woensdag 22 augustus 2012

RAM Mount for my phone and underseat storage

The parts

So, this week a little package from http://www.rammount.com/ came in the post.
It contained some goods I ordered when I ordered the bike. I knew they were going to be late because one of the products on the list wasn't yet in stock.
As I use my Samsung Galaxy S II as a GPS on the bike, I wanted to be able to see it while riding.
My order looked like this:

RAM-HOL-AQ7-2CU RAM AQUA BOX PRO 20 WITH CRADLE $33.33
RAM-B-342U RAM CYCLE STEM BASE WITH 1" DIAMETER BALL $16.59
RAM-B-180U RAM 9MM MOTO ANGLE MOUNT WITH DIAMETER BASE $29.13
RAP-B-224-2U RAM 3" DIAMETER SUCTION CUP W 1" PLAS BALL $11.11

So that's about $ 90 without shipping.
I'll break it up:
RAM-HOL-AQ7-2CU RAM AQUA BOX PRO 20 WITH CRADLE
This is their new "aqua box". The "20" is the larger one, the smaller one only fits very small phones (like some Nokia's, some Blackberries, iPhones, ...). This one fits anything up to the Galaxy S III (which is a bit of a push but it fits without forcing! This means that it's a "lot" bigger than needed for the SGS2, so it could easily fit one that's in a case. It comes with a clip that is attachable to the rest of their product range.

RAM-B-342U RAM CYCLE STEM BASE WITH 1" DIAMETER BALL
This is the part that goes in the stem of the VFR. Little remark on this one: it doesn't really fit the VFR out of the box. But I wasn't going to the regular installation so for me it fitted perfectly.

RAM-B-180U RAM 9MM MOTO ANGLE MOUNT WITH DIAMETER BASE
This is actually a combined item. You can combine some things in one item on their site, and it could save you a couple of $.
1) The most important part of this is the "arm", it's a very very solid piece of metal. I was quite pleasantly surprised as I expected it to be plastic. I could have ordered a shorter arm but this one's actually pretty good.
2) Also important: the ballmount diamond base. This allows to attach various RAM products, such as the Aqua Box.
3) Just a bit extra, because it was just a couple of quid and wanted to keep my options open with the RAM mount, was a ballmount with an "eye", just to mount it on top of a screw for example. Could be useful if I want to install the mount somewhere else.

RAP-B-224-2U RAM 3" DIAMETER SUCTION CUP W 1" PLAS BALL
Again to keep my options open with the RAM mount, a suction cup.

All in all I'm very happy so far with the service, prices (though delivery was steep at over 30% of my order :/) and products. For what it's worth I think they are well worth the money and I wouldn't hesitate to buy again.

Mounting

So, as for the mounting on the stem.
Most remove the plastic "stem cover", I wanted to keep it because I thought it looked better. So I just took the plastic cover and drilled a hole in it. The plastic cover has a couple of plastic flaps that secure it to the inside of the stem, much like the ram mount would do. So what my construction does, instead of trying to "press" itself directly to the stem, it presses those flaps to the stem. As I mentioned before, this also solves the issue that the stem mount is too small for the VFR. The securing was a bit of a hassle, but it's only a one-time deal. The trick is to get it as tight as possible, jam it in the stem (some force may be required ;)) and then try and get it tighter still.
Mine is absolutely secure and would need an allen/hex key to be removed.

VFR1200 RAM Stem Mount

VFR1200F RAM Mount with arm
VFR1200F RAM Mount without case
VFR1200F RAM Mount with aqua box pro
Top view


Verdict and use

 It's actually a lot bigger than I anticipated, which is the only bad thing I can say about it. It's actually more my fault than the mount :). When mounted like this in the stem, and then put in portrait mode (as I like my GPS best),  it covers the entire tach. I don't really mind actually, I'm used to the bike and the tach really isn't necessary then, especially when you have a gear indicator. 

As you can see, it's pretty high up. This is due to a combination of the arm, and the positioning of the attachment on the case. It's ok for me as it clears the tank bag, without the tankbag I can flip it 180° and it's a lot more recessed, only downside then would be that the key isn't as reachable. This is perfect though if riding without a tankbag:



When riding, even with the arm and mount fully "stretched", it doesn't move at all, no vibrations, nothing. Operation through the plastic is a breeze, never would've thought it would be that easy. As said before, it's quite a lot bigger than needed for my SGS2. But the S2 is a very slim profile phone. If you have a thicker phone (like a BB Torch) or use a protective case ony almost any phone, this'll fit and then some. I have no doubt in my mind that this can fit 2 SGS2's. In fact, I'll put my wife's SGS2 in tonight as well to show you. So, a bit of space and a nice case, handy for a bit of cash, an extra battery,...

