William. This was a, this was interesting to look at to say the least. Now moving onto a different email. This one's from Nashville or at least the Nashville area from Brian. Okay. So Brian says, hey guys, like many of your new listeners, I discovered you through Bruce Philips podcast and I'm so glad that I did. Bruce does a great job and he certainly does. We love the show, but he says, but I like to cuss and drink beer, so you guys are more my speed. I've listened to every episode. Thank you. Brian says questionable things about you. They've listened to every episode, but okay. I'm 45 years old and live in Nashville, Tennessee area. I only recently started writing and by that I mean I took the MSF course in April of this year and have since logged a little over 3000 miles. Okay. Respectable amount of miles and that amount of time. So he says, I initially bought a 2018 bmw g 3:10 are as a quote starter bike, but quickly regretted it due to the lack of power. When I went to the dealer for my 600 miles service, I saw 2016, our 1200 rs with 280 miles on it. The bike had sat in the shop for nearly two years until someone finally bought it. When the buyers check bounced and he never made a payment, the dealer repossessed it. I took the bike for a test ride and traded for it on the spot of financially moronic decision I know, but I basically got a new are 1200 rs for a used price. He says, keep in mind to this point, I had written almost exactly 600 miles on a motorcycle in my entire fucking life. Nevertheless, I thought it would be a good idea to jump instantly from 34 horsepower and 21 foot pounds of Torque to 125 horsepower and 92 foot pound of torque. But it has not been a problem. I've since put over 2,500 miles on the RS, including a 600 mile trip out of state and I absolutely love it. I commute 40 miles round trip to work on the bike when it's not a thousand degrees outside night. Otherwise write it as much as possible. I'm very comfortable on it. Then he says, here's the issue. In so many ways, this has been the absolute perfect bike for me. I much prefer spurt bikes over cruisers, but I also want a bike I can take on extended trips with features like cruise control, shaft drive, shift assist, heated grips, traction control, etc. Etc. This bikE literally checks all those boxes, but at 520 pounds wet and with the flat twin engine suited more for touring. The rs really isn't scratching my sport bike itch. I'm highly Tempted to make another financially moronic decision and sell it or trade the rs. For a new sport bike. I'm thinking s 1000 double our cbr, 1000[inaudible] or something similar. Another option would be to wait awhile longer, keep the rrs and try to find a gently used or new old stock, 600 bike. I'm not much of a rancher and have and have very little free time to work on a bike. so I would need something super reliable and ideally still under warranty. And then I do like this at the end he says a third option would be to stop being a little bitch and just enjoy the amazing sport tour. I'm already lucky enough to own. What should I do? Brian from franklin, Tennessee. All right. So there's a lot here. Starting right off here. The bmw pretty good bike. I haven't written one, but I've heard great things from people who have. Right? Um, I don't think they're super cheap. I want to say there's somewhere between six and seven grand, but the bmw 3:10, uh, they're 47, 50 brand new. No way are they that cheap. Okay. Okay. Well we'll get into, we'll get into that cycle yet. We'll get into that later. But. So are we going to get into it later because you just tip your hand. Alright. So um alright, so that bike, by all accounts a great buck and not a bad way to go when you're starting it sounds like. Yes. And disposable income just by the vibe of this email and thinking no kids. I'm thinking a little free and easy, pretty decent working hours. We got a little shot from his office window looking down into nashville. Like I think brian's doing all right for himself, right? This is a new hobby and he's hitting it hard and I fucking love that. Right? Three thousand miles. You know, your first few months writing essentially. That's a very respectable number of miles. Like no problem there, you know, I think, I think you're getting into this, you're hitting it hard and that's great. Now moving up to the arch, 1200 sounds like you've got a pretty good price on one and that is an amazing, amazing bike. It really is. And 125 horsepower and the 90 foot 92 foot pounds of torque. I don't know exactly how much of that makes it to the back wheel, but still a fuck ton, right? We'll just think straight, 15 percent more, 15 to 20 percent more torque than
Speaker 2:the norwich.
Speaker 1:Right. And then you've got the. There's something about this bike that isn't really scratching it for you. Now the are 1200 rs is a fairly sporty bike, right? If you're looking at sports tourer bikes, this one by today's standards leans a little bit for their slightly further towards the sport than it does the touring.
Speaker 2:Uh, I would go the other way around. You think this is more touring, bike made a little bit more sport. Made slightly sporty as opposed to sport. Bike escalated up into, you know, escalate, escalated up, you know, it's not like an st 1300. It's more classic tour may. It's more like a cruiser made standard with performance.
Speaker 1:I don't. I disagree. Let's bring up a picture of one here. This is.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay. Right. It's not like an std. 1,300 where it's the flow. I'm an idiot. I thought edgar, this is. Oh, I'm an idioT. I thought this was for some ReaSon I glazed over. And so a g$1,200. No, the. Yeah. This is, this is fairly sporty,
Speaker 1:right? This has got handlebars very similar to like the height than position that you'd find like on my super hawk. Really? Right. This isn't, this isn't full on rr spec race bike, sort of crouched down position, but this is not necessarily the most comfortable sport touring position you've ever seen in your life. Right. And you know, buy from 99 point nine percent of all people on this planet, they're going to look at this and kind of thing. Oh yeah, sort of japanese crotch rocketing. And that's what they're going to think. You know, it's important to keep in mind that most people don't know shit about fuck about motorcycles, right? Fifty percent of all people here in the states just only know about harley's. Outside of that, their knowledge base is nothing.
Speaker 2:And to them, if they saw an indian scout that would say, oh harley,
Speaker 1:right? So this is just some sort of sport thing to anyone who, unless they are, you know, they ride something other than a harley. So already we're gettIng down to about like what, like six percent of the population tops on top of that. They're familiar with the different age differentiation of japanese bikes and european bikes, sports bike, sport touring and all of that. like, no, this is a fast bike anyway. You cut it now. A lot of elitist might be like a no or seriously do the art.$1,200. It's a pig. Shut up. This is a fast bike. Anything over 90 horsepower, making it to the rear wheel is fast in my book. Right? So brian, here's the thing. This bike that you own is way better than you are. I know you've done over 3000 miles since april and that's a lot your writing a lot. Obviously you're commuting a lot of days if not everyday even taken these. You've taken the 600 mile trip, you feel comfortable on the bike, everything's working and all of a sudden like you feel like you've got to keep this train of escalation going. Right? I don't think you need a new bike. Like you said, this bike ticks all the boxes. What I think you need is a track day because this bike is so much better than you are and let's keep in mind your 45. Statistically this is not a good age to be when you're looking at the possibility of crashing. Alright? Like 45 to 55 right now is where like everyone's wrecking their fucking motorcycles and dying. Sturgis just ended. I don't know how many people exactly died at sturgis but like 700 or something like that. Like it's crazy. You don't need a faster bike. This bike is way better than you. This bike is so much sportier than you realize. so I think two directions. One, what do you need a track day. Either way and you know if you're not afraid to do little damage to this bike than take this spike, but I think your other direction is you need to get a shitbox already crashed or scratched up ninja 2:50 and you can do track days on that. And I think the amount that taking some instruction on a super shitty 200, I mean the thing can be fucking stolen, literally stolen. It doesn't matter because you won't plate it, you won't have to put it in your name, it will only exist for you to take to the track and get some instruction on and after getting some things like that down, you'll Realize how much you'll juSt realize how sporty the bike you already have actually is because it is overkill for the regular roads. It's absolutely overkill. You can, you could have the[inaudible] are rr or you could have a ninja h, two r or whatever and just some asshole that's done a couple track days on your bmw will just destroy you on regular roads or a track or whatever. You know you're running into a little area where it's important to keep in mind that you still don't know very much. Right. And this is not trying to belittle or demean anything because like I said, you've already done an incredible amount oF writing for the short amount of time you have been writing and hats off to you fucking bad ass, right? Like that. That's wonderful. There. You're on the right track there to nothing but big thumbs up from us there.
