Paul Smart Sport Classic. I bought it as a potential superlight and found the handling poor probably due to rear suspension architecture and comfort/ergos were the worst of any bike I've ever ridden and that includes 888, 916, 999, 1000ss, and despite it having ohlins front and rear I would warn that all that glitters is not gold (despite them being obviously gold ) . They do look good and values seem to be on the up but that seems to more aimed at storing/admiring rather than riding.
That looks hideous - what made you want to buy that - or ( for that matter any guzzi ) - I expect now to be picked off by a sniper across the road of my house...
Yamaha R6 which I forcefully inherited of my mate after I smashed it. Uncomfortable (I mean really uncomfortable), gutless, whiney engine noise, have to ring its neck for it to go anywhere. Looked nice from the rear, fairing way too big at the front. Never had a 600 sport bike before and never planned on it and that small timezone of ownership put the nail in the coffin for any more 600 sport bikes ever.
Had a senior moment and bought this as I had always wanted one and it absolutely burst my bubble it was absolutely crap at handling stopping etc looked good but that was it ........ This was better but not much.........it cost me fortunes to restore and tried to kill me for the effort old shit is old shit don't let anyone tell you different.
My 1998 Ducati handled so bad I crashed in a straight line. I was so mentally unhinged by this I blamed Carl Fogarty and accosted him at the winners press conference wearing a bathrobe.
While I know we're talking about an all round package but for me looks is a big thing and, to a certain extent the look of the engine....the main reason ive got my hyper is that its (in stark contrast to this thread) the next best thing to my most favourite bike ever the TDR250 - like an upto date meaty version of that...but one thing that I must confess that I don't like about most if not all duc's is the look of the engine....looks like an old lawnmower engine (moreso when the belts are showing) but ill let that slide as I love the noise that comes from them...
A Kawasaki Z750. Engine was alright and it looked good but I have honestly never ridden anything so badly suspended! Just the most appalling suspension ever to be put on a bike.
Harley Fat Blob Thrusting Penis Extension Bitching Sled thing. Had been through the CVO scheme with vast amount of tuning goodies thrown at it. Salesman seemed very adamant it was a real firebreather and to be careful with the throttle. It was gutless and the biggest bag of sh*t I've ever ridden. Didn't go, didn't stop, didn't handle. Rust leeching from exposed frame threads and fasteners after just a few months on the road, and every time you changed gear it sounded like the box was about to grenade.
I can sort of understand why some on here don't like sports 600's, after all this is a thumper forum. I love 600's, the stratospheric revs and the howling engine note are all part of the drama for me. It gets better when you are on track crawling around them like a monkey especially if you are going past the bigger bikes on the brakes or riding round them in the corners...
Disappointed? Not really. Unimpressed? Certainly. A friend lent me his MHR for a ride out with him. I had an 851 at the time, as it was the early 90s. I've never been a fan of the MHR lookswise: it looks heavy and ponderous compared to the 900SS which looks very cool. To ride it was quite heavy and ponderous. The brakes were not the sort of brakes you want on the twisty roads in the Jura where all the bends are blind. Handling very slow, motor very slow to spin up. The MRH was early 80s, the 851 not a decade later, but it was chalk and cheese. The strides made by bike makers in the 80s were immense. Bikes may be better now than a 916, but you wouldn't say they were 20 years better. My 8 year old 999 is still a very fast and fine-handling bike with great brakes, but if you compared the bikes of 1990 to those of 1982, the difference in everything (not to mention tyres) was immense.
BMWs of all stripes, don't know what anyone sees in them. Overrated, unreliable, monstrously ugly - what is there to like? I had never enjoyed riding them either, but in an effort to overcome my prejudices, or at least put them to the test, I bought an R1100S some years ago - a slow, heavy, pig of a thing that would be embarrassed by most other two-wheeled vehicles, except perhaps for a Jawa 125 I once had, but because that was fully expected to be simple proletarian transport, it did not disappoint by fulfilling its brief. The BMW could not make the same boast. BMW launched the Boxer Cup so their 'sports' offering would get to charge around in a herd, with one of them in the lead, instead of always being at the back in any other company. Any bike that furrows your brow and makes your tongue pop out in concentration whenever you need to apply the indicators, just can't be right. Speed Triple - test rode one and was left wondering why anyone would want one for more than a trip to the shops. Seduced the motorcycle media cooing phrases like, "three cylinder growl", "grunt", "soul" and "character" I eagerly looked forward to my test ride. Afterwards, all those words seemed like marketing hype - just not a twin, or a four, neither fish nor fowl, just a sort of buzzy nothing really. Guzzis? Ridden lots of the older ones and owned a MkI and a MkII Le Mans and a T3 - loved them all, there's something very seductive and addictive about a Guzzi's power delivery and the way they handle - the newer ones I have not experienced. If they ever broke down and they very rarely did, the old ones could be fixed at the side of the road with little more than a spoon and a biro.
I'm with you on the BMWs. Plus they are humungously huge. It's like riding a boat with the front wheel somewhere in the next postcode. Made for large Teutonic people, whereas Ducatis are tiny and made for short-arsed Dagos.
BMW R1100RT, supposed to be comfortable but was far from it. It felt like I was riding with a plank strapped to my back. Sold it and bought the ST3 and haven't looked back!
I have tried one. I took it up the San Bernard pass. It's quite tall, but it's not a physically big bike as you notice when someone is sat on one. A BMW GS looks to be an entirely different plate of schnitzel.
