Innehållsförteckning för February 2016 från RiDE

IT’S ALL TOO easy when you start categorising and classifying bikes to get tied in knots. But this month’s cover story presents a good case for the Kawasaki Z1000SX being the defining bike of a new generation of sports tourers – sports touring 2.0, as we call them. More agile than full-on heavyweight tourers, more comfortable than nakeds or sportsbikes, they’re also more down to earth (literally and figuratively) than the tall, big-capacity adventure bikes that some would say have replaced sports tourers. Every time we test the SX we like it more. It’s a proper, conventional, normal bike done exceptionally well, at a good price, however you label it.…

Suzuki’s GSX-R1000 K5 sportsbike was a milestone machine, universally loved and admired for the way it delivered devastating performance in an unscary way (you could still scare yourself with it, though). That engine has been revived for the GSX-S, though with some mild retuning to move power down the rev range, dropping peak power to a very user-friendly 143bhp. It’s billed as an upright sportsbike, rather than a sports tourer. There’s a naked version, the GSX-S1000, which is £9635 with ABS or £9135 without. As the GSX arrived as a new bike in mid-2015, there are no changes expected for 2016. SPEC Price £10,135 Engine 999cc dohc inline four, 4v per cyl, l/c Power 143bhp @ 10,000rpm Torque 78lb.ft @ 9500rpm Transmission 6-speed, chain Chassis aluminium twin-spar Front suspension 43mm…

The R version of the 690 Duke is £1300 more expensive, at £8999. You get an extra 2bhp, a 1kg weight saving and an Akrapovic end can. The R also has fully adjustable WP suspension, an upgraded Brembo front brake caliper, and smarter electronics including lean-angle sensitive ABS and traction control as standard. The seat height is taller, the adjustable rear-sets are higher for better ground clearance, and the suspension is firmer, so for many the standard 690 will be a better road bike. But if you want to shave seconds off your lap times (or just to own the ultimate single-cylinder Duke), the R is the bike for you.…

The 701 Supermoto is essentially KTM’s 690 SMC R with a fresh set of clothes. In this case Husky haven’t changed the WP suspension, which gives 215mm of travel up front and 250mm at the rear, holding 17-inch wheels wearing Continental’s street-based Attack SM rubber. The Supermoto’s gearing is taller than the Enduro, its footrests have rubber tops, and the street tyres seem to damp out some of the vibes. The Supermoto is smoother than the Enduro, especially on the open road where it cruised at 80mph. Chassis performance is excellent thanks to its light weight (145kg without petrol) and suspension control. With a 17-inch front wheel and plenty of leverage from the wide bars it steers exceptionally well. Even mostly damp roads barely put the Husky off. Its bolt-upright…

With a pillion Let’s be blunt: the Triumph is rubbish at taking a pillion. Thanks to the long rider’s seat, pillion tester Caroline found herself sitting over the front of the pillion seat to be able to hold onto the rider, who had slid forward to the back of the tank. There is nothing for a passenger to hold on to, and Caroline found the pegs high. The pillion seat is a little lower than some other sportsbikes, though Caroline still felt perched on top. Carrying the extra weight of a pillion makes the 675R pitch with every movement of the throttle. The preload on the rear shock could be increased to compensate for the extra load, except the bike doesn’t actually come with the tool to let you adjust…

Affordable yet reliable £800 runabouts 1990 Kawasaki ZZR600 This makes us feel old. The ZZR was a total weapon in the 1990s, even capable of winning the British 600cc championship under John Reynolds. Now, it’s more rocking chair than rocketship, so we can pick one up for a song. Expect the motor to still be in tip-top shape, but the chassis to be tired. MoT fails will be the swingarm bushes and brakes; style fail is the jellymould bodywork. Spec: 599cc inline four, 150mph, 195kg (dry), 99bhp, 47lb.ft Expect to pay: £700-£1000 1994 Yamaha XJ900S Diversion A far better bike than the lamentable 600, the 900 Diversion is a solid performer. The engine is out of the ark, an air-cooled eight-valve dohc four. It doesn’t rev much, but what revs…