Underseat storage

A little note about the underseat storage, well, I fit a luggage net , a disk lock (a huge Detecto 8000, one of the biggest disk locks you can find nonetheless) and now the RAM mount there:

VFR1200F underseat storage

So, in short, I can very much recommend RAM and their products, the mount is great and very versatile, installation took me about 30min (1h30 if you add in the "test ride" ;)).

dinsdag 17 juli 2012

Disc Lock

Little update re security.
I've got a Granit Detecto 8000 which I found to be brilliant on the VFR.
It actually looks good (not that that matters but hey...), it fits over the front disks easily and fits under the seat no problem. It does however not fit on the rear disc.
However, I lost it this week and I thought I opted for the one with the additional chain:

Now, I thought that was brilliant, very practical and because you can loop it through for example a ground anchor, it is actually very long. On a "normal" chain you can only use half the length as you have to make a full circle, on this you can use a lot more.

Anyway, I tried to fit it and... it doesn't. It's hard to describe but let me just say that the part that goes through the disc lock is in the way for fitting it properly. I just wanted to give this heads up, so that you don't have to go back to the store like me.
So a little tip: try and fit it at the store if possible, or in front of it when you purchase it so you can return it immediately. Tbh looking at the design I think there's a lot of bikes it won't fit. The VFR is on the "ok" list for the disc lock, but there's no way it'll fit with the attached chain.

So, I'll go back to the store and just get the disc lock without the chain.

woensdag 4 juli 2012

Luggage on the VFR1200F

So, a lot can be said about just transporting general stuff on a bike. From day-to-day use, doing groceries or going away for the weekend.
For the VFR I've found several ways to transport the stuff I want, and I just thought I'd elaborate on them.

Day-to-day

Well, for everyday use I don't need that much. In general I have to take a pair of jeans, a pair of shoes and a backpack containing a laptop.
Like I already stated, I've got this Givi tankbag that can (with a little pushing) contain the pants and the shoes. It's also a good bag to take with you everytime, contains the wallet, a piece of clothing you want, keys, ... for me it's a great size bag.
The only downside I'd say is that when you want to "lie down", you've got your chin on top of the bag.
The backpack then easily goes on the pillion seat with a 40x40 bungee net over it. The mounting points for the OEM boxes are brilliant for that by the way, 4 nice big holes, perfectly positioned.

With a pillion

So, sometimes the OH can go with me and I drop her off at work. The backpack on the pillion then has to go. I have the OEM panniers, and the most important thing I have to say about them is that they DO fit full-face helmets, unlike a lot of reports I read (I bought them thinking it won't fit them because of that). I can easily put the OH's Shark Vision R or my own Schuberth C3 in either panniers. Other than that, they fit great and complete the look of the bike very nicely. A little shudder over 160 but not much.

So, in short, I've got a Givi tankbag, a €6 bungee net and the OEM panniers, and I'm very happy about them. They complement eachother great for various needs. The net can easily be stored under the seat alongside a disk lock and the papers and a wallet for example.

All this is tried and tested at over 200 leptons by the way :).

maandag 28 mei 2012

After a month... and 2000 km

So, after a month and over 2000 km, I'll just do a write up of my experiences so far.

My first reaction was, after riding it a bit and getting comfortable with it, well, it's deceptively fast. Dangerously, deceptively fast.
Compared to my CBF600SA, even with touring screen, my initial guessing of the speed was off by about 30%. And that's a lot. That's the difference between the national speed limit (120) and losing-your license speeds (160).
After a couple of days I was really thinking if I should even keep this bike as I know that it'll tempt me all the time and get me over 200 within seconds if I want to.

Anyway, I knew I wouldn't get rid of it. The bike still is everything it promises to be, on top of that, it looks fantastic.

