Wintersdark

Heated helmet and jacket, thermally insulated riding overalls, stock heated grips. I'm warm and toasty

Neither better nor worse. Mostly I didn't think about it because I just leave it in A mode all the time. Never had a bike with riding modes before, so 25 years of habit comes into play. Mentioned it because that's where it was. The only time I had difficulty though was loose snow, and no riding mode change would have impacted that - the problem is more the front than the rear there.

Finally had a chance to get out on my new Anlas Wintergrip Plus. Just an around the block run (A mode, as always, TCS1), but it's -15c and snowy so I figure is post some first impressions, and update after a 50km ride tomorrow. In loose snow... Not particularly helpful. They're better than the stock Dunlop's, mostly in that you don't get stuck instantly, but I wouldn't want to ride in fresh falling snow. A fair bit of wheel spin and the front feels really wishy-washy. On packed icy snow (unplowed and we'll driven roads, such as in the pic below)... Not bad. I was pretty gentle, but never triggered TCS (even in 1) unless I suddenly goosed the throttle. Felt ok being gentle in first, riding slowly and being careful in turns. Haven't yet really explored the limits of traction there, and somewhat hesitant to do so. On slushy/icy/very cold pavement? Just fine. Felt comfortable up to 60kph, no vagueness or slip. I've previously ridden in winter on Road 5's, and while they're ok once they warm up, initial riding on very frozen pavement with cold tires was super sketchy, with the tires feeling largely like PVC tubes. Even just getting started with these Anlas tires - at -15c rubber and road, remember - they felt quite grippy and confident. More to come after I get some miles on them tomorrow.

Had one of those for my MT; they're a pretty good buy at the ~$30. I considered getting another, but I suspect that the stock blinkers won't fit with my hardcases. If that's the case, I'd need to swap them out with some flushmounts, but then I'd need to swap the blinker module to get back to a normal blink rate (and lose my running lights), so then I'd want to swap the front signals too..... Gah. I actually like the stock indicators, to be honest, and really don't want to change them.

On the GT, the "Tracer" part is a raised silver emblem..... but the "900 GT" (or, more accurately, gooGT) is just another red sticker. Blech. Waiting for a warm day (-16c is just not good for sticker removal, even with a heat gun) and yeah, I'm pulling all mine off too. I don't necessarily mind stickers (liked the red swooshes on my white+red MT07), but I'm not a fan of the third color. Grey, while, and red? No thanks. And with the silver raised TRACER (...with no other silver stuff around) too, it's just kind of a mess. Definitely going with vinyl wrapping. Matte black on the lower covers, ghost blue on the tank, scoops, and side covers under the seat. Probably matte black on the cases, too, but not certain yet. Maybe some ghost blue in the dished areas, surrounded by black. Less is more for color IMHO.

Only just met you, but I've really appreciated your posts! Still, yeah, as @nhchris said, you've got to know when to fold 'em. We take enough risks as it stands, and motorcycling is really not something one should do at less that 100%.

Yup. I still maintain - as much as I love my Tracer - my MT07 was more fun to ride. The Tracer will be better come road trip time (load the MT07 down with more weight and it's limitations really show), and it's waaaaaaay more comfortable. But even with it's much lower top speed and acceleration(relatively speaking), the 07 was a blast to wring every ounce of performance out of and I spent a great deal of time at WOT, engine screaming. On the Tracer, I very rarely have it WOT, simply because there's nowhere I can really use that much power. Not that I'm afraid to, or don't want to, but simply because you're already going way too fast for most street riding in seconds. It's where the real differentiation with performance cars comes in, IMHO, because you just don't have anywhere near the same acceleration in most cars, so there's a lot more "usable power" room. Gotta have a really crazy car to get to where you simply can't use the power. Kinda sad, because the CP3 sounds so damn good when you open it up. So, what happens is people buy ever bigger bikes, and just turn their wrist less. You can get that same effect with a smaller bike and changing out the throttle tube 😃 Well, I guess you can't brag about having the most power, but... eh.

@Dodgy Knees Oh, that's really nice. Love the satin black instead of the white for that side panel. I've got the same colorway on my GT and am decidedly not a fan. I'm probably going to wrap mine, still deciding on colors. But seeing how well the black works on those side panels is really helpful, I'm definitely doing that. Awesome!