WHAT IS IT? It has the steel spine frame from the outgoing Z750, but with added aluminium chassis members each side of the engine, joined via an extra steel tube across the front of the cylinders. The engine’s based on the old bike too, but with bigger bores taking capacity out to 806cc. The styling’s new, but more importantly so is the suspension – it’s streets ahead of the Z750’s crude effort. WHAT TO PAY £4000-£5500 Prices are a bit haywire at the moment, but this should net you a nice clean 2013 model, with average miles. There are far more standard Z800 models than Z800e versions. £5000-£6500 A used bike with some tasty extras, or a new or ex-demo model. Either way, dealers will be wanting to shift stock…

THE Z800 ATTRACTS a mix of younger riders and slightly older owners who are often coming back to bikes after a bit of a break. Rafael Scabora is among the former – at 33 he’s already had half a dozen bikes but this is the biggest so far: “I love the head-turning looks. You don’t see that many on UK roads, so it feels a bit exclusive. It’s fun to ride, it’s just a simple big engine, no gimmicks or anything not needed there. It’s literally a fun bike to fire up and ride away.” Brian Havers is at the other end of the age/experience range, having started on two-strokes in the ’80s and continued with sportsbikes since, until he got his Z800. “Even coming from sportsbikes you won’t be…

2013-2015 Z800 Full-power version, based on big-bored Z750 engine and heavily modified frame. Built in Thailand. Adjustable suspension, petal brake discs. ABS option. £4000-£6500 2013-2015 Z800e Peak power reduced to 94bhp – this means it can be restricted further to 47bhp for A2 licence holders. Otherwise identical to the standard Z800. ABS option. £4000-6500 2014-2015 Z800 Performance Edition Not a separate model, just a few added extras: pillion seat cover, tank pad, dark flyscreen and an Akrapovic exhaust. Nice, but £700 more than the standard model. ABS option. £4750-£6750…

2002-2015Honda ST1300 Pan European £3500-£10,000 125bhp 140mph 321kg 1261cc 90° V4 If you’re going on holiday, why wouldn’t you want to take a huge V4 with you? Fine, so the ST1300’s engine isn’t the most soulful of this legendary layout, but it is sumptuously smooth. It purrs, it thrums, it gurgles just a bit, but it never feels stressed - and why would it, with more power and torque than an air-cooled RT? Twin balance shafts give an air of imperious class that makes the BMW feel like it’s powered by a pair of lump hammers in a washing machine. With steering geometry closer to a CBR600RR than a Goldwing, the ST1300 is keener, sharper and more involving than you’d credit in a bike getting on for a third of…

MY JOURNEY THROUGH motorcycle clothing started with naivety. A Wolf leather jacket, padding for armour, collar and cuffs that didn’t shut properly and the stylish non-central main zip. Two pairs of jeans and some BMF-sourced gloves with metal studs on the palms, topped off with a Stormtrooper-style Bieffe lid – two sizes too big, naturally. Bad experiences as a courier steadily taught me what works and what doesn’t: draughts bad, windchill badder, leaking clothing baddest. Later I spent years preaching the virtues of safety and kit as an instructor. This also meant setting an example, so full textile kit and heated vests were the order of the day in winter and full leathers were great in summer. For a long time I had to at bike clothing as Personal Protective…

WE TESTED STANDARD tail packs in the June 2015 issue, when we found an impressively high standard and good variety of shapes and styles. But for some riders, a tail pack of 20 to 35 litres just isn’t big enough, especially for longer trips. There’s a school of thought that even for the longest trip, you don’t need hard luggage, with all the weight and bulk it adds. For a few nights away, riders who favour soft luggage could piece together a combination of tail pack, panniers, rucksack and tankbag, or they could go for one of these larger tail packs. Naturally some take up a lot of room, covering the rack and pillion seat, others less so. Some are waterproof, some need covers to remain dry. Some are sealed…

