A2 Bike help pleeeeeease

[Panda1909]

Morning All,

So i'm looking into getting my first bike after passing my A2 test, but i am encountering a bit of trouble.

I'm 6'4 with a 34' inseam, and i'm struggling to find bikes which i fit on and fall into my budget, although in honesty, I haven't been to any bike shops to try any out, jut going on what more experienced riders have told me. (I'm going around a few bike shops in the near future, as soon as i can get a weekend off work).

I was looking for advice on what bikes people have found work for them?

I'm leaning towards adventure bikes as i like the higher seat and the wind protection. I learnt on a 650 Gladius and after an hour or so i would get horrendous cramp in my legs.

Also being 20 y/o living in Bradford and the Centre of Birmingham, insurance is a nightmare, so wondered if anyone has any insurance steals they are aware of? As at the moment for a 650GS, quotes are at around £2,500 to £3,000.

I have a budget of around £5k to £6k at a push (Inc insurance), so i'm not looking at something brand new, as the bike will definitely be hitting the deck a few times as I get used to riding, so dont want to get something I will be too heartbroken if it gets bumped and scratched.

Any advice will be much appreciated

[stevo123]

KTM Duke 390 are great machines but your best bet is to go to a dealer and have a sit on a few different bikes really bud.

[kgm]

Insurance is very personal. What works for one person won't necessarily work for another.

Buy a cheap second hand bike; that's the best way to bring down insurance costs.

Some bikes to look at (unsure which are restrictable - you'll have to find out):

Honda CB500X
Kawasaki Versys
Yamaha Tracer 700 (probably too new for cheap insurance)
Suzuki Vstrom
Kawasaki KLE 500
Honda Africa Twin (the earlier models)
Earlier F650

You might find some of the smaller looking machines might actually fit though.

[Rogerborg]

Have you considered a TDM?
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Biking is 1/20th as dangerous as horse riding.
GONE: HN125-8, LF-250B, GPz 305, GPZ 500S, Burgman 400 // RIDING: F650GS (800 twin), Royal Enfield Bullet Electra 500 AVL, Ninja 250R because racebike

[Panda1909]

[NJD]

[DrSnoosnoo]

Bradford. I'm adjacent to Bradford and the centre is an awful place to ride, all cars are bloody idiots, luckily you should have enough pace to get away from the pillocks, unless they're in their rented RS5 for the day.

Deffo spend less than 2k on your first bike while you generate some NCB; don't claim if it gets nicked.

As for bikes for a super lank ... I know of member here who is about 6 ' 4" who rides, or did, a GSXR1000. You need to sit on some bikes, despite your leg length you may find that bikes you may have written off may fit you quite well.
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Did have: '95 ZZR600 '83 CG125 '97 ZZR1100 '15 Hypermotard 821 SP Do Have: '10 ZX10R

[Panda1909]

[Kentol750]

Xt660 range of bikes may give you room. The xtz (tenerè) may be the most practical of them, it is a2 as standard.
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Some bikes.

[kgm]

[Kentol750]

If your insurance quotes are that much, you'd be better off looking at a new postcode.
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Some bikes.

[Panda1909]

[Kentol750]

Honda 650 vigor
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Some bikes.

[Panda1909]

Thanks guys, I'll keep the suggestions in mind when I go looking around

[Teflon-Mike]

I'm 6'2"-ish with 34" inseam.... I ride.... a 125! Oh, and a CB Seven-Fifty.... with three-inch over-length shocks..... I chose, or should that be it chose ME, my VF1000, oooh, twenty odd years back, when I sat on it, and it was the only darn thing that actually 'fitted'... curiousely a 32" seat WASN'T what did it, but a long 'reach' to the bars.... Which I mention, because it is pretty much the case, you just HAVE to kiss a lot of frogs and see what fits; you can't do it on the numbers and you can't do it on other folks reccomends... they dont have to ride the ruddy thing!

