hey new to bikes

[Kurtdg19]

Hi eclipser2001

First of all i would like to say welcome to the boards, and I'm glad your wanting to experience the thrill of riding!

I'm Kurt, haven't posted here in a while, but hopefully that won't be a shortcoming.

(after typing this, I realized its a bit long, but please bare with me!)

I would like to tell you about my experiences I have had as a rider. I purchased my first bike less than a year ago and haven't been riding as much as some other people on this forum. Probably ticked somewhere around 6k miles since then and I'm loving every second of it

My first and current bike is a 93 Honda CBR 600 (F2) and all I can say is that it is a great bike for a well-rounded person who can appeciate and respect it. And that is very important as if you do purchase a bike, you will soon realize this to be true. It has a bit over 23k miles, and is still running as strong as ever. The transmission is so smooth (Honda's are known for it) its like.....wiping your ass with silk.

For a first timer, this bike is ridiculously fast (emphasis on the ridiculous). An F2 is rated at 100hp at the crank allawhile tipping the scales around 400lbs. Quarter mile times when i looked them up were 11.3 and 0-60 ticking in at 3.3. As I was saying its blazzing fast!. And for a sports bike, it has a relatively comfortable riding posistion (I am 6'1 and it fits well), and the seat is imo the most comfortable seat you can get on a sports bike. Its not stiff and awkward like others, and its riding posistion isn't as cramped. The body style is by far the best looking sport bike for its time, which is another bonus. They are known to be reliable bikes. Some people have ticked over 100k miles on them and they are still running strong. So if you are worried about the age of it being a possible problem, I hope this will help fade those worries away.

Before my experience riding my CBR, I had ridden my friends (at the time) 83 honda nighthawk 750. Another amazing bike.....they most comfortable bike I have ridden to date. Its powerband was linear and smooth, delivering torque at an ever excalating rate with no suprises. I'm so glad that bike was my first experience and I wouldn't take it back for anything . And then.......I bought my CBR.

Talk about opening a can of worms......Going from the Honda Nighthawk, to this thing was literally night and day. The smooth and linear powerband inherent on the Nighthawk was no more. I learned very soon....very (like the first time I took it out) that that little twisty clip on handlebar on the right, was not your friendly neighbor. It meant business. If your expecting the powerband to be like anything of a car, your so wrong its literally not even funny. This bike transforms into a beast within a blink of an eye and a twist of the throttle. If you take it easy, keeping the revs under 7k, its relatively tame. Once you blip the throttle and begin to diving into the revs past 8 and 9k, it literally feels like the bike just gained another 40hp. If you weren't holding on tight ready to expect anything, then you've just officially scared the crap right out of you, and you probably won't dare to try to bring it up into that terrority for a while. And that is exactly how I was.

First time i rode it I brought it up to about 9k rpms and it was scary. It took me another week of riding before I began to overcome my fears and settle into it a bit more. After I've accumulated a little more seat time, my confidence and respect in my abilities and the machine had increased tenfold. This really is one thing that most riders may not understand, and that is the importance of seat time. It really does take a while to begin to feel comfortable on your machine. And the faster, and less forgiving the bike is, the harder and longer it will take for you to feel acustomed to it.

And to summarize this all up.....I love riding! Its one of the best things that have happened to me. And as long as you are respectful to your machine and levelheaded, you will have many rememberable moments with it.

Be prepared if you choose to buy a newer sports bike. They will not forgive you easily if you get over your head. A few things to remember.......braking takes longer on a bike, and its not as easy as just hitting the brakes in a car. Your an extension to the machine, and your body literally controls what the bike will do. Watch out for debris on the road.....gravel, dirt, grass clippings.....its literally like sliding on ice if you hit it wrong. Pay attention to your surroundings! That is the most important thing you must! do when riding. You will be suprised how many people don't see you when your on a bike. The minute you lose awareness of your surroundings could be the second a soccer mom merges right into you. And last but not least......always wear a helmet! Its not about style, its about keeping your brains where they should be and not where they shouldn't.