Speaker 2:So I actually have an alternate theory and a much simpler solution. Was that a saying that brian came from a three slash 10 are[inaudible] with its 34 horsepower and 21 foot pounds of torque? Yeah. The reason I think he thinks the spike is lethargic and tury and old man is because he's probably short shifting the fuck out of it.
Speaker 1:He might be. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2:So brian, what I will say is when you get onto the highway, start shifting around 6,000 rpm and see how it feels. Because I think that what's probably happening here, because I mean when I first got the gorge, you know, outside of the test ride I realized I was shifting around 3000 rpm, which is kind of really just the beginning of the torque curve. Yeah. And you know this is a box twin. So this thing, probably if he shifting around, similar kind of feel to as he was on on the, on the 3:10[inaudible], then he's probably only ever got maybe 40 foot pounds of torque out of that motor and it just sits at 3,500 rpm on the highway in sixth gear. So I think trying and just ride the bike. You have a little more spiritedly don't take risks but just start shifting later and really start ringing the power out of it. Now it may be good. I don't think you need to get a traCk Bike because I think, you know, as you said in youR email, you're not, you're saying you're not much of a rancher, but if you can find somewhere where you can go do a like a track day class and just do a weekend of lessons, I think that would be a shit ton of fun.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Now there is another option which is you could go for a k, 1200 rs, the 2006 and later, I believe, which is a similar bike to yours, but it a bmw in line for cross the frame. It's the r 1000 was like essentially just a track bike. It's a little bit more sports, it's sports tourer. He in exactly the same way your current bike is, but just styled a little more sport and whatever. But I'd stick with the bike that you have. It's already unusable horsepower for the real world. It really is. So yeah, shift later, take a track day and if you really get into track, get an engine to 50 and thrash the fuck out of that thing because nothing will make you a better writer early on than just taking a super small bike and really learning what the kind of limits are there. And then it'll give you this whole new appreciation for the other machine that you have to know what you can actually do on a smaller bike with skill added. So there we go.
Speaker 2:And again, I will, I will just say if you still feel like you want something a bit sportier, then what I would say is even if you do end up thinking what I really want is a super sport at the very least, hang on to the bike you have for another six months.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Do our two bike system, like, you know, just tell you get another one and then just promise yourself you're only going to renew the insurance on one of them,
Speaker 2:which isn't a huge risk because if you're getting rid of, if you end up getting rid of the bmw, they hold their value super well yeah. Well you already bought it a little bit depreciated. So, or maybe even maybe the biggest loss really is going to be, you know, a little bit of depreciation plus um, you know, your insurance and your registration. So kind of work yourself towards the decision points on when the, when the registration expires.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Alright. I think we nailed that. So that brings us to something we're going to talk about. I've been interested in the idea of how I'm just an escalation in motorcycles in general and this was really brought up by brian's email to we. It was like, okay, this is the week we have to talk about it because we've got this ongoing list of things that we want to talk about and we're constantly texting, emailing back and forth, what are we going to talk about? And this so many subjects that are just been thrown to the side for weeks and weeks. Um, but this is the time to talk about escalation. So when you're writing in general, you start with something smaller or the very least cheap. Even if it is a large engine, people tend to get a hold of something with a big engine that's still not even making a lot of power, right? They'll be like, oh, my first bike was a gs 8:50, you know, which by modern standards aren't making a huge amount of power or whatever it is. Right? And then there's this idea that if either in just straight up displacements or horsepower or weight in some way, it's always going bigger and bigger and bigger with every bike. And a lot of people do this very quickly, early on. Some people do it slowly over the years. Some people have just, they buy a 500, they write it for 10 years and then they get something that's like, you know, they get a boost or something. I don't know it. There's all sorts of different ways that it happens. But I'm kind of curious why? Because I'm one of those people that did a very different thing. I got a 6:50 nighthawk to start with. I got the cb 900 after that. And then I went down to the cb 3:50. And I remember like the day after I got it, I took it by my buddy's dad's house. The thing wasn't running. I mean I bought it in, in boxes, you know, it was all taken apart. But I remember taking it by his place because he was in the middle of restoring a bonneville t 1:10 tiger. At the time when that he'd bought from new way back in the day and he bought it back from the second owner who he'd sold it to in like 1983 or something like that. Right. And so I was just talking about what is going to take, what about this and everything. And I still had the cb 900 with me and he, he sort of like, you know, kind of took notice and he goes, oh, 900 down to 3:50. And he looked at him and he said, you've progressed a level. And I really didn't know what he meant for awhile because I was like, well what do you mean? Like this bike by all means is inferior to the cb 900, you know, it doesn't, you know, I was like 900 hundreds. Got like the air ride suspension, which is, was supposed to be better. I mean I didn't know the air ride suspension was complete shit, but it's supposed to be a better system. I'm like the cvt 100 is better brakes. It's got more power, more cylinders, more better. Carburetors carries more fuel. It has more creature comforts, like what do you mean? Like I'm taking a step down and what he meant was I was just, I'd found a bike that I was going to enjoy for just exactly what it was like clearly because I was going down in power, wasn't expecting something new out of it in terms of speed and performance. I was at the bike for exactly what it was going to be. Now when people go up, you know, they're looking at. It's like, um, you know, it's like a heroin addict has to keep taking more and more heroin to keep getting high. Right. You know, the building up a tolerance to the acceleration, to the speed, to the experience of riding the bike and it's like, oh, I've got to have the new thing to sustain this high. I get while I'm writing, but I don't think that's everyone either. I think some,
Speaker 2:I think it is for a lot of people. I mean, I think a lot of people get into, into motorcycles and they have this one particular idea of what they want and then they'll pick a bike that does that one thing that they really want and then if they haven't really gotten a lot of experience on it and they want to escalate quickly, they'll try and get more of the same thing. It's kind of like, you know, when you go to the movies as a six year old, it's, it's, you know, batman, teenage mutant ninja turtles and all I want is teenage mutant ninja turtles too. And batman two, batman, three, four and five more, more, more, more of the same, bigger, better. Um, but I think if you, if you, if you are kind of forced to stick with the bike for a while, you kind of figure out more what you like out of that bike and you can, you can kind of perceptual allies. What do you actually want out of your body?