And blow the pre-conceptions.... adventure sports and real dirt bikes, because they have high saddles in the show room... mean squat... The Jockish Hobbit FFS rides one, and he's knee high to a haggis!

When it comes to off-roady type bikes, the tall seat is deceptive. They have tall seats because the bike's tend to be jacked up on a foot of suspension.... which squashes as soon as you sit on the thing..... at which point how far your bum is from the floor depends how heavy you are, and how scrunched your legs, on how far from the seat the foot-pegs are... and for off-roadie ground clearance, the seat to foot-peg distance tends to be shorter than on a regular road bike; they lift the pegs as well as the saddle! More influential, I think is that wide off-roadie bars stretch you out side-ways which makes the 'reach' to them seem longer than it actually is, and again, is deceptive.. and then we get to seat widths, and off-roadie stylie tend to have narrow saddles which dont spread your legs so much and make the reach and stretch seem smaller... helps shorties, does not mean better for lankie-gits like uz!

To wit... try-before-you-buy, and DONT assume anything....

Other-ways-about, so many shorties, and particularly woman, err towards cruisery things because of the 'low' seat height, and again; works backwards; the low slung saddle, doesn't mean that you can flat-foot both sides, when you have a sofa for a saddle, complete with buttons under your bum, and foot-pegs are in the next county some-where infront of the engine... oh.. and bars so wide, lift you out the sofa, and make you lean the wrong way to turn! It IS all perverse4 and not necesserily as looks would suggest.

CB Seven-Fifty and three-inch over-lengths? This does NOT make it any more comfy.... it actually sits so high that the center stand barely lifts the back wheel off the floor, while the foot-pegs are still as far from the seat... actually they aren't.... Little bother 'helpfully' had the notion to move it on the drive so step-dad could take the dogs out... err... yeah.... he'd done his See-Bee-Tea... on other little bother's moped.... I DONT think he expected it to weigh 200Kg.... so he dropped it and smashed the foot-peg hanger..... in the repair.... I made up new hangers and shifted pegs back about two inches and up one.. We use a pair of axle stands and moved them around until I was sort of comfy... then THAT'S where we welded the new pegs! Point is 'Adaptation may be required'... and not necessarily because of your length of leg.. as much as anything, that was done to suit the way I rode the thing, and getting boots out the way of tilting tarmac!!! But still...

As said, I also ride a 125 Super-Dream... its fun to rag the crap out of something..... and that is very much smaller and incredibly neutral, and to be brutally honest as far as the erganomics go, it is probably as comfy as the Seven-Fifty.. which begs suggestion that NEUTRAL ERGONOMICS WORK!

I dont much like sports bike on the road, and erganomics of them are even more perverse than most offerings, and certainly not well suited to door frame butters... They tend to have pretty short wheel-bases, which put the bars very close to the bum-slot, which itself tends to not be very comodiouse, and then they stick the foot-pegs some-where that sticks your heels in your arse crack.. B-U-T again, thats on pre-conceptions.... some are not 'so' bad....

But, if you want to start from generalities, the conventional street-bike come tourer, 'style' is the most neutral, and your best starting point, and as likely to fit as well or better than anything you 'think' on first glance, and flat-foot on the show-room, might fit better or worse... like I said, you have to kiss a lot of frogs.

REMEMBER... you buy a bike to ride, not straddle outside the wine-bar... how far bum-be-from-floor matters not a lot... when riding, what matters is bum to foot-rests, you only put feet down when stopped, and IF you remember your CBT, and the 'Safety-Position' ONLY ONE, the left.. right should be covering or applying back brake.. how far away the floor of little consequence, you just tilt more or less when at rest... as for flat-footing to manouver the thing? Again, CBT advice GET OFF!!!! No bike between you rlegs you have best balence, support and leverage over the ruddy thing; you have absolutely NO need to 'paddle'.. thats something you do at the beach, not on a motorbike! It's an tendancy made ever more common by DAS and re-training car drivers used to clambering in the seat, starting the engine and THEN starting to think about maneuvering... but... not the best way about stuff on a bike.... maneuver bike where you want it first, THEN get on the dang thing and start the engine! Tiny bit of technique and discipline, and all becomes 'easy' and worrying about seat-heights some-what irrelevant....