SO MANY PEOPLE are worried about riding in the rain - plenty won’t even get the bike out. That’s a shame, not only because bikes benefit from being ridden, but also because the skills needed for riding well in the wet pay dividends in the dry. Riders who keep riding in winter tend to look smooth, confident and in control when summer comes around. Here’s our five-point plan for beating the bad-weather biking blues. ACCELERATE SMOOTHLY Wet roads have less grip, so you want to make fewer demands of your tyres. This means allowing more time to accelerate and, rather than wrenching the throttle open hard, roll it on gently but firmly. This doesn’t mean moving at a snail’s pace, but it means taking an extra half-second when coming off…

Brake fluid transfers force from the master cylinder to the caliper pistons. It comes in two popular forms: DOT 4 and DOT 5.1. These two can be mixed but, confusingly, DOT 5 must not be mixed. Your manual or master cylinder lid should tell you which to use. The first two are most common and are hygroscopic, absorbing water from the atmosphere over time which lessens its effectiveness. Brake fluid should be changed every two years for best performance. Try not to shake up a bottle of brake fluid – this can introduce bubbles that will make it harder to bleed your system.…

#3 Reproofing your textiles Different textiles use different ways of keeping out water. Sooner or later, they all start to work less well. Whatever the technology involved in your jacket and trousers, the answer is always the same: clean them, then reproof them. We covered cleaning last month. Now for reproofing. Most decent riding gear relies on a membrane for its water resistance, and usually the process of cleaning it properly will be all that’s needed to get it back up to full strength. So why bother reproofing? Because that will restore your garment’s ability to repel water. The DWR (durable water repellency) treatment on the outer does the job of stopping water soaking in, making your gear heavy and cold; instead, the rain will bead and roll away. As…

Kev Raymond Features writer I couldn’t get to Motorcycle Live to see the bikes that will arrive in 2016 for myself. But RiDE’s handy round-up shows me everything I need to know about the key bikes from the comfort of my armchair. PAGE 56 Simon Weir Deputy editor Regular readers may have noticed my fondness for long-distance travel. The challenge is always the packing, but maybe a really big tail pack could solve my problems. But which one? I’ll check the test. PAGE 80 Matt Hull Technical editor For something so important, brakes can be surprisingly easy to service yourself. I’ve just overhauled the brakes on one of my bikes and now I’m showing you how to do it on your bike, step-by-step. PAGE 94…

The Cat and Fiddle run: the Peak District’s twisted king of controversy SOME BIKING CHALLENGES have a reputation completely at odds to their size, and the Peak District’s Cat and Fiddle run is a prime example. This 10-mile stretch of the A537 between Macclesfield and Buxton is one of the most celebrated and controversial strips of road on the British mainland. Named after the Inn that sits 515m high on the Derbyshire/Cheshire moors, the road is traditionally ridden west to east, the turns getting tighter and tighter before breaking out onto the high ground. Here things spread out a little, but there are still plenty of corners, dry-stone walls and sheep to catch you out before you descend into Buxton. Its dangers are well documented: between 2007 and 2011 there…

THOUGH THE SUPERSPORTS market is shrinking, the Triumph Daytona 675 is by far its largest seller, with sales split 50/50 between the R and standard 675. In 2006 the then-new three-cylinder Daytona 675 instantly stood out, next to not only the Japanese four-cylinder 600s, but Triumph’s previous TT600 and Daytona 600/650 too. With an extra 75cc giving it more torque than the 600 screamers, the Daytona 675 quickly carved itself a reputation for being a great road bike as well as incredible on track. Since 2011 the Daytona has also been available in an R version, with Öhlins suspension, a quickshifter and some carbonfibre parts. In 2013 it gained a new engine, with a bigger bore and shorter stroke, allowing a higher rev limit. Steering geometry was sharpened, weight lost…

The standard Daytona 675 costs £9599. The Daytona 675R is £10,949, but has around £2500 of upgrades, including the Öhlins forks and shock, Brembo brake calipers, a quickshifter, and carbonfibre fairing infills, hugger and mudguard. Official accessories fitted to our test bike include: adjustable rear-sets (£360); a slip-on Arrow exhaust can (£618); LED indicators (£140); a clear rear light unit (£72); and frame protectors (£130). A comfort seat (£98) is also available.…