Speaker 1:Well yeah, and the reason I want to talk about this so much more as you know, with brian's email, it's this amazing little case study because all sorts of different angles are brought up here because he got the small bike and then you know, the three tenors are, he literally just got jumped to the biggest version of that in the are 1200 rs. Right, right. It's the same thing. I mean it's not the same thing. It's a different frame and all of that. But in bmw sort of, you know, sport line up, he just went, okay, here we go. Yeah, of course. The most insane ones, the s 1000. I know, but it's sort of in terms of that philosophy of bike, he just went boom, here's a bigger step. Right. And he did it quickly. Right. Now was that because, I mean he only did 600 miles. Right? If it's your first bike, 600 miles, I don't know if that's quick enough to get bored of a motorcycle. I really don't think it is. Maybe it is. I dunno. Yeah. I maybe brian has just living on the edge every day and he really, and, and maybe legitimately he was getting bored of it. I know, I don't know, but I think a lot of people go up, they escalate for a social pressure and I wonder what that had an influence there as well. Right. He's taken his bike in for service. He bought it new and everything. Are there other people around the dealership? Has it been talking with people and are they, you know, did someone say to him like, oh, the three, 10. Yeah, yeah, those are good for beginners. And that was just like, you know, gotten his head started festering and bothered him. Every time he went back to the dealership to buy some gloves or get some oil or, or do whatever it was. And he's like, oh, it's a startup bikes to start a. I got to get off of this thing. I've got to get off of this thing and onto something bigger so I can get more respect, you know, because the dude's riding a lot. Right. And you starting to feel like he's a real writer. Do you're a real writer from day one. Okay. And you know this and so, but this isn't, this doesn't happen just in this world. Let's look like harley's, right? You know, so the sportster oh, that's the beginners bike. That's the girl's bike. You know when you're going to get her bike, when he entered drop 16,000 more dollars and get 20 more horsepower. Right. It's, it's weird because there's this escalation that happens, right? So in the harley world it's not even just for, for, for performance, you know, because if you want the fastest harley, it's the v ride or the 1200 sportster or a breakout I guess. But even the breakout, you know, it's just sort of just in terms of general size there, right? Like some people just even escalate up to the trike because it's physically larger and therefore more impressive in their eyes. Right. So, so we've determined that some people will escalate for just the performance because they need that drug and some people will escalate from a social pressure, like a feeling of inadequacy because they don't think that their bike is viewed the right way. It doesn't match their mental image of how they think they are as a writer. Right. And on a certain level, I very much agree with that because why are you riding if you don't feel cool? Right? You know, we, we, we accept risk when we ride and you know, the fund is a big trade off that makes that acceptance possible. But also so is the um, uh, I was about to say like a feeling of self worth, but that's complete bullshit. No, there's something about, you know, how, how cool you can feel on it. There's a certain thing with your ego and the experience and the sense of like accomplishment and mastery that all forums together that just clicks when you're on the bike and if you feel like the bike isn't adequate then all of a sudden you don't feel cool anymore and if you're not feeling cool then you definitely shouldn't be accepting the risk. Right. I mean the most risky things that guys have ever done in the world was to look cool in front of women. Right? Like looking cool in front of chicks or other dudes is like the biggest reason guys accept risk ever. You know, like, hold my beer, right? I'm going to do this cool fucking shit. That's why we do it. So if you don't feel cool on the bike, did I, I understand it. I don't agree with necessarily agree with it. I sort of agree with it, but I understand why people escalate for that reason and then some people will just escalate just to outdo someone else. And that's the really dangerous one right in that, that, that sort of will hopefully that's the one that ends in someone getting the free wheeler because just like limits through the way they couldn't ride and maybe potentially hurt themselves. I don't know, but I've just got to get this bigger thing because my buddy got this right. But that's quite often where you run into the situation of like, oh I started off with, you know, this used ducati$900. Then my buddy got a, an 800 pound igali and that I had to go and get a 1200 multistrada and it keeps going up and then people very quickly run into a situation where they have very little experience and a lot of on demand power. And I'm not saying that everyone that's, you know, moving up is doing that. In fact, most people probably aren't, but several people are and I think it's worth looking at why we need to escalate so much because in terms of a practical vehicle, you start getting diminishing returns as soon as you cross about 55 horsepower and then that curve drops in terms of what you're getting for your money. We'll even more sharply after about 90 horsepower. Right.
Speaker 2:So yeah, there is, it is an interesting thing and it's something that for what I get out of riding seems so it seems like most of the motivations that I've seen for this and what people have told me in terms of what bikes they're getting and what their motivations are, it seems counterintuitive to what motorcycling is to me in that, you know, to me writing, you know, writing is one of those things where, and this is just kind of the way I approach it is, you know, you'll do things like drive through a red light, you know, a second after it's turned, you'll drive through a light a second after it's turned red in the car because you know, what's the worst that could happen? Or I will just assume that this person turning onto the road where I have right away won't do it. Because if he does, we'll fuck him. It'll, it's his insurance. So he'll be at fault. So whatever. Whereas on a motorcycle, you know, you can say, well, you know, you had the right of way and will inscribe that on your tombstone. Yeah. Where it's not just accepting responsibility for yourself, it's recognizing that there's a lot of fucking idiots around. And to make everything go right for you. You have to be responsible for everyone that's around you and all of their fuck up.
Speaker 1:I can sum this up perfectly. Uh, right before I got here, when I was on six, my inbetween. So right was, I was getting on to six headed towards here. Uh, so I was still on or sheridan and all of a sudden this bentley. What's the bentley coupe like? The hot bentley sports coupe car. I have no idea. It's like, it's like the continental butts, the two doors, small. Super fucking fast. Like gigantic engine in this thing, right? It looks kind of like a, like a bmw. What's the z car thing? They did like the James Bond one.
Speaker 2:Hm.
Speaker 1:No, it doesn't matter super fast. Bentley just decides to blow by me. Just super fast. Right. And then he's held up by traffic and I don't know why, but for the moment I got triggered and I was like, oh no buddy. Now I've got this 2003 carborated honda v twin, right, which most sport bike, none. Most sporophyte people want to keep doing that, but a lot of, you know, a lot of people might consider not necessarily all that fast by today's standards, you know, it's like a hundred and 15 horsepower, but 100 sevens get into the back wheel, but it's big corporate whatever. And I just went like, I don't think so buddy, I've still got a better horse power to weight ratio. I'm going to fucking show you what's up. And we weren't full on racing but like, you know, I would weave through a little bit of traffic and get ahead and then he'd find some gaps and he'd sort of blow me off and whatever. And at some point like, you know, it started at like 60 miles an hour then to 70, then 80 then and, and a certain point I was like, holy crap, I'm doing 115 on six. This is a 65 mile per hour zone. Nothing I've done seemed all that insane to me at this point, but I am now noticing this getting away from me and then I just let him go. I just let him go and you know, I don't know if the bentley has a better top speed than my bike. I know I better acceleration than him. Although he had acceleration that was very close to mine. But you know, you've kind of gotta get into, you know, upwards of$150,000 to$200,000 in a car to approach the level of performance that wasn't even top of the line 15 or 20 years ago in sport sport motorcycles, right? If you, if you've got 90 horsepower, you're faster than everybody around you. Like just like 99 point nine percent of the time. I, you know, so when you're, when you're going past that, you know, why it's important to think about why you're doing it and for what purpose, you know, is it because you like how the rest of the power band of that bike is below that point that you're making, you know, a have upwards of 100 horsepower because you know, once your bike, once you're asking your bike to make more than 90 horsepower, you're going faster than 100 miles per hour. That's just the plain facts.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah. I mean most of the time you might be doing might be making 80 horsepower in first gear on a genxer six, 7:50, doing 65 miles an hour in first gear. But yeah. But yeah, but yeah, it is one of those things where unless you are on, unless you're pulling away and accelerating as quickly as you can, or you're on the drag strip, I doubt that more than point zero zero one percent of the time an r one is making close to peak horsepower. Yeah, maybe even less, but there's a combination of do you really need more power? Is it just not doing it for you or is there a perception that you have of yourself that makes you feel more bad ass when you have the super bike over the super sport and getting a bit more torque and you just like how the torque fields or is it the way you feel about yourself given how you perceive that other people you
Speaker 1:rise and. I'm definitely not saying that any of these things are right or wrong because I definitely see a way that all of these are legitimate and that sounds weird, but I always say you have to feel cool on the bike. Otherwise, why would you, why would you accept the risk of riding the bike in the first place? I totally get it, but you know,
Speaker 2:I would also say that like, you know, if you just want to have the roi because it's a lot more bad ass to have an[inaudible] that are our six, that's kind of valid in the same way that having like a$2,000 suit is better than having, you know, a$200 suit from the men's warehouse.