So, a couple of weeks ago my wife and I went on a 300km round trip for the weekend, I got the Honda panniers (a lot of money and not a lot of luggage space, but they fit so well on the bike and are easy to attach/detach), which was just about enough for the weekend but nothing more. Her impressions were the following:

  • She felt that it was effortless for the bike, gear changes were less noticeable (always a good thing). This is probably due to me keeping the bike below 5000 rpm without me even noticing, you can really use the torque when riding two-up, making it very comfortable for both.
  • Her footpegs were to high-up for long rides. She's 1m80 so quite tall, and the rear footpegs really don't account for that, she almost needs to fold her legs double which isn't comfortable on long rides. There's space to lower them so I'll have to look into that.
  • She misses a support behind her back on longer rides. I'm planning on getting the Givi E55 when needed so that'll be solved then.
  • Slippery, esp with her textiles. I'll get a little anti-slip mat (the kind you get for your toolbox) that'll solve that issue.
  • Other than that the pillow was good, wind buffeting was good, so nothing that couldn't be fixed with a few minor tweaks.
A little something I was quite surprised of was the attention the bike gets. I got it in black, what I think is the most discreet colour, but still I get a lot of pointing, thumbs up and requests to rev it at the lights. Personally I think it's great and I give in to their requests without a problem, but it did caught me off guard a bit.

Anyway, I'll add things to the blog if anything springs to mind.

vrijdag 11 mei 2012

Pictures

Just went out for a little ride, took the camera with me, some snaps:

The dealer placed some rather noticeable stickers on the fairings, I've yet to remove them (I already partially did the on the right) but I'm not too happy he did.
VFR1200F Black side

  
Some detail of the led rear lights (new for the 2012 model) 





dinsdag 8 mei 2012

She has arrived

So,

I finally got the bike this saturday. First impressions: well, this is done to death, but the bike has to be seen in the flesh to form an opinion. I only saw one other black one once and I forget how good it actually looks. The black/silver look really works on the bike. The black is (of course) not as deep as the red/blue but it's still a very deep metallic look.

The first miles went (of course) very careful. The weather wasn't too brilliant (as in the pictures), but it wasn't pouring out either and it was actually comfortably warm so I was out in my one-piece.

First things first, I went to the gassing station and took some quick phone snaps:



The display gives a lot of information, the fuel "status" being one of the handiest: when just out, it displays the fuel use (here we use L/100km), when going lower on fuel (at 50km), it switches to "range", and then when getting really low it gives a quite accurate "tank contents" in .1L. When getting from the dealer, my tank had dropped to 1.1L according to the display. I filled it up (about 16L in there), but didn't top it off.

As for the riding, well, I'm probably not the best person to comment on it as I've only been riding for a year and my only other bike was a CBF600 SA. So the only thing I can do is compare it to that. Also, bear in mind that I have had this bike for only four days, doing about 500km on it.


CBF600 SA vs 2012 VFR1200F

Position/Comfort

Well, obviously the VFR is sportier. When taking up some speed, laying down, it's really a position that works on the big viffer, while it doesn't on almost any naked I've ridden, it feels forced, looks silly and isn't very comfortable. On the VFR it's definitely an option.
When just riding around, the "upright" of course isn't that upright. It's really smack in between a sports bike and a touring/naked. So you have to watch out for your back, your wrists,... just mind your position. I'm getting used to it but it's a bit of an adjustment.
As for the foot pegs high up, well, I'm not very tall so I didn't really notice it, but when taking notice I can imagine it's not good for everybody. I do think they have some aftermarket kits by now that solve this.
The foam is definitely not as soft as on the cbf, but I think it provides excellent grip and decent comfort.

Pillion

Can't comment on this so I'm paraphrasing the OH. Just to denote: she's tall so your mileage may vary.
I could understand that at first it isn't a comfortable as the very generous pillion seat the CBF provides. She also said that it's pretty slippery (which I didn't notice). This could also be due to the VFR being a lot more powerful than the CBF, so more acceleration/braking than on the CBF.
She said she could get used to it and isn't opposed to taking it on a long(ish) trip sometime. When it comes to that, I do think I'm going to get the big Givi (E55?) topbox with backrest though.
As for the riding with a pillion, well, I hardly notice her when accelerating, which is a big difference from the CBF (felt very gutless two-up).

