maximo

I moved to California and only ride during the 9 month no-rain season. 🙂

I dunno, pricepoint, maintenance, reliability…. All good things to look at on a spec sheet, but for me it all disappears once I’m on the bike. Some of my favorite bikes have been ones that are thoroughly panned for one reason or another – take the Virago 535: I bought it for my wife to learn on and I ended up riding the wheels off of it all the while my shiny and powerful FJ1200 sat in the garage. Going the other way I’ve bought bikes based on spec sheets and turns out I didn’t mesh nearly as well with it as I would have thought. My FJ-09 is in that category. After two years and 10k miles I’m still trying to make friends with it. Some things I love about it, some things I think are unforgivable. Despite the spec sheet giving it an A+, I don’t consider it my go-to bike. OTOH my BMW K bike – it’s big, heavy, and somewhat unwieldy, and it has lived up to its reputation and has left me stranded on the side of the road twice in 30k miles. But the riding experience is so well suited for what I value that I actually don’t care if it strands me again. It’s the price of admission. And take my 20 year old SV650. It’s my Camilla Parker Bowles. It might have been something back in the day, and now even though it’s long past its shelf life she continues to be faithfully by my side, giving me a thrill every time I take her out, despite the performance being barely above that which Fred Flintstone would ride. I dunno, I’ve gotten to the point where I don’t have many fckus to give. I just ride whatever puts a grin on my face and I allow others the same. If whatever they’re riding makes them smile, more power to them, even if it wouldn’t make me smile.

I'm not sure if I were a Scotsman that I'd be defending sheep this enthusiastically... just sayin'... as I eat my gluten-free toast with organic avocados and fair trade quinoa spread, sprinkled with cruelty-free salt, coaxed gently from the walls of a natural cave in Slovenia, carried to California by hand.

This reflects my experience as well, just on the BMW side. I love my K bike, but she's a jealous mistress. It takes a lot to keep her happy, and has been the only bike to ever leave me stranded. Every once in a while I think to myself that I should just sell her and get a Goldwing, then I go out to the garage and I'm again seduced by her curves, and take her for a quick ride and remind myself why I keep her, despite the headaches.

Ugh, good luck, these things can be so pesky! I had something similar on my BMW; I couldn’t find anything, mechanic couldn’t find anything, yet we could all experience it. I had given up until someone suggested some sort of voodoo trick, which fixed it right away. The trick FWIW was this: with the ignition on, but not running, open the throttle all the way, then close it, and repeat it five times. Then turn off the ignition, wait 30 seconds, and start the bike as normal. Fired right up and the surging was gone for good.

wow, swapping The Anvil for an FJ-09 will require you to strengthen your shoulders, since this bike will want to rip your arms off as it takes off! -)

Yeah, you definitely worked the shoulders! I really like the profile of the front S21. I got mine on saturday and took them out to scrub them in, so I was super gentle with them, but by 50 miles out I was feeling really good about them. I found them confidence inspiring in their response and predictability.

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Talk to me about this short love affair. I just spooned on a set of S21's to my '15 - I got a killer deal that I couldn't pass up - and I'm wondering about your experience.

Well, the ethanol accounts for some of that. According to the DOE, e10 has 96% of the energy of straight up gas. So there's 2 or 3 miles right there. The other 3 or 4 can probably be attributed to a combo of tire pressure, wind and drag, size/angle of your fairing, ambient temperature, and just how springy that right wrist of yours is. For example, to commute I punch up my tires to 42/40, my fairing is fairly tall and angled so that the wind goes mostly around me, I weigh 150lbs, I use B mode and cruise control at 68 mph. I've pretty much done all I can to maximize commuting mileage. I pay absolutely no attention to all that when I'm riding for fun. Tires go down to 35/32, A mode comes out to play, and WFO is not unusual. Those times I'm getting upper 30's or lower 40's.

When it's riding for fun, IDGAF about mileage - only to the extent I make sure I don't run out of gas. In fact, yesterday I was up in the mountains playing (note: it's spectacularly gorgeous up on 162 right now) and I barely made 160 miles on that tankful. Commuting is a different story. If I can go 225 miles a tank it gives me more options on where and when I fuel up.

Mine is like yours, sometimes up to 5 mpg wrong on the upside (ie dash says I averaged 55, but hand calc shows it's 50). The difference is fairly inconsistent too, which is somewhat of a mystery to me, since my commute is so predictable and similar, day after day. I might have some variability in the lane split sections (having to slow down to wait for a space to open up), but that's maybe one mile out of the total 50 mile commute.

My dash readout isn't very accurate, so I measure mine actual miles divided by gals. On B mode I get close to 55, whereas in STD or A mode I'm in the upper 40's. My home and office are both 3 blocks from the on/off ramp, so on my situation it's a good read on the difference - ie there isn't much by way of start/stop on either side of the commute to create a variable that needs controlling (the lane splitting is pretty much the same every day). I roll onto the fwy, set the cruise control at 68, and sit back and listen to music/books. I do almost two tanks per week, so I've had a lot of opportunities to test this out.

