Stinky

I did the maiden voyage today with Mrs. Stinky on our new 2019 Tracer GT. Mrs. Stinky named it "Belle" (as in Blue Belle). We left our home in Georgetown, Malaysia and took the bridge over to the mainland. A little background. I retired early here to Penang, Malaysia from Charlotte, NC. I was always a dirt bike guy, but Mrs. Stinky got the touring bug after we did a few motorcycle day trips in Vietnam. There is a HUGE on road and off road biking community here in Malaysia. I ride with guys and gals from Malaysia, Hong Kong, Denmark, Germany, Austria, Canada, Australia, Great Britain, Thailand, and South Africa. The roads and highways here in Malaysia are very good....equal to what we ride on the US. One of the biggest perks of riding here...there are virtually NO (I mean none) police on the highways writing speeding tickets. The freeway speeds are 110 km/hr. But we got passed by a group of guys on sport bikes doing 200 km/hr+. Here in Malaysia, if you want to kill yourself by speeding on a motorcycle, have at it. Ok....I digress. Mrs. Stinky and I headed out from Georgetown at about 10:15 am. Our destination was a cool little old tin mining town called Taiping. The route was major roads all the way to the 15km bridge that connects the island of Penang to the mainland of Malaysia. Then it was about 120km on the main north/south expressway in Malaysia the E1. We pulled into Taiping and Mrs. Stinky found a great restaurant off her portable Google machine. Lunch was fantastic. A huge chicken burger with bacon and egg on it, a great grilled pork dish on mashed potatoes for Mrs Stinky, an apple/celery fruit drink, and an ice tea. Tax and out the door was 46 ringett (about $11.50 US dollars). We did a quick bathroom hop and back to Georgetown. Rain was in the forecast so we had to hurry home. 140km/hr on the expressway back home and we beat the rain by about 5 minutes!!! Both the Tracer and Mrs. Stinky did great. This was my first trip on a bike with cruise control. I wish I had more than two thumbs to give it. We averaged about 22 km/liter on petrol. Could have done better but as mentioned before I didn't "spare the horses" on the way home. Malaysia and South East Asia is a great place to ride. We must have seen 200 touring bikes on the road today. More than half were tandems. A friend of mine always said: "Play together....stay together." I'll post up more pictures on our next ride.

Jeff, Thanks for the advice. I am going to give your method a try. I have some "chill pills" on order from Lazada:) I'm afraid I might toss the whole thing off the parking deck. This was hands down one of the most frustrating motorcycle projects I have ever done.

Guys, I started doing some farkle on my 2019 Tracer GT this morning. I started with the engine guards. No problem. Then I went to add the engine skid plate. Doh!!!!! I had to take off the crash bars to add the skid plate. No big deal because by now I am an expert. 6 hours later I quit in utter frustration. I had a VERY good wrencher helping me and he too threw in the towel for defeat. It was like an "I Love Lucy" episode. We would get the front all hitched up nice and neat and the back would not go together. We tried doing the back first and then the front. No better luck. We tried the right side first...and the left side would not go together. We tried the left rear corner first and then we could not get the right front corner to fit. You get the idea. The Givi instructions on the skid plate make the engine guard directions look like a detailed surgery guide. Anyone here actually get that blasted thing on? Any tips? I don't have any pics.. I probably would have thrown my phone off the 2nd story of my parking deck. Thanks....Stinky

That is SUPER clever!!! Now I also understand what a "Farkle" is:). I'll work on moving the controls around a little to get them to my liking. I am used to minimalist stuff from my dirt bike days. The biggest mod you could do on the controls is move the kill switch up or down on the bars:) Although...I have to admit, I kind of like "tooting my horn" on my new GT:)

Koth...Thanks for the advice!! I'm super lucky that there are so many awesome riding adventures so close to me. Riding the Malaysia Peninsula, Thailand, Viet Nam, Laos...they are all less than three hours away!! And the bonus here is that there are scores of people who are retired early that have the bikes, the time, and desire to do touring rides. I promise I will post up some of our adventures.

My GT was mostly made in Japan and partially assembled in Malaysia. This is to get around the crazy import duties imposed by the tax man here. What I was told by the dealer (so consider the source) is that he frame, suspension, brakes, and motor are made and assembled in Japan. The wheels, and body fenders, turn signals, and small items are bolted on at a facility in Malaysia.So the stripped down bike comes from Japan and all the bling is put on here. That makes sense to me.

I'm probably the newest 900GT owner here. But after going 175km yesterday on my first ride my biggest gripe is the turn signal switch and horn switch. The guys I was riding with probably thought I was crazy for honking the horn so much!! For some reason my thumb just loves go hit that horn button instead of the turn signal:) That is a pretty minor gripe.

AtoB...I live in Malaysia as well!!! Penang. I bought my Tracer 900 GT on Friday and did an around the island group ride yesterday. I was in second position and the leader was on a Versys 650. I was VERY impressed by the Versys. It had plenty of acceleration and it did really well in the mountain road on the west side on Penang.I started the ride with 13km on my bike and finished with almost 200km on the day. I was really not pushing the bike for two reasons: 1) I am new to the bike and have not ridden road bikes that much. 2) I am gently breaking the bike in. I stayed under 5,000 RPM. I am doing Fast Eddie's motojitsu practice as well. It is a great tutor. Just buy some chalk and find an empty road or parking lot.....just practice. I am originally from The United States and I wish the riders there could see what "scooter traffic" looks like here in Malaysia. It gives most riders (me included) a heart attack for the first week or so. I was on a Honda 125 Wave for 6 months and learned the rules of the road on that. I was an avid off road rider in the US and my last bike was a Yamaha WR 450. Best of luck and come on up to Penang...There is almost always some type of group ride going on here with all skill and experience levels.

Hey guys, Kyle here. Just purchased a 2019 Tracer 900 GT here in Penang Malaysia. I've been a long time Yamaha off road rider and this is my first step into street bikes. The wife said "no mas" to off road biking and insisted that I get a hobby we can do together. So HELLO to couples touring!! The bikes here in Malaysia are really stripped down. There area all kinds of import duty "work arounds" here to keep the prices reasonable. So my bike literally has NOTHING on it. No side boxes, no frame protection, no nothing. So right now I am in search of some bike protective gear. It looks like I can get Givi engine crash guards here in Malaysia. Does anyone here recommend more crash protection on the bike? I see axle guards and also little doo dads that are on the swing arm. Do those really help? I am also looking to get a Givi pipe/oil pan underguard. The roads here in Malaysia can go from really nice to really bad in about 20 meters!! So thanks in advance for all the help and I hope I can contribute.