Handling/Riding

Well, this could be pretty brief: it's in a different league. I know that going from a bike with little over 70bhp to a 170bhp shaft drive monster doesn't really offer a good comparison, and it really doesn't. First of all, the steering is much more "direct", it handles actually noticeable better than the CBF, combined with higher stability at high speed, it's quite a surprise, I wouldn't expect that as the numbers (wheel base, weight) are not in the big girl's favour. The brakes/grip are also not comparable, but I'm going to compare them anyway. I've read some "complaints" that the brakes have a serious "bite", but I found that mine are actually very incremental and easy to apply. The back brake does takes some getting used to. The back brake on the CBF was next to useless, while I'm pretty sure the one the viffer the back brake has more stopping power than the back & front combined on the CBF. I'm trying to force myself to use the back brake more often, but for now it's really forced.
Last but not least: speed. I do think they should give the beast other initials as VFR don't really do it justice. I'll dub it ICBM from now on (if you don't know what it means, look it up on wikipedia). The first time I took it on the motorway at a regular comfortable pace, I was thinking "weird, this has almost as much wind noise than the CBF". Well, the truth is, I was doing about 40km/h faster than I would on the CBF. The bike is comfortable, pretty quiet, very stable and very able. The ability to launch itself from almost any speed to speeds in excess of twice the national speed limits is something that has to be experienced. Tbh, I do think a lot of bikers have felt that kind of power, but if you haven't, you should. Another thing about the power is that it's pretty effortless and linear. You'll be hitting the rev limiter from time to time without even noticing, the power is always there so there's no real peak. Even when opening the throttle at 3000 rpm in sixth, you'll feel the bike pulling itself forward.

Equipment/options

Well, I've listed the options I've got her before, but I'll do the most important ones again:

Centre stand

First think I noticed when putting it on the stand at the dealer was how effortless it was compared to the CBF. To be fair, I do think that the CBF wasn't 100% right with that centre stand. You really had to put some force in it to get the bike up on it. So much that, even with the right technique, I doubt that the OH or the average woman would manage. The VFR, I expected to be even worse (as it's a lot heavier), but the reality was different. It went on the centre stand pretty effortless. The reason for this is probably geometry, and the fact that it doesn't lift the bike as much. I noticed this when stopping at a friend's house and had to put the bike in (hard) sand, the regular stand sank to much for my liking so I put it on the centre stand, only to notice that actually both wheels were touching the ground when I came back (not good!).

Touring screen

So, as you can see in the picture, I've got the "double screen" for more wind protection. With the weather we have now (about 10° C, often drizzle), I'll keep it on. This summer I'll give it a go to take it off and see what a difference it makes. In fact, I think I'll try and vary the height of the screen this/next week to see what it does. It has some settings but from what I could see they require a screwdriver, so no "on the fly" adjustments.

Heated grips

Well, was out yesterday (260km trip to a customer), and I thought it was warm enough to wear the summer gloves. I was wrong. But the heated grips really helped. They have 3 settings as far as I can make out. In summer gloves, to me, anything higher than the lowest setting will burn your hands :).
The button is easy enough to operate with a summer glove, but I'm not to sure with winter gloves, which seems like a very odd design choice. The control is only one button: press it once, the red light starts flashing in bursts of 3 flashes, highest setting (3), press it again, two flashes, and again, 1 flash. At any time a long press will turn them off. I had to figure that out for myself as it's not in the owners manual and the dealer forgot to give me a heads-up :).

Luggage

So, like I said, I ordered the original panniers but they have yet to arrive (normally Friday). What I did get was the Givi tankbag with tankring I was talking about.
The black ring is pretty discreet, but it'll look even better on a non-black VFR, as the tank is black on those while it's silver on mine, so the ring would stand out a lot less on the black tank.
That said, the system is very very easy. You just drop the bag on it from any angle and it snaps in. Very solid, little movement at speed but I feel more and more confident every time I ride it. I bought this bag:

It looks like it was made for the VFR, I'll get some pictures up later, promised!
It's not obtrusive, but anything bigger would be. Of course, again, your mileage may vary.
The bag is big enough, this morning I put in a decent pair of shoes, a couple of gloves and the rain liner for both my textile pants and vest. And then you could extend it, although I wouldn't expect too much of it, it increases the size a little bit. It also has a handy GPS/cell phone holder, though it requires landscape mounting, so in case of a smartphone you should opt for nav software that can lock the screen in landscape, or have an android phone and get a rotation lock app (dozens out there, this one works very easy) (also available for jailbroken iPhones iirc).
I cut off the straps that are supposed to go 'round your steering bar (because they are useless on the vfr), besides, the bag is solid enough, I can't see why you'd give yourself the extra bother of having to detach/attach that strap everytime. As for getting the bag on and off. It takes one second. Literally.

