ZigMerid

The fuel capacity has marginally increased from 4.8gal to 5.0gal (or 0.75 litres) for the 2021, so less than a 1kg wet weight increase, but in conjunction with a claimed 4% improved fuel consumption it should help on the "tourer" part of a sports tourer a fraction. I'm of the opposite thinking. They seem to have shifted slightly more towards the tourer front which suits me: a bit more range, a longer swing-arm and torque coming in at lower revs due to a longer stroke so I'm hoping the reputed "buzz" at highway speeds is a thing of the past, or at least has moved to highway++ speeds. On the down-side, the '21 is significantly more expensive, it's a new model so likely some bugs to work out and some of the visuals are controversial such as the asymmetric lights and the Wall-E two-eyed dash. As for E-doodahs, even the 2020 model is well into that. Let's face it, all modern machinery is littered with little brain-boxes all over the place. As others have noted, dealers are not yet discounting their 2020 stock, so it's not as if you get a price advantage going with the older models. At least not yet. Maybe that'll change once the 2021s hit the showroom floors?

That may be so, but I doubt that Mr Yamaha is lying about these sort of details, consumer protection laws and all that. But I guess until someone puts both of them on a weight bridge with equivalent fluids, then it's all speculation. In any event, in case you haven't seen it, here's the Yamaha AU spec sheet for the 2021 Tracer9GT which specifies a wet weight of 220kg and here's the Yamaha AU spec sheet for the 2020 Tracer 900GT which specifies a wet weight of 227kg. So according to Yammie AU, the 2021 is 7kg lighter! If true, that's nice. Has Mr Yamaha used a different formula for wet-weight calculations between the two models? Frankly I'd be surprised as they will always want each model to appear as light as possible when it comes out. So, unless someone actually weighs the two variants, I'm happy with the manufacturer's spec sheet.

Yup. That agrees with the specs I have.

According to the spec sheets I have, the Tracer 900 weighs in at 474lb without side cases and the Tracer9 weighs in at 485lbs not including side cases. So the 2021 Tracer9 is 11lbs or 4.9kg heavier.

You are going to hate me for this, but I just can't get an S&M Vest out of my mind when I first saw this. Not my scene, but I am a big fan of "A Clockwork Orange" in which they must have worn something similar. But no, they are cool pegs. Don't let my imagery change your thinking.

I'm getting a little OT here, but speaking of large guys on small bikes... these dudes tried to convince us they were riding all the way up the California coastline on these Grom pre-cursors. We almost believed them for a coupla minutes. Sometimes you meet the strangest and nicest people on the one ride :-)

@kilo3 is absolutely right. Motorcycle mags are beholden to their advertisers, who are mostly motorcycle manufacturers such as Yamaha. While we can sometimes glean a few tidbits from such reviews, they pale in comparison compared to what forums such as this offer. While I suspect that many of us are biased towards the tracer, and we want it to be a good machine, that doesn't stop actual owners with real riding experience telling us how it truly is. So while the reviews are generally positive thus far and the spec sheet looks promising, it'll be what I read here that will determine whether I plonk down my hard-earned buckaroos on a 9GT. Or as @PhotoAl puts it: which is spot on.

Here's a North Island rental company with tracers: Auckland Motor Bike hire And here's a South Island rental company with tracers: City Motorcycle Rentals Not that I know anything about either of these companies, so due diligence is still in order. But they are out there!

Not my country - tho I've been there many times. But no offence was taken anyway. I was mainly thinking the press release must have got it wrong. I understand. And you don't even get to have beautiful mountain scenery to compensate. Having worked in the DFW area, I completely sympathise. Texas seems very flat to me. Just to rub it in a bit, I have a motorcycle trip planned for South Island New Zealand - and a few places rent Tracers!!!

I'm sure the kiwis on this forum will pipe up soon enough, but, no, NZ is not *that* small. I don't really know but I would expect that their top ten largest cities have more than a dozen or two motorcycle police. After all, NZ has a population of close to 5M people. I expect that whatever press release the original quote is referring to, relates to a single city since most police are regional and fairly autonomous.

Perhaps the bigger question is, what happens to the name of this forum, or even the domain it runs under? In a couple of years time people will mostly only know Tracer9GTs (assuming Mr Yamaha marketing doesn't come up with yet another name in a few years time) and will wonder what the heck a tracer 900 is.

But mirrors are pretty cheap to upgrade, right? It's the bones of the machine that really count.

Yeah, the asymmetric front lights and the Wall-E dash will take some getting used to, but I'm with you 90% of the way wrt you don't see it when you ride it. But... there is 10% of me that really wants to like the look of the bike I'm about to ride. And I must confess to looking at my bike parked outside of where-ever I'm at and going, "dayamm" that looks nice. Frankly it inspires you to ride more. But beauty is in the eye of the beholder, right? I'll bet most people think they are riding a thing of beauty - me included. But in reality there are a lot of dogs out there. Having said all that, I think I'll end up getting one. I'm just wondering whether it's worth waiting for the 2022 model since this is such a new machine compare to the 2020 that it's bound to have a few kinks and bugs to work out.

Are you French/Spanish literate? Love to hear your interpretation if so.