1 MoT If you need your £800 bike to be a regular reliable runner, then an MoT fail is your worst nightmare. If the bike comes with a 12-month ticket, then cool. If it’s going to run out soon, then look for difficult-to-fix (and therefore expensive) fails. Things like pitted fork legs, damaged wheel rims or thinning brake discs are tough to fix on a budget. 2 INSURANCE You’ll be tempted to go for third-party-only cover, since the thing is almost worthless. But, perversely, that can be a more expensive option these days. Check out theft and comprehensive policies too. 3 ELECTRICS Older bikes don’t have the waterproof connectors of newer models, and years of moisture will have taken their toll. Some preventative maintenance will help avoid many breakdowns.…

Way better than the Z750. The engine is smoother, brakes are more powerful, and suspension is much better. The combination of a relatively heavy bike, relaxed geometry and a fairly aggressive riding position means you get decent ride quality without sacrificing too much fine control. Sportsbike junkies will find the steering a bit slow, but stability is built in to cosset inexperienced riders. The same goes for the brakes – enough power, but set up for feel rather than outright stopping force. And the engine? The full-power Z800 has a nice, linear power delivery which allows you to ride the torque most of the time, while still making a bit more power up near the redline to make it worthwhile giving it the beans now and again. Low gearing helps…

Dunlop Qualifier 2 £194 a pair Sticky as you like in the dry and seem to suit the Z800 well, sharpening the steering slightly and giving great feel from the front. Less good in cold/wet. Michelin Pilot Road 4 £221 a pair Good in the cold, very good in the wet, quick to warm up. Not especially hard wearing, and pretty pricey, but very popular all the same. Continental Road Attack £161 a pair Hard-wearing but not especially grippy, especially in the wet. Good grip and feel in the dry though, and cheap-ish. Prices are mail order. Add £6 per pair for P&P. Source SMD Tyres: 01942 604511…

Q Walking around Motorcycle Live at the NEC, I was struck by how few bikes – especially those that are new for 2016 – come with lower bodywork. I came of age with sportsbikes, and have more recently been riding sports tourers, but now I’m looking for something new and different, but I’m not looking forward to the prospect of having to give the engine a thorough clean after every ride. Any thoughts on how I can find a bike that I can spend more time riding than maintaining? A Although a lot of 2016’s new bikes are, at a glance, naked roadsters, plenty of them do have some kind of protection either fitted (Honda NC750S, for instance) or available as an official accessory (Triumph Speed Triple). And some full-on…

IT’S TAKEN ME a while, but I’ve finally embraced layering: base layer to regulate my temperature and wick away sweat; mid layer to keep out the wind; outer layer to keep out the rain and the cold, and to hold the armour and pockets; and an over layer for extreme rain. If the weather changes, you add or subtract layers and fiddle with vents. As they’re all thin and light, it’s easy to carry surplus layers ready to be used later if needed. Simplicity is really important to me. Layering may involve several items, but each item will be simple. Crude definition of simple: it requires just one action to do it up: buckles or zips, not both; poppers or Velcro, not both. Layering only really works if I’m not…

We assessed the bags on four criteria: 1) Ease of fitting. Some use mounting systems fitted to the bike, which the bag clips to. Others fit with permanent straps. How easy is the system to set up and use? 2) Stability. Is it secure on the bike? Is it intrusive when mounted on the pillion seat? 3) Loading. How easy is it to close the lid on a pair of boots, three days’ clothes and a wash bag? How easy is it to find the one thing you want in a large bag? 4) Showerproofing. Some have a waterproof cover - but do they leak if you had to ride for five minutes before fitting it? Surely the ones designed to be waterproof won’t have any problems with the same…

Kreiga R3 bumbag | Price £55 | Info www.kriega.com I USED TO loathe bumbags; couldn’t see the point. I’d stuff things in my pockets, happily demonstrating that nobody needed to strap a bag around their waist. Life got tricky on some bikes, with keys and phone digging into my thighs, while sporty leathers without pockets meant I always had to have a big rucksack. But hey, at least I didn’t need a stupid fake marsupial pouch… My attitude changed in 2010, when I killed two phones in quick succession. One was in my pocket when I was caught out in rain. The other died on a dry Alpine ride – the phone inspectors confirmed it was liquid damage: I’d drowned it in sweat. Yuck. Enter the Kriega R3. It’s made of…