Lights

Finally, light! The light has a very nice projector shape and a good range. Much, much, MUCH better than the CBF. I often contemplated to replace the default light on the old girl, but the amount of ultra bright blinding lights on motorcycles I've seen put me off. The light was dim, but not so dim I wanted to look like a d*ck (it can be done right too I suppose, but a lot of bikers don't seem to manage that). Anyway, I don't see the need to do this on the VFR anytime soon. I works well in badly-lit areas (of which we have very few in Flanders).

Controls

Well, there are some things to be said about them. I already explained the one on the heated grips but here are some of the other ones.
First off, the often-mooted switch of the indicators and horn. For me, I think I hit the horn twice in the very beginning instead of indicating. After that, I got used to it and I actually understand honda for doing it. The indicators are right at the thumb now and easier to control.
What is a bit worse imho is the "warning" indicator switch at the right thumb. On the cbf it was a slider instead of a big button, which was a more cumbersome desing, but it was easier to apply. On the VFR I find  that I almost have to release the throttle, so now I pull the clutch lever before applying the 4 indicators.
Other than that, some complain the clutch is heavy, well, I invite you to, as a newbie to biking, go pull the clutch lever on half a dozen of +1L bikes with a lot of torque and say the same. The clutch is heavier than most bike, but so is the bike. It's a big, heavy, powerful bike so it's understandable and not really an issue.

Display

Like I said, a lot of info, on the left "wing": Big digital readout for the speed, very easy to read. Below that in small fuel consumption/range/fuel left,... and on the right of that a fuel gauge with seven(?) blocks (I'll count them later :)). then you have the big centre tachometer, I love the fact that they kept that analog as I've been on a bike with a digital horizontal one and it's just not the same. On the right "wing", on the left there is the water temp which offsets the fuel gauge for symmetry, on the upper right the trip computer which displays the regular trip A, B and TOTAL (odo). Below that the time, always convenient, I've had a CBF600 (non-S) that didn't have a clock and it drove me mad even if I only had it for a day :). And bottom right the ambient temp.

Mileage/range

Well, this is a big one. Often discussed when talking about the VFR1200F. Bear in mind that my bike isn't even run in (500km by now), and that it'll get better. I also haven't been nurturing it, nor have I been dragging it's ass off. My average (real-world, not indicated, I have to look into that to see how accurate it is!) now is about 6,5L/100km or 1L to 15,3km. The book says it's a 19L tank, I filled it (almost to the brim), rode 260km, filled up 17L. This would give me another two litres, good for about 30km.
So a complete range of 290km. Given that it's not even run in, I'd say 300km is not only achievable, but even very attainable. Like I stated in the first post, if it does over 280km on a tank I'm very happy.

Conclusion

My expectations of this bike were very high. Even so high that I pretty much set it up for failure. But to be honest, for now, it lives up to the expectations and more, which is the highest praise it can get. It all feels right when sitting on the bike. I've got some gear from Richa which gives me the same impression from time to time: have they thought about everything? A bike like this will always be a compromise. It's not the last word in sporting, nor does it pretend to be, nor is it the last thing in comfort. It's a very good compromise. I'd say it's a niche market, but imho it's not more a niche than a big tourer or a supersport bike.

What I also like is the peoples reactions, everybody seems to love it in the flesh (or are polite enough not to tell me it doesn't look good ;)). Went to the bike shop and one of the employees who went out for a smoke came in to say to his colleagues "you've got to come out and see this bike, it looks phenomenal". :)
I'm also still impressed by it's rarity over here. I've never seen one on the road so far, but maybe this summer there'll be some around. I'm curious as for the amount of black ones though.

Anyway, I have hopes that this bike will stay with me for a long time, but time will tell!

PS: When I went to pick up the bike, there were 3 CrossTourers out for delivery, it's a bike that shares the engine with the VFR1200F, also called the VFR1200X. Looks brilliant tbh, same fit and finish of the VFR1200F: impeccable. I'm curious if it will steal some sales from BMW's well deserved success with the GS bikes.

dinsdag 1 mei 2012

Schuberth C3, SRC, Cardo Scala Rider Q2 Pro Wired review

While waiting for the VFR to arrive, I've treated myself to a new helmet, a shiny black Schuberth C3.
My previous helmet is a Shark Vision-R, which will go to the OH.

I also got myself an intercom/bluetooth system, in the C3 the (quite expensive) SRC kit (made by Cardo), and for the Shark a matching Q2 Pro.

