Recommend me a 125... For the missus.

[Redoko]

Chantelle, my other half has always been into bikes, she drives at the moment for practicallity but plans on taking her CBT soon and eventually her full license.

She's into classic style bikes, not to say she shouldn't consider a sporty one or crosser, she would just prefer.

So BCF, what 125 would you suggest she learn on which she can also enjoy?


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"Let's face it, this is not the worst thing you've caught me doing."
Sudika Sportsman SK50QT > Gilera DNA50 > Honda CBR125 RW7 > Kawasaki Zephyr750 > Suzuki GSXR600 > Honda Hornet CB600F '51

[Gazdaman]

I've been after an Aprilia RS125 for my mrs for a while.

But on an easy-to-ride frame of mind, something like a CG125 would be best.

Gaz

[pepperami]

I cant comment on the latest whizz-bang strokers, but what about these?
YRB 125.
SR125.
CG125
Vereado 125 (honda)
____________________
I am the sum total of my own existence, what went before makes me who I am now!

[dextersaurus]

CG125, definately.

Or even a CBR125, tad faster and more protection, but just as easy to ride as a CG.
And given that she'll be (i'm assuming) under 5'10, she'll not look like a twat on it (like i did on mine... )

Thinking about getting one up for my other half, in exactly the same position as you

Dunc

[ollieholt]

+1 for the cg125

awesome value for money. bullet proof cheap to insure you need me to carry on?

you can buy one for 500 quid and sell it for that 2 years down the line.

i made a proffit on my cg125 that i bought to learn on. had it two months made £150
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< This? Well this is just a day brightner.

[Redoko]

Cheers for all the ideas guys.

She's planning on selling her car to help fund her bike, at some point we'll go to George White's and sort her out a lid at least.

This is the kinda style she likes, she loves the AJS DD125e.

https://www.bikerdean.co.uk/userimages/DD125NEW.jpg

Anything similiar to this she could get?

Her budget is around £1,500.


____________________
"Let's face it, this is not the worst thing you've caught me doing."
Sudika Sportsman SK50QT > Gilera DNA50 > Honda CBR125 RW7 > Kawasaki Zephyr750 > Suzuki GSXR600 > Honda Hornet CB600F '51

[dextersaurus]

Honda shadow - better reliability and a better name.

https://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Honda-Shadow-VT-125-Learner-Legal-Proper-V-Twin-Custom-/250676046617?cmd=ViewItem&pt=UK_Motorcycles&hash=item3a5d74eb19

https://cgi.ebay.co.uk/HONDA-VT125-SHADOW-125-LEARNER-CUSTOM-CRUISER-COMMUTER-/130414744779?cmd=ViewItem&pt=UK_Motorcycles&hash=item1e5d5314cb

They sell for £1k-£2k so finding one in the bottom half of hat won't be hard

Dunc

[MonkeyKnuckle]

Kawasaki Eliminator 125?

https://image.motorcyclistonline.com/f/15280946/122_0903_04_z+1997_kawasaki_eliminator_600+right_side_view.jpg
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MKGaming.com
2000 Honda CBR600F - Sold! 2003 Honda CBR600RR - Current!

[dextersaurus]

Also got the honda rebel...

https://cgi.ebay.co.uk/1997-HONDA-CA-125-REBEL-/190424869389?cmd=ViewItem&pt=UK_Motorcycles&hash=item2c5634ea0d

https://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Honda-Rebel-chopper-cruiser-125cc-/150442817821?cmd=ViewItem&pt=UK_Motorcycles&hash=item230717391d

Bit cheaper than the shadow, but look kinda the same, might be more suited for her due to it's size though.

[Redoko]

[Doovy]

[Carl_steveo]

I heard the name Chantelle and my first thought was she needs a bike thats pink and with enough room on the back to shag and keep hair straighteners.
____________________
Current: Honda Nsr 125
Live: Sunderland
Luke "cant be arsed to read your post, but suck my balls anyway."

[neil.]

https://vita.mn/images/tab/scooters/1.jpg


____________________
CBT February 2008 | A2 June 2008 | Yamaha YBR125 (written off) | Honda CBF125 (current)

[P.addy]

NO ONE HAS ASKED FOR PICS?!

Pics will help us choose Redoko, you know that!
Obviously need to check her dimensions

[Teflon-Mike]

Snow-Tigeress had an AJS Regal raptor DD125E..... I'm sure there was more to the name!