SO.. buy to ride, not straddle outside the wine bar... feet to floor matters very very little, bum to pegs far more, THAT is how you sit when actually riding.

WHICH widens the remit rather a lot, to almost anything... and if you have the reach that matches your leg length, as neanderthals like me do, almost anything will seem a tad on the tight-side... but, about the ONLY thing I can truly say was horrible to try ride because of my size was a Honda MT125 over-the-counter GP bike.... it was so diddy I was folded double to sit on it, and so narrow I couldn't get my knees behind the effin fairing! (and I was only 15 at the time!!!!) I actually found a mini-moto more comfortable and easier to ride!!!!

So, expect to find finding a 'good' fit hard, and don't sweat the small-stuff.... In thirty odd years of this game, I have SERIOUSELY had more hassle finding water-proofs that... first are... and second are even close to a decent fit! I either end up with a trouser leg that stops somethere just under my knees and a huge gap to my boot-top when I lift my feet to the pegs... OR I end up with a marquee some-where around my balls and half a mile of wasted waist flapping in the breeze! THIS sort of thing, I have found far more vexatiouse, finding trousers that 'fit', than bikes that do!

Oh.. and the term 'Big-Bikes' is something of a misnomer..... the only thing that is guaranteed to be bigger is the size or cumulative size of holes, where fire happens in the engine.... everything else? Well, designed like off the peg cloths around 'standard' sized people... a pair of 26" wide handlebars are fitted to a bike whether its engine is 50cc, 500cc or 1500cc.... just because the engine displacement if bigger doesn't mean anything else has to be... so again, dont work on preconceptions, nebulouse ideas about how comfy something 'should' be from numbers in the books... go try for size and expect a lot of frog-kissing along the way, and likely you will STILL end up with something not as 'ideal' as hoped... it's not about the stats, its about the compramises, and unfortunately, what you cant get from a dressing-room-trial-fit, is much if any idea how comfy it will be weaving through traffic sticking boot down every traffic light, or NOT, sat in the same possition for a couple of hours when touring or tripping.... then its not just about size and shape and fit, its about wiggle room, and we are back to water-proof over-trouser analogies... you takes your pick, pays your money, and takes your chances... nothing will be comfy every where, all the time... this is biking, you WILL: get numb, you will get achie, you will get cramped, you will get sore.... its just a question of how much, and how often... and the numbers will NOT reduce that much if any, no matter how great a fit you get at the go-get.....

But start with your regular Street-bikes like a Divvy or Bandit or Fazer etc.

On the insurance issue? Get old. Its about the only thing that's ever worked for me!!! Has little else to commend it I'm afraid.. but cheaper insurance is one recompense!!!

Picking older, less valuable bikes will help; picking stuff that's not so trendy, more, and there are a couple of holes in the insurance groupings; 250ish bikes tend to be cheaper then 125's, the 750 'class' tends to be cheaper than both 1000 and 600's, but that is as much down to the untrendie-ness of bikes in those sectors I think; otherwise there's no good answer, or suggestions; you just have to spend a lot of time on Go-Compare or the like running the numbers on different alternatives... again, more leg work, no easy answers.. and if there was... there wouldn't be for long, and ins-co's would plug it as soon as folk cottoned on!

Hope.... that helps... maybe... welcome to the wonderful world of biking.... enjoy the adventure... and if you get through without being skinned or fleeced... tooooooo much..... chalk it up as a success!
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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?'

[Panda1909]

Thanks, that was a lot of information to take on but very helpful, thank you