Schuberth C3

First the helmet: I currently still ride my CBF600SA which has some wind protection but quite limited. Tbh I don't really find the C3 much quieter than my Vision-R, though it's marketed as a very quiet helmet. Anyway, it's quiet enough. I was also one of the people that said I'd never use a flip-up helmet. Well, I was wrong. The C3 looks good (for a flip up), and the flip-up is very practical, arriving somewhere you don't have to take your helmet off immediately, filling up the bike you can just flip it up to get some fresh air (I always keep my helmet on during fill-ups).
The sun visor works great, although it could have been a shade darker in my view (pun intended). I do have a pair of sunglasses that I can wear under the sunvisor, though it's a "face hugging" type so I highly doubt it'll work with every type of sunglasses.

Anyway, so far very happy with the helmet, the visor is easy to remove for cleaning (also on the shark), it's silent for a flip-up and the glass-smooth surface of the helmet makes for easy cleaning (the matte colours will be harder I guess).

Schuberth SRC on the C3

Well, the collar. I'm going to start off with the downsides.
  1. It's too expensive. It's basically a Cardo Scala rider they integrated in the collar and charge a 50% extra for that.
  2. Once fitted, the already "snug" collar becomes a lot "snugger", in the store I was in between buying a M or L C3, and ended up with the L as the M felt just a bit too small. I'm glad I did as the SRC makes the helmet feel even smaller (do note the SRC is the same for S M L sizes helmets). Putting the helmet on/off without flipping it up became impossible (possible without!).
  3. FM reception. Could be due to our FM transmitters, but FM reception seems particularly poor. This leads to poor quality sound, so I prefer using the MP3 player now.
  4. Fit,  this is point two but additional, the "boom" mic on the SRC is a bit in the way to close the flip up, when closing the flip-up, the mic will almost always touch your chin/lip. Not irritating but it's there. Also, after closing the flip-up, you'll have to get your hand inside to reposition the boom to a comfortable position. Easy with thin gloves, but I think I'll struggle with winter gloves. This can partly be solved by positioning the mic right before closing the flip-up
That's about it, if you could get over that (I can), it's all uphill from there. The featureset is great, pairing with my Android handset no problem, even voice dailing if you want. Like I said, FM reception is pretty crap but ok for some stations. Operation is easy enough, though the manual is deffo required at least for the initial pairing.

Schuberth SRC intercom with Cardo Rider Q2 Pro

Setup was easy enough, and once paired this works brilliantly. Minimal wind noise and on the naked we could understand eachother (rider & pillion) with ease at up to 100km/h. One small remark: initially we thought it didn't work that well, but when you start up either set the bluetooth-properties become apparent:
First it'll connect the mobile phone (can take a couple of seconds), then it'll connect the headsets with eachother. You even get a notification ("Intercom A connected", "Mobile Connected",...). So starting up both headsets, it can take about 20-30 seconds before the intercom really works. No biggie of course, but something to take in account.
The Q2 installation in the Shark Vision-R was very easy. Because the Shark has pretty thick removable ear cushions, I didn't want to remove them as that makes the helmet a lot noisier. So I kept them in and after some trying and testing I decided to put the speakers on top of the cushions, rather than behind them (as in the C3). If you can do this without them touching your ear, that's definitely the way to go. Placing them behing the cusions will give very low sound levels so not advisable. Removing the cushions will give you a lot more wind noise. Anyway, after that installation and doing about 100km two-up, the intercom really works pretty well, even on a bike with minimal wind protection.

Any way, it was some expensive kit (about 900 € for the helmet and two intercoms) but worth it imho. Riding trips could get boring for the pillion, and being able to talk to each other on trips is a bit of a requirement for us. The ability to connect a MP3 player and maybe even listen to FM is a very welcome extra. We hope to do a nice part of Germany later this year, and I'll deffo get back on how the intercom handled that.

woensdag 25 april 2012

:)

Just phoned the dealer, if all goes all right, I can pick it up this saturday.
I also ordered the panniers while I was on the phone.

Fingers crossed for saturday!

Edit: bike still not there :(. Sincerely hope it's this weekend...

maandag 23 april 2012

VFR1200F purchase and plans.

Hi,

I've created this blog to share my experiences with my new Honda VFR1200F.
To begin, I'm not a regular blogger, nor a professional writer or reviewer. I'm also not a native English speaker, so if you happen to see an error or weird turn of phrase, don't hesitate to point it out to me as I'm happy to correct it.