It was not a bad bike, but ill-balenced for a newbie, and HEAVY! Weighed more than a Moto-Guzzi V50!, dog slow 55mph flat out, and the depreciation was horendouse, even tho she bought 2nd hand!

She's now gone for one of these:-

https://i178.photobucket.com/albums/w269/teflons-torque/Little%20Dreams/histoTD.jpg
(Original Brochure shot)

Mid eighties Honda CB125TD.

Engine is what they 'based' the copy in the raptor in, but its better built, & more powerful.

Bike is well speced too. Old fasioned street-bike looks but not SO mundane as a typical commuter. Its bigger, more comfortable, and a genuine 70+(a little bit!) mph.

Riding possition is neutral, and very manageable (Light! a LOT lighter than the cruisers, and probably half what a Raptor weighs!), as well as confidence inspiring.

And the handling is very 'nimble'. Has pretty stiff frame and mono-shock suspension, and slightly better damped forks than the GC and its ilk, as it was Hondas 4T 'sports-bike' in its day lining up against RD125LC's.

Most impressive features though are 12v electrics, electric start and a VERY powerful twin piston caliper front brake.

HOWEVER!

This is the real attraction..... DONT SELL THE CAR!

These things are real 'underdogs' in the e-bay arena. A good one, with long T&T in tidy condition, and mechanically sound, can be picked up for well under HALF what you are looking to spend on the Raptor, £750, a 'good' one about £500.

If you are prepared to take something a litle care worn, or needing work, you can get something quite useful for under £500.

I just picked this one up:-
https://i178.photobucket.com/albums/w269/teflons-torque/Little%20Dreams/XLD02_01.jpg
Taxed & Tested, low miles and VERY VERY tidy, £250, needing a new head-gasket.

OK, I'm a bit biased.... when I was a teen-ager, I didn't give them a second glance, they just weren't 'cool', they were the bike your Dad chose for you; but twenty years on, NOW I know why!

A very capable litle machine, VERY well suited to the purpose you have in mind. They were a favoured 'girlie-mount, back in thier day, beouse of the electric start and the 'sensible' propper bike styling.

AND a real bargain, if you hunt out a good one.

BUT, check over candidated carefully. Neglect sees te rear suspension siezed or worn, and that is an expensive PITA to sort of its sloppy or solid. Head-Races often dont get adjusted, and fork seals go, but they are easilu sorted for about £50.

Motors are pretty tough, only real niggles with them tend to be carbs that need cleaning and balencing, and ignitions that need the timing checking properly, the procedures for both vexing many newbie owners... get a Haynes though, and easily sorted, as are the valve clerances and timing chain adjustment.

Bit of tinkering and these motors HOWL! 16,000rpm from an 'old' air-cooled twin!

Anyway, thats the bike to get my vote, and the reason why, AND I have put my money where my mouth is, fronting the tigeress the dosh to get hers, and following suit, getting one for me to go oyt & play on with her too! (Ah! aint love grand! His & Hers Super-Dreams! int eye sopppy!)
____________________
My Webby'Tef's-tQ, loads of stuff about my bikes, my Land-Rovers, and the stuff I do with them!
Current Bikes:'Honda VF1000F' ;'CB750F2N' ;'CB125TD ( 6 3 of em!)'; 'Montesa Cota 248'. Learner FAQ's:= 'U want to Ride a Motorbike! Where Do U start?'

[Mord]

For you, your Mrs, mum, cousin, dad, aunt, uncle, grandma and any possible relatives in all combinations..

first bike for all of you --> CG125

[Blackwolf]

[pepperami]

[Inkognito]

The yamaha Virago 125 would be a good choice if that's the style she's into.
You can pick one up fairly cheap and they keep their value really good.


https://images01.olx.fr/ui/1/03/68/1719568_1.jpg

[Teflon-Mike]

From when I was instructing, I have to advise against buying a bike on 'style', particularly a cruiser, but often as applicable to sportsbikes.

'Standard' street-bike / commuter-bikes with an upright riding position TEND to be far more 'neutral' and easier for more people to get along with.

Sportsbikes can be cramped and suffer restricted steering lock, while cruisers tend to have very 'lazy' steering geometry and longer wheel-bases.

Sit a cruiser and its low seat and low center of gravity feel like it OUGHT to be more manageable, but on the CBT course and on the road, often proves not so, particularly for persons of shorter stature, who are atracted by the low seat height.... like girls.

