Innholdsfortegnelse for June 2016 i BIKE

>> People have been banging on about the good old days since Adam and Eve left The Garden of Eden; ‘Apples? They don’t make ‘em like they used to.’ But it’s a fact that biking’s heroic and hilarious past is a critical part of what makes motorcycling cool in the 21st century. Triumph know the score. It’s what the brand new, stuffed with the latest technology but old looking Bonneville is all about. Barry Sheene was a great racer and the 40th anniversary of his first world championship is an irresistible excuse to raid the picture archive, but there’s more to the summer of ’76 than celebrity racers and their glamorous girlfriends. The second half of the 1970s were a golden age for motorcycling, when teenage communication wasn’t about Snapchat,…

‘Honda’s best-selling big bike in Europe now has the style to match and an improved dynamic too’ HONDA’S NCs ARE not performance bikes. Instead, the ‘New Concept’ twins are hugely versatile, peerlessly easy to ride and irresistibly useful. They’re successful too: the adventure-styled NC750X is Honda’s best-selling big bike in Europe with over 70,000 having rolled out of showrooms. And now it has the style to match and an improved dynamic too. Friendliness, practicality and low price can only compensate for a lack of sexy styling and performance to a point, so a major makeover is aimed at improving image and dynamism. New and more aggressively-styled bodywork now mimics the rest of Honda’s adventure range, and has natty LED lights front and rear. Paint is livelier, and there’s a colour-customisable…

Nicolò Bulega >> If you happen to catch a gangly Italian teenager with a luminous yellow number plate breaching the top three in Moto3 don’t adjust you TVs – Valentino Rossi hasn’t miraculously knocked 20 years off his age. However, Nicolò Bulega is a new national sensation in the making. And he doesn’t just resemble a younger version of the nine-time world champ, he has the speed to match. A member of the VR46 Academy, Bulega graduates to Moto3 as the reigning FIM Junior World Champion – a fierce formula to cut your teeth in – and is a regular on Rossi’s training ranch, where he’s been known to beat the great man and a host of other GP regulars. The long-haired prodigy’s performance in Qatar, where he finished sixth…

>> Where are you now? Camped out on the Orange River, which forms the border between Namibia and South Africa. I’m expecting to reach Cape Town in a few days. >> What’s the big plan? I’d always wanted to see more of Africa and after a bit of research, and passing my CBT, a motorbike seemed the best way to explore the continent. I left the UK on 4 November, 2015. Cape Town was my ultimate destination, but now I’m almost there I want to continue as long as the motorcycle and funds allow. After hopefully arriving in Cape Town next week I’m going to try and find work so I can ride back up the east side of the continent. I’m also raising money for the Malaria No More…

Heading the right way I am a head teacher but sometimes I get the chance to just sit and talk with my weans, and we like to talk about motorbikes. For the last couple of years the buzz has been Power Bands. ‘Has your bike got power bands?’ they ask. ‘My pit bike has power bands in every gear.’ The general theory is a power band is an additional extra, something that a lucky owner can bolt on and for a bit more cash you can have power bands in every gear. At that age, I was just as daft, getting very excited about a high lift cam on my Triumph Tiger Cub or a Ramair system on my Suzuki GT250. In my dad’s time he spoke with great reverence…

Kyrgyzstan sounds like it’s at the other end of the world, but it takes just ten days to ride there from the UK. Most of its population is nomadic and live in yurt camps. They’re a friendly lot, even if you don’t have any language in common – with a bit of gesticulating you’ll be invited in to eat and sleep with a local family. Getting there involves riding through Ukraine, Russia and flat Kazakhstan. The latter is vast and if you’ve got time, drop off the road and cut corners wherever you want. Some yurt camps are at 10,000 feet and get very cold at night. Sheep dung fires work well if you don’t mind the smell, but don’t last all night. Take a thick sleeping bag. You can…

>> Lincolnshire riding is Wolds riding.It’s the most scenic part of the county, and most importantly it’s not flat. It’s not a big area, but because of that it’s accessible. Beautiful rolling hills that you can attack from whatever angle you want. Most of the best riding takes place between Market Rasen, Louth and Horncastle. All three are proper traditional Lincolnshire towns with market squares with shops and places to eat. Whenever you visit there’ll be a market happening in one of them. And you’ll get people talking broad Lincolnshire. There’s a nice little twisty route south of Horncastle. It’s the B1183 and heads to Revesby through Moorby. But turn back after Revesby: there’s not a lot going on further down south. >> Willingham Woods is famous around here. There’ll…