Speaker 1:Get very few people can tell the difference, but when someone, you know twice a year, someone does recognize the difference. Maybe that makes all the validation in the world for you, you know, like, okay. So, uh, Another weird thing that happened to me on the right down here today, um, I'm in the middle of greeley and I'm coming up and there's this sidecar rig in front of me and I'm like, what is that? oh, that's old. Or is that like a euro? No, it's not a, you're all like, oh, is that an infield? Nah. And then I pull up next to him and it's a bmw or 60. Now this is a red light conversation. So I had to like, get to, like. So I just flip it, my advisor, you know, I'm like, is that an r 60? You know, and, and I mean I knew it was in our 60 but it was so perfect. I didn't know if like maybe it was a kid bike or something like that, you know, it was so perfect. It looked newer, the new right. And the guy, you know, clearly he was like in his, like late sixties or something. This guy I've been writing a long time and you know, he very much had the, uh, there's a certain look or you know, from guys that age, you know, the, the genes with the, with the cuffs of them folded up and the white tee shirt and the sneakers and the three quarter helmet with the plastic, you know, he was dressed like, you know, he had been riding since he was a teenager and you know, this. And he, he sort of looked, looked around and you know, what I say is that an our 60. And he looks around and he sees me in like this incredibly puzzled look on his face. And he goes, it is, you know. And, and then he just started, he's like, you know, bmws. I was like, yeah, I do, you know. And he just starts spouting these. I had all these slash five models and he was still rattling off bike cities hadn't restored as like he was pulling away and turning left and I was going straight, you know, but it made, I could tell it like it made his year. Yeah, because the bike, he was on fit who he was and he walks around all day or writing it, just hoping someone will recognize. And I did. And that was like everything in the world that he needed, right. Completed him the shock on his face that I recognized it and you know, and like I said, I would have said like all, you've obviously spent a shit ton of time restoring this and whatever and that would've, that would've filled him up even more. But just the fact that this dude that didn't look the part to him did, he wasn't on the vehicle. That was the part to him just bridging that world. And in that moment, is that in our 60[inaudible] yes. And just him totally just completely validated and shocked that he was. He'd been going a long time, you know, feeling just cool to himself on the inside, but obviously not getting a whole lot back on that, you know, and for some people the are one is that bike that does that. You get on it and you just feel right because you're like, yeah, you know, I'm going to get around to doing that track day. But Inside I know I'm that guy, right? Like I get that, you know, you haven't gotten around to it yet. You're eating, you probably are aware of the bike is better than you are with them. At least the meantime. You know that you can arrive to the you, you're 100 percent sure you can ride to the level and ability that you at least currently have. The bikes definitely not going to let you down right now. You may not know just how many times over that bike is better than you are, but whatever you know for certain that you've got the kit to get done what you need to get done and you feel cool on the bike. I get that, but I don't know, I just feel like everyone, it's worth taking stock, you know, what do you think about what your next bike is and what you're currently on, but there's also are really the motivation
Speaker 2:there is also somebody has taken to keep in mind, which is, you know, if, if you're riding a check 600 and you think you need the 1000,
Speaker 3:you know,
Speaker 2:rather than thinking I've got to get the$1,000, there is very much this taoist perspective shift that you can have that will instantly solve$6,000 problem in your life.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's true. It's true. Understanding that your current 600 chicks or is limited to 167 miles per hour and capable of more. You can save yourself a lot of money, dude. Like, you know. okay. I know we might have some more thoughts on this later, but I think I've kind of said all I need to say about it right now, just. Yeah, and just sort of closing on this part. You know, um, escalation in general. I'm a fan of it, but I juSt, I think it's just always worth for everybody just on theIr own time to really sit and meditate on exactly why they are going to go for something bigger and when you and when you come up with a reason that's good enough for you, then I'm on board. Get a bigger bike bro, because at the end of the day, getting a bigger bike is fucking awesome. So a lot of fun. All right, let's take a break here. All right. We're back. And as always on the show, we're going to do best worst bike in the world this week. Now our usual disclaimer, if we have chosen a bike that you owned or want to own, don't get your feelings hurt. There'll be a new worst bike next week or you know what if you think are best bike in the world is pretty lame. You know what? It's just a fun way to look at a couple of different bikes at a different way than you might normally. So brief discussion, a explanation. We each choose a new bike every week, each of us ultimating best and worst. We have no idea what the other is chosen or those swigging might've tipped his hand earlier in the episode on this one this week. And let's get into it. So as always. So he goes first and this week you have worst bike in the world. Is that correct? Yep. Alright. Reveal it. And the worst bike in the world this week is
Speaker 2:the bmw g 3:10.
Speaker 1:Oh, okay.
Speaker 2:Look up the specs. Okay. So what are we dealing with here? So first of all, sorry brian, but you got a little bit suckered here. Okay. So as brian already mentioned in his email, spike makes 34 horsepower, 21 foot pounds of torque and send a sort of beginner naked standard style right thing to keep in mind. This bike is 4,750 dollArs, which is cheap. Cheap and cheerful. Yeah, no problem. Price for an entry level bike, you would think however this bike makes the same torque and too less horsepower than a nIneteen 70 cb. Three 50?
Speaker 1:No. Yes. Now I know cb 3:50, claimed 36,
Speaker 2:but
Speaker 1:in my experience they were never really making more than 24,
Speaker 2:20 aids, but it's in the same ballpark because you have to remember this is a 310 cc single,
Speaker 1:right, and for valve, which. Well, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Okay. So on top of that, you also have to look at the fact that for$5,000 you could get an r three[inaudible] or a ninja, 400 making 10 more horsepower and six foot pounds of torque. Yeah. Now that. yeah, that's where this comes in and both of those bikes are fully faired.
Speaker 1:What also makes more power for the same price is the ktm.
Speaker 2:Yes. Which also makes 44 horsepower and has
Speaker 1:similar styling and all of that. So you're kind of just paying for the bmw badge on this one,
Speaker 2:but it's also not a bike that gets really gets you into the bmt. This bike gets you into the bmw club as much as a street. Five hundred gets you into the harley club rights. Yeah.
Speaker 1:It's the new kid on the block. so there's no one that remembers having one or one similar to it or anything like that.
Speaker 2:Yeah. On top of that, at this price and at this price range and this level of entry, there's no reason not to go japanese. Agreed. because overall the japanese bikes are more reliable even than bmw. You get the insane aftermarket options and the much better part. Support. That's okay.