I know. I was pretty impressed with their roads when I drove around the country. Almost like it's an advanced nation which spends good money keeping their infrastructure up-to-date. Would that more advanced nations do the same. More seriously - on my local Australia roads - which are rarely as good as Sweden's - I've never found a need for a sump guard on any of my road bikes. Same with the road bikes I road in the US. To double-check, I did a web search for broken Tracer sumps in Australia and the first five pages were all ads for sump guards. So lots of people pushing products, but very little evidence of real world damage, leastwise in this part of the world.

Oof indeed. That Canadian MSRP (in USD ~= USD13,300) is even better than the US MSRP of $14,899. Of course it's a bit tricky getting an apples-for-apples comparison because of taxes, registration, dealer fees and whatnot. But I've given it a shot. I'm assuming a purchase in San Fancisco, Toronto and Sydney with an "out-the-door" price which includes 12 months registration and all tax and dealer charges. The only cost I've excluded is insurance - tho I believe those locations all insists on some form of minimal insurance. All up I get a 12 month drive-away price (converted to USD) of $16,980 in San Francisco, $15,700 in Toronto and $17,940 for Sydney. Naturally there is a bit of rounding and some guesswork on some fees. Corrections welcome of course. So you Canadians definitely got lucky! But all-in-all, a 5% premium over California pricing isn't as much of a rip-off as it first looked. BTW, I have to do the calc this way because the only pricing shown in Australia is an "out-the-door" price which I believe is encouraged by Consumer Protection Laws. In any event, the actually money leaving my bank account is what really matters, right?

Is Canadian pricing available? Or are you anticipating a shock up there in cold-country?

Thanks for that, Rob. I must say, to my eyes there is not a lot of green in that! Which actually makes it a bit more appealing. We hardly want Kawasaki green now, do we!

Ah, ok. That matches the name a little better. Definitely seems like a something you need to see IRL to get a true idea of what it looks like. I probably should have realised that matt-black might have been a bit too close to teenage angst for a company going thru its mid-life blurple crisis :-)

I just checked the Yammy website in Australia and they now have retail pricing and a paintjob that I haven't seen anywhere else. Something they are calling "Tech Kamo", which looks to be a matt black finish. Retail pricing is $23,299.00 drive away with 12 months rego, etc. which at current exchange rates, equates to about $18K USD so we'll be paying a USD $3K premium for the privilege, compared to the good ol' USA. But maybe the US pricing doesn't include sales tax, rego and dealer delivery fees, which would make the difference closer to $1500, which I guess is tolerable. Here's the "Kamo" image. It's an awful name but I think I like the low-key matt finish without the Yammy blurple. and here's the website: Tracer 9 GT | Yamaha Motor Australia Lighter, more powerful and supremely versatile – and now equipped with...

The other thing I read .... (somewhere on the internet so must be true) is that automakers aren't volume buyers compared to computer companies and consumer electronics. Furthermore, apparently most automakers are cheapskates who only want to buy at the cheapest price possible. As a consequence chip vendors put them at the back of the line when it comes to satisfying orders. Certainly Yammy would not be a volume buyer in this case, let's hope they are not total cheapskates! (Frankly I have little sympathy for automakers crying for support because they didn't plan well or buy well, yet here we are.)

Oh? Hmm. Maybe it's more of a geeky issue than I thought. Here's some links. Plenty of others to be found. Here are some of the car models most likely to be in shorter supply due to the global chip shortage Car shoppers may see an impact in the availability of certain car... Intel and AMD Ask for Government Incentives While Apple Supplier TSMC Expands to Meet Unprecedented Demand | MacRumors Forums A group of U.S. chip companies, including Intel, Qualcomm, Micron, and... Chip Shortage Hits Global Automakers A semiconductor shortage is pinching some of the world’s biggest auto... How Covid led to a $60 billion global chip shortage for the auto industry Automakers are expected to lose billions of dollars in earnings this year...

I presume most on this forum have seen the news around chip shortages affecting many "Just-In-Time" car manufacturers, including deep-pocketed Japanese ones such as Honda and Toyota. It strikes me that motorcycle manufacturers could be similarly vulnerable given most new motorcycles have a bevy of brain-boxes controlling things like stability control, emissions control, ABS and more. But I've not read anything in the motoring press one way of the other! That could be because much of the motoring press has little interested in the two-wheel world, or it could be that the manufacturing numbers are much smaller, so perhaps they are not as vulnerable to supply issues. Personally I'm most interested in the potential impact of the April release of the 2021 Tracer 9GT, so if anyone has any solid news on the matter, it'd be great to know. Anyone?

Same same in Australia. Seems like just the GT will be offered, leastwise according to Motorcycle News Australia Article on the 2021 Tracer 9 Still no mention of price.

It's a huge dilemma. Right now, dealers are clearing their 2020 GT stock at some pretty good prices and the 2021 Tracer9 is going to be at least $2K more expensive with almost zero room to negotiate. What's that expression? You forget the savings the day after but you remember the limitations for years? I've rarely ever regretted going "up market" and often regretted going for the bargain, but it sounds like your experience is the exact opposite. What do people think? Take the bargain 2020 or wait for the premo 2021?