Helmet: Keep the visor clear, inside and out. This will stop water building up on the outside and fog on the inside. This is important, even if you have a Pinlock fitted. If you don’t have a Pinlock, consider using an anti-fog treatment on the inside. Gloves: You need a good, waterproof set of gloves. Don’t throw them on a shelf after the ride: make sure you have some way of letting the outer material dry. Don’t place them on directly on a radiator though. If you’re commuting, consider taking a spare pair in case your main ones aren’t dry before you ride home. Boots: If they leak, they’re no good. If they don’t leak, let the air circulate around to let the outers dry. Textiles: A textile suit shouldn’t…

Many Ténéré Experience customers are owners of large adventure bikes who want to try the rough stuff without risking their £12,000-plus bike. Others have been considering buying a big adventure bike, and have used the experience as part of the decision-making process. For many riders, it’s their first time off road. The Ténéré Experience runs from April to October. As well as the XT660Z Ténéré and XT1200ZE Super Ténéré, the smaller, more agile WR250 is also available. The two-day course, the more popular, costs £450, with the single day priced at £250. If you bring your own bike the prices go down to £180 and £100. Lunch is included. Riding gear can be hired for £20. For more details, see www.yamaha-tenere-experience.co.uk…

Q On rainy rides I dread stopping to fill up with petrol because it always seems to result in rain getting inside my gloves (and inside my helmet too if I have to remove it). Any tips on how to avoid this? A It’s an eternal problem, and hard to avoid completely. Here’s what we’d do: 1) After stopping and getting off the bike, but before removing anything, jump up and down and shake as much water off yourself as you can. (Yes, you’ll look a bit stupid.) 2) Put your gloves down on something dry – maybe some of that tissue they usually have at petrol stations. 3) After filling up and paying, and immediately before putting your gloves back on, dry your jacket’s cuffs and your hands as…

The Z1000 engine is descended from the ZX-9R, comprehensively reworked with a larger capacity producing plenty of low and midrange drive. Hang on to the revs, though, and the motor really screams at the top end. Revised in 2013, the SX gained integrated optional luggage and a bigger pillion seat for the touring half of its brief, along with more power and torque, traction control and updated ABS, plus more powerful front brakes. It also got a resonator plate in the airbox to ensure a high-speed howl. For 2016 the SX will get a slipper clutch, with a lighter lever action, and will cost £9835. This Tourer model appears to be dropped from the range - you’ll still be able to buy the panniers and grab rails as extras, but…

YOUR GUIDE TO THE BEST UPCOMING BIKING EVENTS Are you organising a bike event? Tell us about it ride@ride.co.uk ONE MONTH AHEAD... Arenacross January 2-February 27, around the UK Cracking indoor family entertainment. Stunt-based off-roading at stadiums in Manchester, Glasgow, Belfast, Birmingham, Newcastle, Sheffield and London. Some incredible skill on display, plus lots of explosions and shouting. www.arenacrossuk.com Dakar Rally January 3-16, South America The continent-shifting rally raid this year confines itself to Argentina and Bolivia, Peru having opted out because of concerns about the likely impact of El Niño on the country. Unless you can afford to take a month off work and follow the competitors for 6000 miles, Eurosport and apps are your friends. Works teams from Honda, Yamaha, Husqvarna and KTM (two, in fact) will be competing.…

Q Next year I’m going to Andermatt in Switzerland. After four days there, I have two free days before I have to get to St Anton in Austria. Can I ride the Stelvio Pass and the Grossglockner if I stop somewhere along the way? A Yes, but it might involve two long days. Easy bit first: from Andermat head east to Chur, go south over the Albula Pass, then into Italy over Passo del Bernina to reach Bormio and the start of the Stelvio. From there we’d head into the Dolomites: head to Bolzano and pick up the SS241 over Passo di Carezza. Take the SS48 to Canazei and over Passo Pordoi to stop overnight in Arabba. For our second day, rather than going straight to Bruneck we’d take Passo…