Speaker 1:Big one. Yeah. I mean bmw parts support is good, but it's definitely not what the japanese stuff is going to get you in this country. Definitely not.
Speaker 2:Right. Also, this isn't. This is clearly a bike that bmw doesn't really care about too much. First of all, if you go to bmw motto ad right? And look at the, the copy for this bike.[inaudible] the, uh, the title, the subtitle of the description is good genes. Good looks. First of all, Germany settled down here. It's a little
Speaker 1:good genes and good looks. Okay. I'll give it to you that bmw has been in the game as long as anyone. A great history of people say, you know, be in trouble used and all that sort of stuff. But, you know, over time, uh, actually a very good record of reliability over time, you know, in the sixties it was like, oh yeah, by bmw, it'll never break. I mean it would break all the time, but that just meant it would break down way less than everything else which broke down just every other day.
Speaker 2:So they are trying in the description. So the first line of the description here, the copy, good looks unmistaken unmistakably run in the family. The g 3:10 are clearly carries the[inaudible] art genes. Uh hm. Yeah. Hm. Maybe settle down here. Okay. First of all, second line, second line, the sporty headlight fairing with powerful headlight, dynamic fuel tank trim, and typical roadster proportions. Transform it into an eye catcher on the street. If the first thing that you're going to advertise about your bike is it's powerful headlight, the shape of the tank, and it's proportions which defined just kind of what class are styled. The bike is in. You can't have a lot going for you here.
Speaker 1:Yeah. It kinda needs to be a bike that's just only going for style. Like let's say the new bonneville's, right? You know, the bonneville can trade on tank shape and a better headlights and letting people know what the bike is from a mile away because that's the whole point of the bike. This is supposed to be a sporty, engaging starter bike, you know, user experience.
Speaker 2:And this bike is not easily identified as a bmw at a distance. It's true.
Speaker 1:Yeah. If this was like a 3:10 like gs adventure bike or something like that, then maybe they could have a point there but not as a sport bike of some description.
Speaker 2:So there is this kind of, as you scroll down on the page on the bmw motor rad website, there are some very suspect things that they're, they're clinging to that they're advertising. Because you know, whenever you get down to this size bike, you're trying to play up things that aren't all that special in the same way that you know, if you're selling a shitbox car, you're going to have, you know, front discs and rear drums and you're going to say front disc brakes. Yeah. And just Ignore the fact that it has rear drum brakes. Yeah, because it's a piece of shit because it's cheap. But you're, you know, you're with what you've got. Yeah. So three of the things that are being advertised on the 3:10 are in this kind of tiles description they've got here, gold anodized upside down forks.
Speaker 1:Okay. Yeah. The uh, at this point,
Speaker 2:which tells me that they're not shows or anything special. They are just inverted forks that are gold anodized
Speaker 1:right now. Okay. look even on like six hundreds or even liter bikes, unless you are actually writing on the track constantly. Inverted forks are pointless unless you're really riding that bike hard now on again, the respect bikes, a super sports and the super bikes, I get it because the bike needs to be capable of that should one day you decide to start doing that with the bike. Okay. Outside of that, there's zero reason to have inverted forks on anything. No one needs that kind of rigidity. No one's doing that kind of Writing on regular roads and you know what, even at the smaller level of these bikes and everything, like when you are taking to the track, you just, you just don't need that. This is true. So it's purely a styling thing. So I'll give it a little bit of a pass on the fact that they aren't show or any, you know, thing hot to talk about, you know, the bikes, a small bike, it's built to a price point. What is sad Is that the bike is so unremarkable though. They have to resort to this kind of gimmicky thing to sell it to you.
Speaker 2:So here's the next one. Okay. Gold brake calipers, some harley davidson bullshit right there. What's even better is if you look at the actual brake calipers there, something like fibers b, y, b r e.
Speaker 1:Oh no, no, no, no. Okay. So those are the brembo offbrand,
Speaker 2:right? Yes. Which is clearly meant to just look very close.
Speaker 1:No, they're made By brembo, but out of a different factory in like Taiwan or something like that. And it's. Yeah, it's the knockoff. It is the um. Oh god, what's the off brand of. Okay. If brembo in terms oF breaks his budweiser, the king of beers, these brake pads are a busch lights. I think that's how you, That's how you describe this.
Speaker 2:Right? And this is kind of the bare minimum you need for a new bike today, but this has to be played up as a feature. But now here's my fAvorite one. Okay. Actually I've got one more before that, which is multifunctional display
Speaker 1:my own three night hawk has a multifunctional display. It'S carborated.
Speaker 2:Well, here's the thing. If you have a speedometer super hawk, I said nighthawk, whatever. If you have a speedometer and a neutral light, you have a
Speaker 1:multifunctional display, multifunctional display that just means you can toggle between like your different trip meters and like that's. You can run a Set it with just holding a button down rather than twisting a mechanical dial to send it back to zero.
Speaker 2:That here's my favorite. Okay. Innovative single cylinder engine, which I think is the bare minimum. You need to have to be called an internal combustion engine.
Speaker 1:Okay. Look, when honda put out the cbr to 50 double our engine, that was a 2:55 valve single cylinder, which was a prototype platform for all the motive. Three Bikes to be based off of that was innovative. Right. And then escalation took over and it's like, all right, okay. And then honda buMped it up some more. Cc's like tWo 89 or something like that just to be able to call it a 300. But uh, yeah, that it's not innovative to have a four valve single. This has been happening in dirt bikes since 2005. Right. That's not a big deal. yeah. Yeah. It just starts to fall apart a little bit. Not in that it's necessarily a garbage bike, but bmw is struggling to markets a entry level bike and make that fit with their premium brand image. Right. So they have to oversell you on this rather than be straight up what it is a very marginally cheaper but slightly more inferior than the cost difference would suggest entry level 300.
Speaker 2:Right. And again, here's the thing, unless for some bizarre reason, the only dealer within a hundred miles of you happens to be a bmw exclusive dealer or maybe a shop that only sells bmws and harley's. There's no reason you would ever choose this, but if you were informed of all of your options.