Anyways, good luck on your pursue! I hope this doesn't sound like I'm scaring you off. You'll soon know, that upmost priority is your safety, and yes we do preach it! Maybe thats why we are telling you to consider somthing thats a little less extreme

[Z_Fanatic]

There are better deals out there, the key is to wait, and not to get anxious or impatient about it. When I got my first bike, it was 1990 Yamaha FZR600 $1600 with 14k (questionable, since theere was no speedo cable) miles. It was a beater in truest sense, and when I had to fix some of the stuff just to ride, it was a learning experience, since I was never mechanically inclined before. When I sold it, it was break even to how much I spent.

Then I got 2002 SV650 for $3300 with tank bag and rear wheel stand, and one spare helmet. When I got it, it had 800 miles, when I sold it, it was close to 5k, and I lost $300 on it, only because I didn't wait long enough for more sellers and picked a bad season to put up the ad (winter), winter is usually buyer's market.

While I owned my SV, last year I heard of a '1999 Honda F4, and get this, through my mother, and she dislikes that I ride. The bike wasn't put up on ad, so I quickly nabbed it for $1900. It had 7k miles, complete stocker, dropped on the side, scratches on left plastic. And since then, it was all gas up and go affair. So I had two bikes in the garage for a while, hehe. Since then, I did mods to fit my own taste. It's been on a highside, and fairings and everything else survived pretty well due to combination of frame sliders and luck.

Any Japanese bike that are below 10K miles, no wreck, and the owners did the usual maintenance, it's all gravy for me to consider purchasing.

My personal goal was to not spend any more than $2k on first bike, it was going to get dropped no matter what. So better set your loss for cheap. And so far, I dropped every bike I owned, once,

[eclipser2001]

Well fortunately the price isn't set in stone yet. I has to be appraised first. And I'm not paying more then the appraised amount for it. Nada's average retail for it is 4385, so I'm not paying more than that for it. The guy is in college and not working so he really needs money, so I'm pretty sure he'll take about 4300 for it.

[speediva]

The first scratch you put in it, YOU WILL CRY. I don't care how big your balls are. Just consider this my final bit of advice on this one. I think there are FAR better deals out there... especially on more forgiving, more user-friendly bikes.

[Z_Fanatic]

Originally Posted by saturntangerine

The first scratch you put in it, YOU WILL CRY.

unless the seller already did it for him.

[DealsGap]

Originally Posted by Kurtdg19

A few things to remember.......braking takes longer on a bike, and its not as easy as just hitting the brakes in a car.

Bikes have the capability to stop much more quickly than cars do. The two big problems are that it requires the bike to be properly set up, and the rider to have the capability to use that potential. In panic situations, most people... panic. In a panic situation in a car it's very likely that you'll be able to get away with doing all the wrong things. Most people will stomp on the brake pedal and wait for a situation to take care of itself. On a bike, you will be required to display much more control of your machine to handle a given situation, and the results for failing to do so are much higher. Take the time to practice short stopping and evasive techniques. A parking lot is a great place for this, and it may very well save your life. I can't remember the last time I rode without having to use one of those techniques, and unfortunately many riders haven't taken the time to give themselves these skillsets to work from.

[Z_Fanatic]

Actually despite the weight advantage, bikes just don't have to 4 fat wheels to make up for traction, it's relying basically on one wheel. After a point when all the weight is transferred, it will lock up easily, yet it needs lot of weight on the front to stop fast. During emergency situation, it needs quite a bit of modulation, where the rear will rise a few inches off the ground for max braking, but not too much, all of this while keeping the front checked from being locked. When they do those legitimite comparos about fast bikes vs fast cars, regardless of which wins, the car always brakes a bit faster when pushed to limit.

.