Customising your 690 Duke couldn’t be easier. If you visit www.ktm.com and select Configurator, you can add any software upgrade and accessory that they offer for the bike, either individually or in the form of various packages. All prices are displayed when you select an option. Running costs will be practically identical to the current Duke’s, as insurance and road tax will be the same. As it’s a new bike, there are no special finance deals available but you can buy the Duke - as well as all other KTMs - on a PCP basis. The bike is also available in restricted A2 licence-friendly format. Service intervals are 600 miles, then every 9500 miles.…

Finance On-the-road price is £10,949, but Triumph’s TriStar (PCP) finance scheme is popular. A deposit of £2559.30 would leave 36 monthly payments of £115, and an optional final purchase price of £5710. That’s an APR of 6.9 per cent, based on 5000 miles per year. There are no special deals on hire purchase at the moment, so a £2500 deposit leaves 36 monthly payments of £277.80, at an APR of 11.9 per cent. Service intervals > First service 500 miles> Minor service 6000 miles> Major service 12,000 miles FUEL ECONOMY…

Dan Miles from DMP Motorcycles (www.dmpmotorcycles.com) in Surrey has worked on his fair share of sub-£1000 bikes over the years. “Even at this money, most Japanese bikes will still have really strong engines in them. They’re built to do mega miles, even if abused. But the chassis will be a different story. Things like brake calipers on older Kawasakis and Suzukis just rot, and on the ZZR the pad retaining pins seize in place, so you have to drill them out. I have an old ZZR600 in at the moment for new pads, and it’ll take two hours of labour to sort them because the pins are solid. “The old Tiger is a good choice - they seem to last well, although the carbs can do with fettling to get…

WHEN I STARTED riding, I just wore jeans, a T-shirt, a leather jacket off the market and a pair of 14-hole Doc Martens. In winter I got cold and if it rained I got wet. My kit was basic: it wore out fast, it was unprotective and uncomfortable. So now I want kit to be sophisticated: tough, protective and comfortable. I do still ride in jacket and jeans on sunny days, but now the jeans have knee and hip armour, with an anti-abrasion lining: I use the Bull-It SR6s, which come in a long-leg fitting; or a set of old Triumph leather jeans. My jacket has thick leather, triple-stitched seams and real armour, including a back protector. I wear the Halvarsson’s Seventy or my trusty eight-year-old Dainese Arizona jacket, with…

WE COVERED A good number of miles testing these tail packs. They hold so much and we wanted to test them properly with differing amounts inside. Almost all of them catch the wind when you ride at any speed. On our test bike, a Suzuki V-Strom 650, it was no great problem, nor did it present a handling issue any greater than you’d find by carrying a pillion. It is simply something you have to factor in to riding with these bags: the bigger the bag and the more you pack, the more the bike is affected. We also discovered that packing off the bike then loading works for some and not others – and vice versa. It depends how large the bag is, what shape it is and whether…

THE FACT IS, there’s room for improvement in everyone’s riding technique. That’s why we’ve teamed up with RoSPA to offer a trio of RiDE readers the chance to get some expert guidance, free of charge. Whatever your weak spot – maybe cornering, braking, confidence – or even if you don’t think you have a weak spot, you’ll find that RoSPA’s tutors can help you get more from motorcycling. Interested? Then drop me a line – email colin.overland@ride.co.uk – outlining your riding experience, your typical ride, and any areas you’re particularly keen to develop. It would be helpful if you could include a photo of you with your bike. Let us have it as soon as possible, and we’ll be in touch if we think we might be able to offer…

MATT SAYS... If your brake fluid is a couple of years old, replace it – a fresh bottle costs less than £10 and you’ll notice the difference. Pads and lines are more expensive, but don’t skimp on changing them if they look tired. WHAT YOU’LL NEED EQUIPMENT You’ll need a few specialist items on top of regular tools: socket set, torque wrench, needle-nose pliers, toothbrush, brake cleaner, G-clamp, spanner, small plastic bag, tape, rags and paper towels, gloves, a large syringe and a brake bleeding kit. HAVING ANYTHING TO do with the brakes on your bike might fill you with dread, but it needn’t be that way. In fact, it is essential to perform basic checks on your brakes on a regular basis – a lot more frequently than with…