Speaker 1:Exactly, yeah. You put this next, an r three on the showroom floor and everyone goes through the r three everyday of the week, right? I mean the r three. Oh god, we need to talk more about the r three In a later episode. But I mean, it's the best looking 300. Uh, there's no question. It's the best performance is the best value for money. I would say the ninja$400 better performance. That's true. But, but if we just rewind the clock, you know, to a year ago or something, you know, within the 300 class, your bang for buck and I don't know, I can't remember the msrp of the$400 off the top of my head. They're both 5,000. Oh really? Okay. Well yeah, there's no reason not to go for the ninja 400, but um, but let's pretend the ninja 400 doesn't exist and we're just simply sticking to the 300 class or there abouts, you know, and let's just say anything under 399 and even include the ktm in there. There's zero world in which this is the absolute best option. The only way this makes sense is if you're getting into bikes and all your friends already owned bmws, so you couldn't just have the brand matching with them. Right. That's the only way, right? Exactly. Yeah. Because I know we were just talking like janet during the break in between these segments of why people escalate and whatever. And you know, we were sort of talking about how rather than having the absolute fastest best bike in the world, it's a lot cooler to have a bike that's the best in its class, right? That's more bragging rights and the real world because well anyone can just combine with the hyatt bussa or an h, two r and b, or just referenced those, right. That someone is going to have to own one. You can say, oh, I've got this bike that's so fast and poweRful, and they'll be like, oh yeah, but the h two r, right. You know the h, two r is to the motorcycle world. What the bw got. Iran was for a long time. It's just like no one and all of a sudden everyone's dick went limp because will the Iran exists? So everything else is garbage apparently. And it didn't matter that no one coUld afford of Iran are given, have the opportunity to buy one even if they had the money to buy one didn't matter. That bike existed, rIght? And the h two ra exists, which is the most stupid out of this world. Crazy motorcycle ever. And deep down I have to admit it's fucking cool. But in terms of the real world, you know, it doesn't fit into a class that it doesn't fit into my life. It doesn't. You know, what's it really for, right? Because you can't race it against anybody. So it doesn't matter how fast it is. Right? So this thing on a track loses everything else in the class and you know, am I going to say like as a new writer, does it matter if you have 34 or 36 horsepower? Not really, but what is important is because it's the lowest of the class, you're going to outgrow it that much quicker because you know, you have no bragging rights, you're probably going to stick with an r three a little bit longer because you know it has a reputation, you know, it has some sort of street cred, which is probably why brian moved so quickly from this and upped to the our 1200 because he was like, I just, I can't, I'm just so embarrassed to be seen on it. It didn't make him feel cool.
Speaker 2:Forty mile round trip to work, which has got to include a little bit of highway or at least some 55 mile an hour roads which getting up to 55 and accelerating and overtaking on a 55 or 65 mile an hour road with 20 foot pounds of torque. It's a little terrifying.
Speaker 1:Yeah. You've got to ring it open, uh, for sure. And you know, it's doable. And you know, I've often, I've often actually said like these a 300 class bikes aren't really the greatest beginner bikes because the power bands are very narrow and they do have a small amount of power. You always have to be riding with those ribs right in the power band and you, there's no room for error on your gear changes and they're actually kind of more advanced bikes to ride. You can get yourself into trouble just by making mistakes in gear changes and where your shift points are,
Speaker 2:they're good bikes. If you just sit in the slow lane and everybody around you is a responsible driver
Speaker 1:in a higher speed situation. Yes. I mean, in the middle of the city, all of these bikes are basically identical and who cares? They're all going to handle gray and they're going to look good and everything and super cool. No problems. But, you know, nashville, yeah, I, I've spent a fair amount of time in nashville playing gigs in nashville and all of that stuff and knoxville and everything. And um, nashville highways, they're kind of crazy. I mean they're not super crazy. I mean they're only midwest crazy but of all midwest highways there amongst the more annoying, you know, and nashville rush hour is definitely not a, a, it's definitely not nothing, that's for sure. So and okay. And nationals bad with like all the spaghetti junction kind of bullshit as well. And oh, I've got to know which lane to be in and like, oh I've got to fit myself in there. And you don't have the roll on power to make it in there. Yeah. I could see this Being not necessarily a great bike for that situation. So i'M not going to knock brian on his early escalation from this. Do you need to go to one point tWo liters right away? Maybe not, but he's already there. You might as well fucking enjoy it. Like, you know, merging with traffic is now zero problem for him. Right. Well again, my first public road experiences or a ducati, ssa, 800 and my first bike was a cb, 1000, right. Which oddly, making almost identical horsepower and torque numbers. Like there may be a 200 pound difference between those two. Yes, yes, yes. But yeah, the ducati 100. Um, it's weird because it's like definitely a full on, mean sport bike. Only, like 85 horsepower. But again, like I said, 90 is really like, you won't notice anything missing, especially if it's got big torque. You won't notice anything missing after that. Like actually low key cb one and cb 900 I would say are probably excellent. First bikes, very forgiving. Very forgiving with the gear changes. Yeah, reasonable horsepower. Pretty good torque a bit heavy and rides smoothly power all across, you know, torque all across the power band. Yeah. The nighthawk was the same way too. Um, okay. So I think, I think we've, I think we've broken down the uh, the g 3:10 are pretty good here. It's also not a name that rolls off the tongue. That's true. Yeah. There's some, you know, our three just works and you know, we're all just used to saying cbr, right? Well we can't even, we can't even deal with gsxr and we have to shorten it to sir. It's. Yeah. Yeah. There's no way to shorten g three, 10 are. You have to just say it. Yeah. I guess you could say three, 10 hour but, but still people aren't familiar enough with this bike in this category to know what you're talking about. Yeah. Yeah. I think I've made the case even the name sucks. Yeah. Okay. Alright, so let's move on to the best bike in the world this week and the best bike in the world this week is the cow saki, z l 600 eliminator now I'm sure 99 percent of our listeners listen to motorcycles and misfits and they were talking about this bike earlier this week and yeah, I'll admit it. I just straight up stole the idea to talk about this bike from them because I was aware of this bike a loNg time ago and had just completely disappeared from my memory and if you don't know more about it, it's a bike that will just completely just disappear off of your radar. Right. This looks like a shadow with an inline for and that's kind of exactly what it is. Now there was a zl 600 and 900, but I think the zl 600 is way cooler. Wait, is this like the cruiser equivalent of the will know? philosophically, this is completely different. SO what this has is a gpz 600 motor from the mid eighties. Essentially they started selling these in like the early nineties. All right. NOw first of all, I have to say for all these weird like eighties, nineties midrange cruisers time in terms of styling has been the nicest to this one over pretty much all the other models, right? There's something, a little harley soft tail about it. With the upswept tail, the tank has a certain beefiness to it and the way the the console like kind of comes out of the middle of it just doesn't look so weird like it does on others. Even the riser seat, having a very distinct super sharp angle looks a lot different than theirs. Super cheesy king queen risers that you see in a lot of these like eighties, nineties cruiser bikes right in. It looks at first very quick glance. It looks like it's making a lot of the styling mistakes as like, um, the ducati and deanna made, but when you take a second look at it, you're like actually know that that kind of looks good. Right? So, you know, obviously the, the gpc style, 600 motor was sorted and you know, has that certain look that you're used to, right. The, uh, the side covers over the air box, have a pretty pleasing, nice little tights, you know, tidy shape to them and the handlebars while, you know, coming up in a very cruiser position and being pulled back a little bit, you know, it's not like on the um, what was the suzuki one where they just come back way too far. I can't remember the model, but it overall is a lot more pleasing than all of the other. So first of all, in its time and still existing today, it's easy on the eyes. It looks a lot better than a