[aussieidiot]

Originally Posted by saturntangerine

The first scratch you put in it, YOU WILL CRY. I don't care how big your balls are.

he he

when i did a stoppie on my 954 and went ass over tit i laughed at my own stupidity.
















then cried myself to sleep

[DealsGap]

Originally Posted by Z_Fanatic

Actually despite the weight advantage, bikes just don't have to 4 fat wheels to make up for traction, it's relying basically on one wheel. After a point when all the weight is transferred, it will lock up easily, yet it needs lot of weight on the front to stop fast. During emergency situation, it needs quite a bit of modulation, where the rear will rise a few inches off the ground for max braking, but not too much, all of this while keeping the front checked from being locked. When they do those legitimite comparos about fast bikes vs fast cars, regardless of which wins, the car always brakes a bit faster when pushed to limit.

.

http://www.madro.net/carbike/carbike.html

Here's the best car vs bike comparison I've ever run across. Complete with telemetry data, it highlights the strengths and weaknesses of each platform. If you'll notice the bike dominates the car in terms of braking points for a given speed.

[Z_Fanatic]

I don't have to read it all, before presuming he's not a good driver as he is a rider, does he race cars professionally? The article seems biased as well.

[DealsGap]

The article is written in very cynical manner for entertainment purposes (it is a bike mag, after all), but its the most neutral test I've ever seen done, and it's all backed up with track data. Schwantz was a professional driver in several classes during his career and is extremely fast in a car, and of course we all know his accomplishments in the bike world. If you read the article it will touch on some of his accomplishments as a driver, and will also compare his lap times in the vette to the SCCA T1 class lap record at that track, just to alleviate any doubts of those who don't know his driving ability.

[Kurtdg19]

Originally Posted by DealsGap

Bikes have the capability to stop much more quickly than cars do. The two big problems are that it requires the bike to be properly set up, and the rider to have the capability to use that potential. In panic situations, most people... panic. In a panic situation in a car it's very likely that you'll be able to get away with doing all the wrong things. Most people will stomp on the brake pedal and wait for a situation to take care of itself. On a bike, you will be required to display much more control of your machine to handle a given situation, and the results for failing to do so are much higher. Take the time to practice short stopping and evasive techniques. A parking lot is a great place for this, and it may very well save your life. I can't remember the last time I rode without having to use one of those techniques, and unfortunately many riders haven't taken the time to give themselves these skillsets to work from.

Thanks for the input DealsGap. As I did a bit more research I have found the general consensous to be different as I originally stated. It seems the braking power of modern race replica super sports are just about on par with high end sportscars. I won't go as far as saying their abilities are better than one another simply being that the tuning capabilities for a car of bike is quite vast. They are however, dang near close to each other . However the skill involved in performing such task between the two may be an entirely different story. As far as my bike goes......its old, and doesn't quite match up to the braking capabilities as new sport bikes so I hope you can see why my impression was as so.

On another note: I have seen and read that comparo article with the Z06 and gixer in it before (great article btw! Makes me feel good i have a bike ). I'm still pretty hesitant to say that article is absolutely how bikes and cars match up, so I went ahead and looked around for some other articles and found another bike/car comparo from Evo magazine (a car mag, but I'm sure you've all heard of them).

http://www.radicalsportscars.com/media/fastfeud/index.php

The only actually data they really give is acceleration times, but its still imo a good read.

[Z_Fanatic]

As I can't provide any evidence at the moment, I can't comment much. I agree that bikes has the edge as far as out of corner drive goes, and probably what gets them the faster lap times. But I am truly not convinced that even the best stock race rep can match the 4-disc ceramic (or whatever Formula 1-derived compound they're using this year) braking power of F430 or other high end road-going cars. It seems to me one can trail brake much further and later on a self-stabalised 4 wheel auto than apply equal forces on two or sometimes one wheel bike, as it has far greater tendency to lose the front, wipe out and crash. Race bikes and race cars are different.

[eclipser2001]

Is my suspension adjustable? Just out of curiosity.

I read the owners manual, it talks about the suspension but not weather or not they are adjustable and if so- how to.

[eclipser2001]

anybody know?