AS A CRASH investigator I see quite a few accidents that have been caused by wheelies. The problem is even if people do lots of practice, it’s usually in areas that are quiet and controlled. But when they try to show off, it’s often not in similar circumstances and it only takes something to go slightly amiss for it to end in tears. The second problem is a wheelie will never ever go down well with the magistrate’s bench. It doesn’t matter how technically brilliant it was, you will always be seen as a lunatic. A well-timed, well-executed wheelie brings a smile to my face, but legally there’s no hope. Practicing wheelies will improve your control, balance and feel for the bike to a certain extent, but the third problem…

SUZUKI SV650 The chirpy SV650 (and its Gladius derivative) has been around for years but gets a big revamp for this year. So does it still cut it in 2016 and can it compete with Yamaha’s top value, super frisky MT-07. Due next month. KTM 1290 SUPER DUKE GT KTM’s crazy version of a sports tourer combines 160bhp potential of the Super Duke with better weather protection and panniers. But is it really a viable two-up tourer? Coming very soon. Hopefully. DUCATI XDIAVEL Possibly the best ‘cruiser’ yet built, bloody fast, great dynamics and stunning looks too. But what’s it like to live with on UK roads, can you actually persuade anyone to get on the back and how do you keep the bling blinging? It’s imminent.…

This month: Morini 500 Camel Other bikes ridden: Honda Africa Twin, Yamaha XSR700, Miles ridden: 354 NOTHING MATCHES THE euphoric high that comes from kick-starting a bike with a freshly rebuilt engine. The overhauled power unit of my Morini Camel was re-fitted into the chassis but there were issues. Kick, kick. ‘Did you re-join the block connector?’ Kick, kick. ‘I might have switched the transducer wires’. Kick, kick, brrrrrrrrm. Big smiles, deep joy and the smell of burning oil. With the engine running we check the ignition timing with the strobe light then, using a Morgan Carbtune vacuum gauge (£59, carbtune.co.uk), the carburettor slides and idle mixture screws are adjusted. I ride the bike across the yard, load it into the van and take it home, dreaming of summer trail-rides.…

‘Dad prefers the new motor but I like the look of his external oil lines and separate gearbox’ This month: Royal Enfield Classic Other bikes ridden: Yamaha XSR700 Miles ridden: 503 I’VE JUST GOT THE OLD GIRL OUT of hibernation. It turned over for ages but wouldn’t start, so I took the carb off and blew the jets out – I’ve owned it eight years and have had to clean the carb every spring. Still wouldn’t go, though.’ It’s a bright day in the Leicestershire lanes. I’ve brought our new Royal Enfield Classic for a ride with my dad, Les, on his 2006-model Bullet, and he’s introducing me to the finer details of Enfield ownership. ‘So I popped the carb to Charnwood Classics, who blasted every nook and cranny with…

John Westlake Ducati’s canteen >> There were just 140 workers at Ducati’s factory in 1976 cobbling the 900SS together. The workforce is now 1200 – a vision of precision. Rupert Paul Triumph Bonnevilles >> In 1976 I was told that Triumphs were great bikes for real men, but I discovered that they were oily heaps. Now they’re properly good. Mark Williams I remember when… >> In 1976 we had a long summer, empty roads and the first adventure trailie. All best viewed in a rose-tinted rearview mirror.…

The cuts begin Triumph T100 >> New models mean tasty savings on previous versions. With Triumph’s new Street Twin and T120 heading to dealers there are deals to be done on the old Bonneville. Fowlers (fowlers.co.uk) have ex-showroom T100 models for £6999, which is an £800 saving. We expect prices to slip even lower as the year goes on. Exclusive exotica Bimota SB8K >> Want delicious? Bimota’s SB8K Santa Monica uses alloy frame spars mated to carbon swingarm pivots, Öhlins suspension, a tuned TL1000R V-twin with 142bhp, OZ wheels and carbon bodywork. It’s just 175kg. Only a few were made. There’s a zero-mile 2006 bike at thebikespecialists.com for £19k – two grand less than a new Panigale S. Old-school deal Kawasaki Versys >> The PCP boom is great, making new…

GOODWOOD’S FIRST MIKE Hailwood Trophy race, for 250cc and 350cc GP bikes made between 1970-82, featured a packed grid of Yamaha two-stroke twins. The race was part of the car-dominated Member’s Meeting on 20 March. The bulk of the field were classic racing regulars but eight-time TT winner, 65 year-old Charlie Williams, brought along his own 1974 Maxton Yamaha 350. Charlie retired from racing in 1981 but still managed to finish a creditable sixth. Winner was three-time TT victor Ian Simpson. A rare Harley-Davidson RR250, later version of Walter Villa’s World Championship-winning machine from the mid-seventies, was also on the grid. The next Goodwood event is the Festival of Speed 24-26 June. Classic Bike Live >> An all-new event hosted by our sister titles Classic Bike and Practical Sportsbikes, Classic…

