I promised myself not to take part in "Which Bike" threads, but somehow I did and now I see it's opened a can of worms by just giving a personal opinions, since this thread has already gone "into bananas" like someone ingeniously said on HUBB once.


You see those type of bars a lot in Asia among local bikers and I reckon they're very useful for serious travelling in hard conditions when falls are prone to happen. After a fall, a lot easier to pick the bike up as well.

You can laugh, it's good for your health.

Everything that moves, wears, true. But the thing is, some bikes just don't wear that easily out like others do. Okay, I am biased on older oilheads, but still I haven't seen a big trailie (let's not count Wings and Pans here okay) that has made over 300 000 miles without a any work on the engine. I've seen loads of over 100K, some over 200K and a couple of R1100s well over 300 000 miles and the guys who ride them don't pamper them like tar-tourers - they ride them every day to work, do their third-world travels, trash them offroad, often carry silly heavy things on them (furniture!) and all they needed to replace are consumable parts - and yes, before you start knocking that final drive, it's pretty much concensus now that the BMW's FD main bearing is a consumable part with a life expectancy of 50 000 - 150 000 miles if shimmed correct, but for me it's still better than oiling and replacing chain a lot more frequently. While I know Afrca Twin owners who swear their bikes are bomb proof yet they've already stripped them into bits for a complete engine overhaul in less than 200 000 miles, some less than 100K. How many bikers do this mileage in such an extreme variety of riding conditions? How many of of the bikers stick to their bikes that long? This is what I mean under "lasting a lifetime" judging what's the average annual mileage for an average biker (with a lot if not majority probably being "sunday" riders). Maybe I want to say this because I don't buy a new bike every second or third season, I do ride mine daily back at home, do offroad, do shopping, now I'm even on an RTW with the same bike and I plan to keep mine till it's totalled or stolen, or worn out like you say, if that'll be the case, so be it and I'll report it to you. 100 000 km is just a run-in bike for me if it's an oilhead BMW boxer GS, but like you say, most of buyers (and thus dealers) see it as excessive mileage already. I don't see a simple means transport in the motorcycles like many bikers do and replace them as running boots as new models come out - with "too old", "I'm tried of it" excuses. I see character, a form of art, packed with design wonders, innovations of their time and a phenomena that together work in the way described: joy, that makes me just grin, and gives me a real sense of freedom while riding it (and from the other end I can probably fall a sleep while riding a V-Strom, it's all down to the personal taste of bikes, different strokes for different blokes, as they say). If I'd just see a point A-to-B transport machine in two wheels then I'd probably already chosen a Japanese 125cc scooter for our RTW to save on fuel or a comfortable air-conditioned 4x4 with a healthier budget.

And oh yes, on most big trailies the turn signals are trash once you've gone down in a proper way. Made in China $10 turn signals made for offroad bikes with rubber arms are the first mod you should do with 10 minute installation. But at least you haven't broken well over $300 worth of side plastics and other bits with that off…


True, if you take appropriate precaution, I'd say there is a statistically high chance you can even do a RTW on a bike with a fairing made out of shiny transparent plastic glass with programmed flashing disco-lights below it without leaving a scratch on the surface or a visible dirt mark. But will you have freedom to go where ever you like, open the throttle full on a steep rocky trail when you feel you're in the right mood for doing so?

I guess it all goes under "your mileage may vary" case, where everybody has its own opinion about it and nothing can be classified as true or false. It's all up to the rider who has to choose/set up the bike for the personal needs. My personal opinion was just to be on the safe side rather than put all tour hopes on your own precautions and be constantly stressed with your own concerns that you may break something any time. At the same time this doesn't neccesarily mean you have to install full Touratech catalogue of reinforcement/protection parts on your bike for that weekend ride to the pub.


I think the weight is definitely not the case in terms of stability. Try riding a standard R1200GS and then V-Strom afterwards - you notice also the 1200GS has a noticably better stability than the big Strom while it's lighter by spec and feels a lot lighter when you actually ride it. So it can't be the weight.

I guess horizontally mounted engine (gyroscopic forces?) has something to do with the impression of very good stability on the road (and ditto to all other "grand-tourers" with the same engine mounting, Pan European, Goldwing, Guzzis that just feel bloody well planted on the road when you ride them). Maybe also telelever or frame geometry plays some part with the big GS, but I think it's negligible or even non-existant at steady speeds.

Telelever starts to play its part only if your throttle and braking operation becomes "irratic" (curvy roads, traffic, avoiding potholes etc) and in terms of those conditions, so far I think with 2-up full gear setting the telelever front suspension is really a God-sent system and I find it pityful that others haven't aquired the simple (excluding the expensive side-steered Benellis, Yamaha GTS and other handbuilt $$$-experimental bikes) non-diving suspension technology to stabilize that huge load-transfer of heavy bikes (Hossack's patents BMW-licensed only?) that would make 2-up RTW-ers selection of well handling bikes a lot wider than limited to that one GS. While we've also seen 50cc two-up "doable", we wanted the best bike affordable to us before going on our own RTW, so we tested different bikes to be sure of our choice (yes, times do change, so while on RTW we've tested other bikes as we had a chance just to keep our minds open) and IMHO telelever is a superior system to the regular forks and I haven't found even radically modified forks that give the same steady feeling on a pig-heavy 2-up loaded bike once you start playing around with that weight of the bike. Now before you start knocking, that being said, with a light bike, solo and with a lot less gear, I'd probably prefer well set-up conventional forks since I don't find any really noticable advantage on telelever when riding a light bike solo.

Again, I must stress those are my personal opinions and my personal observations. There is no universal truth out there anyway, so the original poster should make up his own truth from this thread that's already utterly off topic.

Margus