nighthaWk, right? I mean, I love nighthawks, but the honda nighthawk is a styling disaster. Time has been kind of this one and you know, and it won't even think about, it looks very honda magna as well. I may have a weird opinion on this, but I love the, the nighthawk. Is it the 6:50 sc? Oh that's the 700 you're talking or the 700 with the. With the black and blue with the square head. A little mini bikini fairing thing. I know you're talking about. Yeah, I'm super in love with that bike. Stylistic. Yeah, that's a little aside, but yeah, I get what you're saying, but you know, but yeah, time has also been a little bit kind of that one as compared to other ones. And this one fits in that category. So a lot of people can't Bring themselves to be on these like, you know, 85 to mid nineties sort of cruiser power cruiser bikes because of the styling. But firSt of all, this one stands out just alone on being pretty easy on the eyes. Now let's get into the performance. As we've stated in a lot of episodes on a cruiser, you're really usually looking at somewhere around 60 horsepower. Right? So this is making 74 and most importantly, this revs up to 10 and a half thousand rpm, which is a lot on a cruiser. Now thinking back to our last episode where we're talking about torque and horsepower and revs and all that sort of stuff. Well this is crushing a modern sports. Oh absolutely. In terms of the horsepower, now here's the thing. And 83 horsepower could not have a motor like this because it's too heavy. You're just sending a 30 horsepower. Sorry, 83 sportster and navy three sports sportster could not get away with having an inline 600 motor because it's too heavy, right? We were saying it's easier to take the big v twin and put it in sport bike than it is to take the higher revenue sport bike motor and put it in a cruiser because of the weights. But this one comes in At 460 pounds. So a cow asaki sport bike of this same year.[inaudible], he like I used to own, came in at 500 pounds and that 40 foot pounds of torque and that horsepower would move 500 pounds. Now once you start getting north of 500 pounds, you start having big problems with not having enough torque, but five hundreds kind the magic number where you can still get away with around 40 to 45 foot pounds of torque. That'S just kinda how that works. It's not gonna feel like big and brutish at all, but it's enough to make the experience work and this comes in lower at 460 wet, so the torque is enough and it's light enough that it's still kind of moves the bike. Like when you crack the throttle, this is still going to have a little bit more of a jolt than even a 9,600 ninja. That's impressive. And again, you know, 74 horsepower sings going to break 100 miles an hour and it's a cruiser that you get to rev the shit out of. Is this going to be a v max experience? No, but this is what if they made a 600 v max? This is what that would feel like
Speaker 2:when you really take the horsepower and the torque numbers on here. This is basically giving you the horsepower and the torque to weight ratio of a cb 900 but 150 pounds lighter.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's, it's very, very cool. And you know, the only problem with this bike is that they didn't make very many of them, that it was a little ahead of its time because kawasaki is moving back towards this thing right now. If you look at the vulcan ass, it's a two cylinder, but the revs, the torque, the horsepower are all still in the same sort of range. Now the styling goes a little bit more towards like a, um, like an indian scout. I mean, not exactly, but you know, it's so low and it's long and it's beefy and chunky and everything. And this is sort of the eighties version of that or nineties version of that.
Speaker 2:Were things going on stylistically with like, like the, the rear turn signals coming straight back out of the back of the subframe. I liked that. I love it. I think it's great, but I've never seen like every bike of this generation and for the two previous generation, mostly long dorky stems coming out the side. Yeah, but this is just got stock stems that come straight back out and are neat and tidy.
Speaker 1:I'll give this thing another bite of this thing, another styling award as well. The obviously late eighties, early nineties mag wheels on it actually look correct on this bike.
Speaker 2:Normally I hate the look of like three spoke wheels and this has three spoke mag wheels front and rear
Speaker 1:and it kind of pulls it off. It does, yeah, it really does. Now again, they made a 900 version of this that was making like a 100 horsepower and 60 something foot pounds of torque that was really just like a bad ass bike. That was very close to the v max experience. Another weird thing I think for this generation is the matte black and yeah, well again, that that nineties, the eighties gpz motor, they had already completely figured it out and this was right before they were moving towards the um, the full on liquid liquid cooled. And air cooled and slash or cooled like super duper like you know, hard cast aluminum casing version that went onto what was actually coming out at this time. So this is the older generation gpz, you know, it hasn't gone, hadn't moved to the zx model ninja engines yet. It is kind of getting the last thing they could out of those gpc engines in these two bikes. Well it's also interesting you can tell that to get the bike to rev that high with an air cooled motor, it has an oil cooler on the front of it. That is about the size of a modern. A liquid cooled radiator. No, I think this is a liquid cooled engine. It just still has some fins to assisted as well. It is liquid cooled. Okay. Yeah. no I just got the fence on. This doesn't have the oil cooler as well yet though. Like the zx motors do is also. OkaY. So like I said this, this is the eighties motor and a nineties bike. But in An application that no one had really seen an inline four go into before. And now, like I said, what's what's important about this and why this is really the best bike in the world is we're starting to see some smaller capacity cruisers. Like I said, the vulcan ass basically in philosophy do exactly the same thing with a big styling update. And here's my prediction. We were. You were complaining about the 3:12 honda shadow motor, right? I think in the next two or three years we're going to see a parallel twin or four cylinder across the floor frame. Honda shadow, 600, 7:50, making very similar weight, horsepower and torque numbers to this. I think as harley decides to tell the public that there just aren't the. Aren't necessarily the be all and end. All we get were the 6:50 f motor. Exactly. That would be perfect. That's making numbers just like this. Exactly. The 6:50 f motor we're going to see like a shadow or maybe just another line of cruiser, although I think harley will just scrap the whole shadow line and then just reinvent it because how can they get rid of the shadow name? Harley honda, gs. I'm missing things like crazy this week, so almost like a turn signal day, right? Yeah. I think we're going to see something like that from honda. Yeah. Six 50 f motor in like a shadow sort of package and I think this we're gonna see this return to the small mid range cruiser, right? Because if the worlds have gone so far apart in sport, bike and cruiser, right? So you either have to work towards this giant cruiser on the harley side or the super insane sport bike on the other side and everyone in the middle has been forgotten about. And really, you know at heart a lot of people want to lIve both worlds. A lot of people want the best of both worlds and there is a formula to make that bike and this bike is the perfect blueprint for it. You have to update a lot of things, right? You have to update the rear drum brake, you have to update the way it's cooled. You have to update the styling, but there's a lot of important things about this you can keep. And the vulcan asked as a very good job of that and I think what we'll see from other manufacturers, right, like you know, could indian do an eight slash 50 version of the scouts for a slightly less price, you know the, there's, I think that's going to be a new entry level points, right? This is sort of a, a moto damas thing put in with the best bike in the world here. I think this very middle sized cruiser market is going to reemerge because I think that's what a lot of people want.
Speaker 2:That's an interesting proposition because when you're looking at entry level bikes, if you assume that like the street 500 or the shadow sevenfifty are kind of the entry level for the cruiser world and you know, the r three and then into 400 and whatever are the, the entry level for the sport bike world. Really, you're going to pick a bike and you don't know what you really want because you haven't experienced the whole, you, you, you don't get a really good wide breadth of experience on your first bike because each one of these categories has become super polarized, so you're either we're just going to keep going with what you've already got an escalate in that class or you have to make a radical shift to a different class like yeah, there is no really good middle ground unless you go up to and buy something like a cb, 50 f, which is a standard bike with an in line for that kind of straddles that middle ground and if you want to buy in entry level for seven grand like okay, but that's kind of where you've got to go.