Snow-Tigeress suffered quite badly on the Raptor, and following her about, trying to fathom what it was about the bike that to ME seemed a very tidy, useful little tool, apart from being so sluggish, that made it hard work and less than confidence inspiring for her.

Eventually sussed it. The low seat and high wide bars, meant her short arms (she's not exactly tiny, she's 5'5") was stretched to the bars.

The 'lazy' geometry and long wheel-base then meant that to turn, particularly at slower speeds, she had to turn the bars further to get the same angle or 'steer'... made worse bu the wide bars, meaning not only did she have to twist the bars a lot more than on a 'regular' bike, she also had to physically move the grips further forwards or back.

Now, imagine, to 'follow' the bars, as she conered, she would slightly lean forwards to accont for the distance she had to move them, BUT not just forewards but also sideways, leaning OUT of the corner, to stay with the further end of the bar....

So, low CofG, bike tips in to a corner nicely, but the rider has to lean perversely, off-balencing the bike to get the steering affect.....

Makes what SHOULD be a 'stable' bike 'wobbly', and not confidence inspiring.

(We did make it 'better' for her, by fitting lower risers, and lower narrower bars, and pushing the grips about 1 1/2" further in, leaving bar out the end like an end weight, but the 'reclined' seating position and forward foot-pegs, still made it more awkward than it need be)

Looking back over the years watching folk wobble through the cones on the play-ground, the ammount cruisers have to be tilted to make them steer, and the amount of steering effort demanded, always made me think they were 'unwieldy' even for some-one that fotted the bike..... but having studied how Snow struggled, makes me very cautiouse of reccomending one to ANY-ONE, particularly a girl, who might be similarly short of arm.

They seem a good idea, but dont ALWAYS work quite as well as hoped.

And its NOT that I'm anti-cruiser. Had plenty of people, lads and lasses, turn up for training on 'inapropriate' bikes, bought for style, that really haven't made the learning process any easier for them.

Trail-Bikes, should be pretty manouverable, but again, wide bars and perverse weight shifts can make them wobbly, even if the rider can get thier feet flat on the ground both sides with the high seat height, and as said, sports-bikes, with cramped riding position, and restricted lock, often make life hardwer work too.

Had a girl on a Derbi once; brand new, delivered to the training ground by the dealer before she arrived, bought becouse she thought it looked 'pretty'...... horendouse throughthe cones, she just couldn't get enough steering lock to get through them......and she actually crashed it into a wall during the lunch-break, trying to practice!

And there was a lad, who was about 6'3" if not more, turned up on an 'old' Suzuki RG125 'Gamma'. TINY little bike, it was a 'big-bore' 80, in effect! Credit to him, he'd found it in the back of a garage, paid £100 for it, and fixed it up to do his training on, on the cheap, and he did pass his CBT, but, boy was it a laugh watching him try and do the cones! Elbows and knees stuck out all over the place! again, HARD WORK.

And at the end of the day, THAT is what this bike is about; learning and getting your test passed on. Once you have that in your back-pocket, THEN you can choose whatever kind of bike suits your taste, and live more readily with the compromises, NOT having to perform for an instructor or examiner.

On the Chantelle topic..... Oh! that brought back memories! Wasnt going to mention them, beouse they were off topic; but every-one else has so what the heck!

It was 1992, and I had woken up in my student digs to find my bike missing from outside the house.

I wandered about for the best part of an hour, looking like Arthur dent in a pair of pejama bottoms and a dressing gown, calling ALL of my mates every name under the sun, waking them fro thier drunken stupors demanding to know where they had hidden it! We'd been out on the razz the night before.

Eventually I concluded that none of them was culpable. They were all far to stupified. And an idea dawned on me. One of the lads we'd been out with had left his car at our house before we went out. Idea we all cought the bus into town, and got a taxi back. He could then sleep off the booze, and drive home.

Neither he, nor his car were in evidence! BUT, I remembered that I had had the taxi fare! and at the end of the evening, the girl I'd been with sluffed me off. And when I went to go find them, HE was no-where to be found....

I immagined him, peeved we'd left him behind; walking back in the small hours of the morning, sobering up, and deciding to get me back for his walk, shifting the bike some-where.

So I went over to the phone box over the road. Red thing. Used to see them everywhere. What we used before we all had mobiles. ANYWAY, called him up, and he pleaded inoccence, vehemently, and eventually drove over, and took me to the cop-shop to report the thing stolen.