Now, I've only been a "biker" since 2011 as the visits to my customers became more and more cumbersome in traffic, and the "freedom" of riding a motorcycle has always appealed to me. Also, I'm now 26, have owned a couple of cars (7), I felt I was also mature enough not to kill myself within the week.
So I had to chose a bike that would do about 500km/week, or a good 25k km/year, not to powerful, some weather protection, and not to expensive.

That landed me on my first and current bike, a CBF600SA (S= half faired, A= ABS). It has done well for me, have had to drop it couple of times (luckily at slow speeds or even standing still), but suffered minimal damage during the process. The bike was great overall, returned good mileage: 5,5l/100km or 18km/l, had a little under 80hp so as someone new to biking it felt very fast, my only gripes I'd say is that the chain does require regular maintenance when doing those kinds of miles, and two-up you could really feel the "lack" of power. (I use "lack" very loosely here as it would still be faster than most cars, it still picked up speed pretty well).

Come 2012. I've always lusted after the VFR800 when I was looking for my first bike, but I thought, I'd get something cheap with not that many miles and sell it on and get myself a VFR800 after half a year. Well, almost a year has passed and I started to look for a bike. Looking at my options I saw that a new one wouldn't be too bad a deal, but what bike? Well I had some new requirements, as a new one would mean that I can't sell it after a year, losing too much of it's value. My new requirements:

  • Fast, also fully loaded two-up
  • Good weather protection
  • Looks good
  • Not too big a footprint as I have limited space to place it, ruling out most tourers that can't fold their mirrors
  • Reliable
  • Shaft drive
So, my list quickly got narrowed down to the K1300S and the VFR1200F. Up close, the VFR somehow looks a lot more expensive than the BMW, and when I saw the deals I could have on the VFR, the cashback I could get for the CBF and the 3-year (no miles limit) warranty we get on it, I decided to go for it.

I could get very decent deals on the MY2010 (there was no MY2011 afaik), but in the end I decided to go for the 2012 for a couple of reasons*, most of all traction control. As it's a significant power hike, about 120% more power. (that would be like going from my 159 to a 911 Turbo)
So, almost a month ago I placed my order. The bike would be here in two weeks, but it still isn't (I'm not too happy about it although the weather is pretty shit so that's ok). So I really hope I can pick it up this week.
Here, I will try and tell my stories, experiences and share pictures on a regular basis.

The bike I ordered:

2012 VFR1200FC

  • 6-speed manual
  • Black
  • Heated grips
  • Screen spoiler
  • Centre stand
  • Rear hugger (yes, I do find it preposterous that the latter two are optional extra's)

Some extra's I'm deciding on:

Panniers:

I didn't order the luggage yet, but after doing some reading up I'm going to fork out he cash for the original panniers, based mostly on the fact that there are no racks required for them and I've heard they are very well made and very easy to attach/detach. Also, at 2x29l, they'll be sufficient for the weekend out. The original panniers' list price is 900 €.

Top case:

I'm not going to get one right away, but if we go touring for longer than a weekend I think I'll go for the GIVI MAXIA 3 E55 Tech. As, if the panniers aren't sufficient, I'll want a LOT of space, and the regular case is just pretty small (31l iirc) and very expensive (750€ incl bracket). The GIVI, giving me a lot more space, is 450€ incl bracket.

Tank bag:

Well, I've made the mistake of getting me a cheap magnet bag for my CBF600 and, while it was a brilliant bag, it scratched my tank pretty bad, so I'm not going to repeat that mistake. Also, since most of the VFR's tank is the plastic fairing covering it, it wouldn't work anyway. Now the original bag is only 120€, and that's also a small one, but I have a couple of problems with that one:
  1. It's VFR1200F specific, so no putting it on other bikes
  2. No map holder
  3. At 7L, it's very small
  4. If you get a tank ring, you can get several bags for it
So I looked at a couple of tank ring solutions and decided I'll probably go for a GIVI T489 Tanklock (see a theme here?) as they are pretty cheap and you have some choice.

GPS

So, the standard navigation was about 450€. But I've got a perfectly fine Samsung Galaxy S2 that I'll go and get a holder for. I ended up at ram-mounts, their Aqua Box in combination with a stem base mount seems like a winner. The total will be about $70 + shipping.

Anyway, as you can see and as any biker will understand, I'm very eager to have a go!

* 2012 changes summed up on this VFR owner's blog