I commute in B mode. I have found that it gives me noticeably better gas mileage than other modes. I have 50 miles of dead straight highway, so there's very little need for quicker acceleration, or more responsive throttle.

Parallel story and lesson: My 20 yr old SV 650 stock saddle fit me perfectly from the get go. After 80k miles it had shaped in a way that no other saddle had ever shaped, which is to say it molded exactly to my needs. The vinyl recently ripped, so I took it to an upholsterer to have it recovered. When I picked it up, the guy, very proudly, told me that he noticed the old foam was stiff and misshapen, so he took it upon himself to cut off the top layer and glue a different, softer layer on top before re-covering it. He was beaming as he told me that his cruiser customers love that foam. It completely ruined the saddle. Now I sink into it and within 30 minutes I lose sensation in my legs. The upholsterer figured that one kind of happy customer would make every customer happy, without understanding that not all bike ergos are the same. Lesson learned: only let saddlemakers touch your saddle. Use folks that know what they're doing.

Good call on getting down off the mountain! A bunch of roads were closed up there due to snow. An epic ride, one that you'll talk about for a while!

Many of the observations apply to my K1200GT as well. There are certain commonalities for the brand.

The thing with Q3 is that the track day heat cycles kills them, so by and large I've found them to be a one shot deal. After track day they are pretty useless. And frankly, they are way above my riding skill. So for me I find them overkill. I like the Bridgestone S20 EVO for my track days. They offer good feel, plenty of grip, and I'm able to ride them on the road after the track day. But then again, I take my SV650 to the track which, to state the obvious, is no S1kRR. I don't know what that beast would do to them.

Fantastic write up! You managed to capture a few of the loose thoughts I've had in my head regarding where my FJ sits in my current stable. The S1KRR sounds like an amazing bike.

I'm the odd duck here. If I'm being honest, I'm still working on falling in love with mine. On paper it should be everything I want, it's even farkled to my own prefs, but there is still something that keeps me from lusting a ride on it. I've only put 5k miles on mine, and that's because an embarrassing number of times I end up backing it out of the garage just to roll out my 20 year old SV650 and ride it instead. I love the feeling of being so enchanted with a bike that all you can think of is to get off work and go ride. I'm hoping it happens for me at some point.

He said "comfortably touch the ground", not flat foot it. Depends on where your comfort level is. I'm 5'10" with a 31" inseam, and I can touch both feet at the same time, but only on my tippy toes. The bike is light, so I think I can comfortably touch the ground. You probably will as well.

I commute in B mode since I have a long, boring straight highway commute. I find B gives me better MPG and I don’t miss the power at all on the long straights. For spirited riding I use STD, since my A mode the bike turns into a bucking bronco. I bought it post flash, and I can’t imagine what it would’ve been like before the flash. Tight right handers are nearly impossible not to overrun in A mode, unless my trail braking technique perfectly anticipates the non-linear increase in power. Which I usually don’t do well, since I have decades of muscle memory to fight. Just as I’m trading the last bit of brake for more throttle near the apex, the violence with which power suddenly comes on launches me wide enough to push me over the center line. I don’t have the same issue in STD. The only use I’ve found for A Moe is from a stoplight when That Guy in his Dodge Charger thinks he’s fast and he needs to get embarrassed. Otherwise A Mode sits unused.

There's lots of great riding up in that area. Your biggest challenge is going to be adjusting to a much shorter riding season than you're used to. I lived in Idaho back in the 80's, and there were years that I'd prep and store the bike for winter late September, and it would stay there until late May. When I moved to the Bay Area in '86 I was amazed that 1. I didn't have to prep the bike for winter (drain tank/carbs, oil vitals, remove battery, disconnect plugs, etc), and that I could actually ride 12 months out of the year! It was though I'd moved to Shangri-La. The weather in the Treasure Valley is milder than where I was, so you should be able to ride more than 6 months/year, tho. You won't run out of great rides, they're all over the area.

Good suggestions - the fun parts of LaPorte road are between Quincy and laPorte. Up and back is not a bad idea. Although 49 can have traffic, especially below Downieville, I've never had a problem dispatching with traffic, there's plenty of passing opportunities if you don't let double yellows hold you back. They're painted for cars, anyways. 🙂 I actually ride 49 quite a bit (I work in Oroville and live in Chico, and I often take the long way home after work), and have only had an abundance of cars on saturday/sunday lunchtime. Any other time and it's been just fine. In fact, I can't count the number of times I've jumped on at Camptonville and ridden all the way over the mountains into the Sierra Valley without seeing a single car. tl;dr if it's a weekend lunchtime, the LaPorte out and back merits consideration. Any other time I'd definitely take 49. It's just a fun road. Full disclosure, 49 holds a special place in my heart, since that's the place where I was pulled over doing triple digits and passing on double yellow, yet managed to not get my bike impounded, AND I rode off without a ticket. A story for a different day. But it holds magic for me.