I was, as you can immagine, rather glum. So he suggested heading back to his for a party he had planned. (he lived with mummy & daddy, but they were away for the week-end)

The party was NOT lively. Three people turned up. One of them his next door neighbour, whose sole interest was trying out all the sound effects on his Dads surround system sterio.

The other was a lad he'd known from college, who had two topics of conversation; his Nova GTE and his tropical fish, and his giggly girlfreind, 'Chantelle', who flirted with me ruthlessly all evening infront of her other half!

By about ten o'clock, a few more people had turned up, but I had pretty much polished off a pack of Newcastle bown, a bottle of gin, and was looking for other enhebraints.

Chantelle had been joined by a shcoolfreind who was equally giggly, and the boyfreind had slumped on the sofa.

I was sat in the hall, and to no-one inparticular, having failed to find booze, sighed, '"Whats it all mean"

To which Chantelle and giggly school freind, immedietly spun-round and announced in 'sterio'.... "Thirty Two"

I looked at them quizically for a few moments...... "Err if thats a reference to the works of Douglas Adams" I suggested, "I think you mean 'FORTY' two"

They looked at me, like I was daft for a moment, then chantells said, "Well, according to Hitch-Hikers guide to the galaxy, the meaning of life, te universe, and EVERYTHING is 'thrity two'"

I looked at her for a moment, thinking 'daft bimbo', as this was long before 'blonde' jokes became popular, but for which she was probably a prototype, and considered informing her that HHGTTG was written by Douglas Adams...... But I had no need.

The 'host' of our sware was THE biggest Hitch-Hikers 'geek' alive, with ALL the original broadcasts taped off radio and neatly labled....

His ears had pricked up at the mention of the series, and jostled through the throng, to discover the conversation.

Chantelle introduced me to her freind.... I forget her name now, as, I had at that moment Chantelles.

Our host imedietly interrogated us over the mathmatical confusion and sprang to his rack of cassettes, turned the music off, and followed by the freind, started searching through to find the EXACT moment at which the answer to life, the universe and EVERYTHING is revealed.....

Chantelle looked at me expectantly.....

I looked at BOTH of her blearily, tried to think of something apropriate to say..... and gave up.

Blurting out, "Sorry, I dont remember YOUR name.... I just recall it was something fucking pretentiouse2

At which point she grabbled me by the arm and dragged me upstairs.

She was no-where to be found the following morning..... but the boyfreind, staggered into the kitchen while I was searching for orange juice...... and asked if I had seen her........

The police found the bike the following day..... it was rather badly mangled having been crashed through a security fence when the twocker spotted a police car!

Never sw the one with a fucking pretentiouse name again..... though I did have to endure the boyfreind singing Kareoke, when my mate decided to invite him out to 'cheer him up' after she dumped him!
____________________
My Webby'Tef's-tQ, loads of stuff about my bikes, my Land-Rovers, and the stuff I do with them!
Current Bikes:'Honda VF1000F' ;'CB750F2N' ;'CB125TD ( 6 3 of em!)'; 'Montesa Cota 248'. Learner FAQ's:= 'U want to Ride a Motorbike! Where Do U start?'

[Teflon-Mike]

[N cee thirty]

basically get a cg ?
____________________
'00 Aprilia RS50 > '92 Honda CG > '99 Yamaha Fazer > '91 Yamaha RXS > '79 Suzuki X5 > 01' Honda Cg > 07' Honda Cg > 82' Kawasaki Z200 > suzuki gsxr 400 gk73a > honda vfr 400 NC30 Mod 2 Passed 09/06/2011

Jewlio Iglesias wrote: I actually did vote BNP once

[Inkognito]

Teflon Mike you really do have a story for everything don't you?

[Carl_steveo]

He's sort of like warped, except I can actually endure reading what he says. Plus his storys don't invovle trannys and I doubt they are made up either.
____________________
Current: Honda Nsr 125
Live: Sunderland
Luke "cant be arsed to read your post, but suck my balls anyway."

[dextersaurus]

Mark is an interesting fellow i have to say, he sent me a picture message today of the biggest bogey i have ever seen, and i then sneezed and faceplanted an oil pan full of oil. He also invited me to come and have a threesome with him and his girlfriend.

For these storys from TM i have to sit comfy, quite an interesting read though

STILL! BACK ON TOPIC!

Have a look at an SR125, they are cheap as chips and they are as good as any bike, plus it's a single so it won't be too bad on fuel compared to all these vtwins.

Dunc