What's funny? When I saw it, I was just... No. Just no. But having seen them driving, around other cars? You know... I want one now. It looks a lot better once you get it in a more real situation, and it definitely stands out. Like buying a supercar - they're not really pretty, they're actually typically really weird looking. But they stand out. You really notice them right away. So long as it does what the spec sheet says it will, anyways. If you're gonna stand out like that, you need to be able to "walk the walk". That's ultimately what takes things from "Wow, that's ugly" to "Wow, that's awesome". I mean, history is littered with unique - ugly - vehicles that failed utterly, and those pretty much always go hand in hand with being terrible cars outside of their ugliness. Much of the cybertruck's "ugliness" is in how wildly it departs from traditional truck styling. So long as it does what it says on the tin, people will buy it - lots of people will buy it. Once you start seeing them around, then it's going to be less jarring and more "Oh, hey, look at that!" I'd argue that maybe the weird styling is a benefit, as traditional truck people will hate it, but traditional truck people are not really the target audience here. If it performs as advertised, this gets people what amounts to a supercar in terms of head turning... But at a price a normal human can afford.

This was largely the rationale for me buying my old MT07, and this GT. 99% of my riding is ultimately sub-100mph, and basically all the most fun riding is. Either it's launching from stoplights, or carving up twisty mountain roads, either way pushing far beyond 100mph isn't really very important to me. I certainly like to Go Fast, but in practice it's pretty rare I'm in a situation where I'm going to be looking to hold 120mph+ for any length of time. There's just not a lot of places you can do that safely and not risk really, really unpleasant encounters with the boys in blue. If I'm doing long highway rides (meh; find alternate routes that have curves and scenery!) I'm just slapping on cruise control at whatever speed people are driving anyways, and if I'm commuting to work, or out in winding roads, acceleration and grunty power is far more valuable to me. Exactly. Even on my MT07, I was never left behind on group rides except for when people wanted to show off on long straight stretches (and even then, only when they wanted to "make a point"). As soon as we got to any kind of corners or more limited visibility, I was right with the liter bikes. Not because I'm some super great rider, but just because there's only so much speed you can actually use. It happens every decade or two - manufacturers get into this horsepower/max speed race - but it's really just spec sheet penis measuring IMHO. I'm a strong proponent of 600-class sportbikes, and up to liter bikes in touring spec (where you're looking to carry a lot more weight) with everything beyond that being "Hey, this is awesome and all, but not actually useful." We're definitely in another one of these cycles now, with new models always being just a bit faster than the prior ones at the top end. Shelling out more money for worse fuel economy, more expensive insurance, just to have a bigger number on your bike than the next guy.

I like the MT line styling, but the colors in particular just make me shake my head. I got the Nimbus Grey/White model common in the UK as it was heavily discounted specifically because it wouldn't sell in that color. Since day one, I've been contemplating what color I want to paint/wrap it in. Plastic grey with red accents and white lower fairings? Erg. Who thought THAT was a great color scheme?! The whole push to have the off-color lower fairings on lots of different models confuses me, to be honest. Likewise, the dark grey MT's with the wierd "flou" yellow-green wheels, or even the new 2019 MT's with the weirdly orange-red wheels against the white. The white's nice, for sure - pearly and sparkly, it's quite pretty, but then they offset it with that weird orange-red.

My experience anyways has been that custom seats - that is, not on some online webshop, but actually going into an automotive upholstery shop - tend to be substantially cheaper than options like Corbin or Bagster. I shopped around a lot for my MT07, and found most would do a custom re-cover with new shaped foam starting for around $150-$200 (including multiple adjustments), vs. say a bagster seat at wallet rending prices (though, if reviews on the forums are any indication, it's a good buy nevertheless). A more advanced multi material seat with heating elements can be done for around $400. The trick is to find some competent people who do bike seats, but aren't bike seat specialty shops as they come with a significant premium.

Hmm. Did not heat it at all, was just inside in my basement so at room temperature. Definitely no sun; it's -20 outside right now, so that wouldn't be very helpful I'll definitely do that too next time around.

I've never found a shop that'd do it for less than $60 per wheel if you bring your own tires in - they'll typically do it for $40/wheel if you buy the tires from them. It's kinda pricy, hence why I wanted to do it myself. It's frustrating, though, because I've watched people do it lots of times and it's been pretty effortless for them. I'm a big guy, I've done hard physical labour my whole life and have no issue with "putting in elbow grease" - but damn. I struggled hard and just damaged stuff rather than actually accomplishing anything, despite liberal application of lube and rim shields. I think it'd be a lot easier if I had my own stand, though, so I can have the tire elevated and manipulate it better without having to try to hold the wheel down at the same time I'm doing everything else.