Speaker 1:You eat the vulcanus hits it. The vulcan asked comes in someWhere around eight, eight to half brand new. they're starting to creep down because I think they came out in 2015, maybe 2016, but I think 2015 you can start getting ones now and about six and a half grand used and the great thing about them is that as a cruiser that you can put bags on, doesn't come with the baggage of owning a cruiser. It's a little smaller, but it's not small like a rebel to 50. It's a legit bike. Right? There are a couple faults on this one. Some people claimed like, you know, it wasn't super comfortable if you were taller person, right. Getting that 600 and getting the weight down. Right, but you know what bikes in general, we're super fucking crazy heavy back then. There's a way to make a 450 pound bike have the same dimensions now that allows for more leg room and everything for your controls and all that stuff. The metallurgy, the lighter materials, it's all there now. Right? Right. The only problem with this bike is that it was a little ahead of its time because instead of going on for the full power cruiser thing that was popular at the time, this one went to be a sensible middle way cruiser and while it was aimed at being competition for the eight, eight, three, which it definitely was very good competition for the, the, by the, by the nineties, harley was becoming, you know, harley, like we know him, like, you know, hey, if it ain't a harley, it's bullshit. And by then it was too late. If kawasaki had been able to do something very similar to this with again, a version of the, um, the old z motors, not the, not the, the gpc motors than I think they would've been able to crush the 83 sports, certain sales and this would have really takeN off. and there was a way to do that. It's somewhere probably, uh, towards higher sixties and horsepower rather than mid seventies. But in any, it's a blueprint for the future because I think this market is going to like, just come back in a real big way. PeopLe are getting a little tired of retro bikes, people are gettIng a little tired of big heavy cruisers. People are getting tired of sport bikes people or even starting. I'm noticing a little less zeal for the Big adventure bikes. You know, like the big adventure bike backlash. Actually I think. I think you're a little bit slow to the party here because the backlash for the big adventure bike started like three years ago and now it's back on the upswing. Well yeah, but the guys that buy them are like older dudes that really just don't care what's cooler. Hip you mean? People with money. You're exactly right. So more affordable middle range cruiser. It's going to be this sort of get back to America and cruisers, but it doesn't have to be american. It's more practical, but it's still a cruiser. I think it's perfect. Moving forward and this is a blueprint for that and I think this is going to read. I think this is what everyone that bought at r three is going to kind of move to when they're like, yeah, I tried out a 600 and the seating position is not comfortable. The[inaudible] lead me to believe that sport bikes are more comfortable than they actually are, you know, that sort of thing. I think we'll see people moving to shit like the vulcan s and fingers crossed honda. Don't let me down a shadow with an inline four across it at somewhere around 700 ccs, you know, something like that. Um, again, honda, if you're not already working on this project, fucking hire us like we've told you 2 million times. And uh, with that, I'm just going to say kawasaki z l 600, not the 900 600 eliminator. Also bad ass name. Best bike in the world this week. Let's take a little break. Okay. And we're back. So let's see. Rent like an hour and we're passing hour and a half or something. I don't know if we got really enough time to run into another subject. I don't know if we need to run that long on this episode. We tend to, we tend to even break in like two hours a lot lately on this show, which I think a lot of people like, um, like the long form, but I don't know what the other things I want to talk about. I think take a substantial amount of time, but I do want to read a couple reviews that we've gotten lately. So this one says want to have a beer with dot, dot dot from bojack's 34. He says, I don't know why this works or why I enjoy it so much, but I do learn a lot about a, about bikes listening to the podcast. I do wish the guys were keeping in mind that not all their listeners up to speed as they are when rattling off bike models, et cetera. Remember that we might not even know what brand of bike you're talking about. Clewis and a little more other than that. Love it. Okay. Just speak to that. Um, it's a little tricky because, um, I guess everyone listened to motorcycle podcasts. There's people listening that are very new and people that had been riding for a long time and yet it's hard to strike a balance of what kind of information you're giving out. So we just try to just talk about everything we can possibly talk about. But um,
Speaker 2:I love that we have that we're pushing back against five star reviews here.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I guess this is something that is, it's a little tricky to just, with every single bike to kind of, you know, really flesh out exactly what it is. It can be a little tricky sometimes. Um, and that's kind of a limitation of the medium. Um, one thing I will say that is a, if you're not wrenching on your bike or doing something else while you're listening to the podcast, you, we do put the um, we do put a, at least pictures of the best and worst spike in our show notes. Yeah. So. And we do put them as links. So I don't know if those show up in itunes or not. I guess we should shut up and make sure
Speaker 1:do on my phone. So.
Speaker 2:Okay. So normally if you're, if you're listening, if you're on your phone, you and you're listening through itunes, you should at least be able and I would assume on most platforms you should be able to at least pull up the picture of the bike. I mean, you usually go into horsepower and torque
Speaker 1:one ways and a bunch of other things, gearing some times, all sorts of specs about it. But, you know, I, I get where this guy's coming from, you know, we, we, we just like dive deep into stuff when we start talking really fast. But you, you know, at the end of the day, um, uh, we kind of live and breathe this stuff. So it's a little hard for us to, I guess dumb it down at times, but you know it. But basically bojack's thank you for the five star review and totally noted. And then here we go. We've got another one called, another five star review is almost always interesting from gary. And 42 says occasionally runs a little long on discussion of moto two or something like that, but usually stays interesting even with that. Hey, bad ass. So, you know, he's recognizing that we ramble on a bit, which, yeah, we definitely do, but um, you know, he loves the long form anyway, which I think most people do. So. Hey guys, thank you for that. Now, speaking of itunes reviews, we've been brainstorming here a little bit and you know, we've asked you guys to send this in some ideas for best and worst bike and we've actually decided to up the game a little bit on that just a little bit more. So since we have a lot more or less numbers than we have it and reviews still, we've decided if you will run this for a few weeks before we make a decision, but here we go, right? IT's the most insane review you can entertaining off the wall. Weird and wacky. We're not going to give you any direction, just go for it. Okay. Let's put the one caveat that there are a few dozen needs to not get filtered by apple. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Make it one that will actually show up. And then after that, send us an email with your itunes handle. You know, and you'd go ahead and include like, you know, your name and what you ride and all that sort of stuff. And then after a few weeks we're going to choose the best itunes review. Right. So we probably won't read itunes reviews for a few weeks just while we're sorting out who's, who sent him the best one. Give it a little bit of time. Right. And then after that, if we choose your itunes review as the most entertaining to us, review that there could ever possibly be. We'll send you a call in time. We'll have you on the show and you can choose best or worst bike in the world this week. Lay out the case and um, we'll, we'll just talk it out with you dude. And we'll go from there. So since you know, since best worst bike seems to be the thing that everyone enjoys the most, that's the part that we should bring someone in on. I think so at least for that portion of the show. And who knows If you're funny as fuck or just, you know, a character in one way or another. You know, we might just have you on for the rest of the show in general, like, who knows, right. We'll get you matched up with us on discord and we'll, we'll have you. Yeah. We'll get you to call in and whatever. We Recorded a pretty regular time every week. That shouldn't be too difficult when we record I think is a pretty manageable time for most people. So there we go. that's our, that's our contest and I think that, I'm hoping our listeners are, uh, you know, uh, into us enough to be tickled a little bit by that. So let's see. Anything else that we want before we close this one out? Um, I will jusT say I'm a little disappointed that we haven't had any good hate mail yet yet. Well we had the one two star review, which really I love that. Yeah. Yeah. But a two star review doesn't count hate mail. It's true. It doesn't. Hate mail would be fantastic as well. That would really tickle me but. Okay. So after that I think we're pretty much done here, right? Uh, yeah, I think so. Alright. Let's run the outro on the remind you guys to again, send us reviews and emails and everything like that. Send us ideas for best worst spike or give us a review so You might be able to get on the show, all that good stuff and I'll remind you to stay safe and stay tuned. Let's hit it.
Speaker 4:Dang it all mom, her side.