Well, I don't have the money to replace it right now, and the tire I removed (while very good) is wildly more dangerous for me to ride. The stock Dunlop's are utter trash below zero, no traction at all, and murderous on ice. I miss my Road 5's. Upside is, being a winter tire, by nature I won't be pushing them hard. Gotta keep the bike mostly upright and ride carefully all the time. That said, any deformation and it goes. I don't run tires on anything with wierd bumps and such.

Yeah, had a shop change them, and coat that with bead sealant. Seems to be holding air, which is good. I'd be real sad if I had to replace the tire, as it's both not cheap and very difficult to get here. Bad enough that I scratched up the rim. Got the front back on yesterday, today will see the rear hung and then a trial run in the snowy -15 weather. Don't really expect good performance in actual snow, but gotta test it. They're beastly looking tires.

Buckled down to learn to mount tires, and get my Anlas Wintergrip M+S tires mounted up for the winter. Despite many hours of youtubing, using rim protectors, and struggling with tire irons, I managed to damage the bead on the rear significantly, and scratch up my rim pretty severely. Not normally a quitter, but there's a point where you need to recognize that you're doing something *wrong*. I figure I'll wait till I can get a stand, as doing it on the floor is just not working for me. I figure my problem is that with the width of the tire and it's stiffness, I can't get the "top" bead into the drop channel because the floor pushes the bottom sidewall up too much. So, after hours of struggle, I took the rims and wheels in to a shop to have them mounted. They used a bead sealant on the now severely mangled rear tire, and hopefully it'll last. Well, I tried

Oh, good lord. That's amazing. I doubt I'll ever have 7k to drop on something like that, but a man can stream, right?

Yeah, it depends if they have OIS or not. I use an old phone without for that. When travelling, I set the old phone in the bars and wifi tether to my good phone in my pocket. Done 20k that way with no problems. Didn't work for video anyways though, as there's terrible distortion when accelerating.

I certainly haven't measured (or even seen a gen 1 tracer in person - FJ's are very, very uncommon bikes here), just going off the review articles I read in regards to the 2019 GT vs. the 2018 FJ. Maybe the older FJ bars where wider yet? For sure, the control cables aren't nearly long enough to support a couple inches per side, so that'd be way more work than it's worth IMHO.

This was one of the first things I tested on my 2019 GT. It gets identical fuel mileage in A or B mode too, counting freeway constant-speed miles only. Obviously, stop and go traffic in B saves a lot of fuel (and makes me want to die inside) but running the bike at a constant speed uses the same amount of fuel... which honestly makes a lot of sense, as the engine needs to generate a specific amount of power to hold the bike at a specific speed - so that's going to require the same amount of fuel no matter what. B mode just ignores a lot of your throttle input, restricting fuel use under acceleration. Edit: Ah, this was a really old post. Probably should have checked that first.

Woah, woah, woah. There's turbo kits for the CP3? I can slap a turbo on my GT? To google I go!

I don't, but would like to. I've tried using phone cameras on RAM mounts, but the bikes vibration absolutely trashes image quality under acceleration (and that's basically all the time for me). I'd like a bike mounted cam setup powered by the bike's electrical system so I don't need to worry about batteries, but ultimately I've never found one that's reasonably weatherproof and has good image quality even with the inevitable vibration. Helmet mounted cams are probably the best way to go (basically no vibration concerns!), but then you're at the mercy of batteries - less practical on long road trips. I'm reluctant to drop a lot of money on one without knowing it'll be good for me, as typically you're way past returning once installation and trials are done.

I'm definitely a fan of wider bars vs. narrow bars. I rarely lane split/filter so don't benefit from narrow bars, and like how wider bars allow finer input control. On my old MT07, swapping the bars out for substantially wider (2") ones was pretty much the first thing I did. Being a huge guy, too, narrow bars become extremely uncomfortable vs. shoulder width - you end up with your arms pointing inwards rather than parallel, then your wrists have to twist outwards even more. Ugh. The GT's bars are pretty decent, though - they're only a half an inch narrower than the FJ bars, if I understand correctly - quarter inch per side. If it's a bigger difference than that, though, maybe it'd be worth tracking down a set of used older FJ bars. And if the control cables will fit, of course. Edit: I'm so jealous of that knee angle! Even with the seat raised, I'm at 81 degrees; 77 degrees stock.

This is really the only way too, just looking at bars, trying out bikes, and accepting that bars are only a part of all the interconnected parts of rider ergos. A downside of our bikes now is they're non standard diameters(at least with the stock risers). If you're got a bike with standard 22mm/ 7/8ths bars, you can grab Emgo bars for $20 a pop and try em out with relatively minor investment. Fortunately I'm pretty happy with the stock bars, my issue with the ergos is limited to the way the seat pushes you forwards all the time.