‘Hacked it up to make a mono rear and get the weight down to a very creditable 125kg’ JUNE 1978 AND the CX500Z arrives in town. With camchain tensioner issues. The problem is quickly fixed with a longer tensioner support, but what could have been bigger sales are compromised. The bike is good. A little heavy and a little top-heavy – but way comfy and easy to chuck around. Despatch riders adore it. Production stops in 1983. Most have been despatched to death, the remaining few are cared for by riders who value economy and dependability over being ribbed for riding a ‘plastic maggot’. Scroll forward to 2016 and the CX is achieving status as the new darling of the customising classes. It’s a V-twin – always a good start.…

Scotland, the summer of ’76 >> Troon’s biking gang from the summer of ’76 were; Robert Abbott, Clive Brown, Leslie ‘Coop’ Cooper, Gordon Dickie, Dave Hanvey, Grant Jacobsen, Stuart Jacobsen, Brian McCrory, Robert McFarlane, Gerry McGhee, Dave Merrikin, Dave ‘Smooth’ Patterson, Jim Paxton, Chris Read, Marco Rossi, Ian Smith. And apologies to any who’s names we’ve missed. It was a golden moment.…

BMW Rallye suit Price: £985 Info: bmw-motorrad.co.uk They say ‘For the start of the 2016 season, this globetrotter is available in the new colours blue/grey and black/red. The suit’s essential new feature is not immediately obvious: from now on the Rallye suit is made of the new material ProTechWool. This modern, sophisticated fabric – a mixture of synthetic fibre and technical wool – is highly breathable, dries quickly and has excellent thermal conduction properties. All in all, ProTechWool provides an improved climate and more pleasant wear properties. A carbon fibre finish compresses the fabric, giving it increased abrasion resistance. ‘The Rallye suit is essentially designed for off-road riding and lengthy tours in summer temperatures. But if the supplied waterproof insert is zipped in, the suit’s range of use can be…

This isn’t a limp brochure-style round-up of all the bikes you can buy. No, your guide is far more useful as it only contains bikes that we have tested, with comparable on-the-road prices plus data, expert opinion and must-know detail gathered by fussy full-time testers. We do hundreds of thousands of miles, dyno, datalog, weigh and answer the big questions. Don’t buy a new bike without reading this first. *FLATTERY-TWIN This isn’t a normal Harley. Built for the US Army, the XA750 had a flat twin so its protruding cylinders stayed cooler in deserts. Based on Germany’s reliable and low-maintenance BMW R71, it even had shaft drive. 1000 were made. Rival firm Indian tried something similar, turning their V-twin round so its pots stuck out. * ZX-10R TRICYCLE BSB hero…

This month: Ducati Monster M900 Other bikes ridden: Triumph Street Twin, Bonneville T120 Miles ridden: 233 I’M A NATURAL WORRIER, and I’ve become paranoid about having my Ducati Monster stolen. It’s not about the money, my bike isn’t super valuable, but it is my bike and I don’t want to lose it. I decided to fit a Bike Trac tracking device. It’s a unit the size of a cigarette packet that is hidden on the bike, power is fed from the bike’s battery, but it has an independent power supply too. If the bike is moved (for more than 20 seconds) without the ignition on you’ll receive a text and email. If you don’t respond, but movement continues, you’ll get a phone call and can then call the Old Bill.…

This month: Aprilia Falco Other bikes ridden: Yamaha XSR700, Honda Africa Twin Miles ridden: 387 BLUE LIGHTS IN MY MIRRORS. Pull over. Angry looking policeman points, shouts, pulls in front and leads me to a quiet bus stop. ‘What’s the speed limit on a dual carriageway?’ he asks. ‘70mph,’ I say. ‘And how fast were you going?’ I panic. Best be honest I reckon. ‘I’ve no idea, my speedo’s stopped working… It’s only showed 0 since I left Bike HQ and it’s not clocking up any miles either. He claims I was doing over 100mph which – if I’m telling the truth about my speedo (I am) – I can’t argue with. Didn’t feel anything like over a ton to me. He takes my details. Says I’m looking at a…

‘The CRF250 Rally is production ready’ Honda >> A hot-rod version of Honda’s CB1100 inline four appeared at Japan’s Osaka show. The CB Concept Type II features uprated suspension and brakes, and a new swingarm (below). Alongside the CB was the CRF250 Rally. The Dakar-influenced adventure version of the CRF has been shown wearing a concept tag, but in Osaka was labelled as a production prototype. Get a deposit down. Husqvarna >> The arrival of sharp Husky road bikes is now definite. The annual report by owners KTM says ‘for 2017 the next step will be realized with the arrival of the first two Vitpilen production models,’ implying the 401 (based on KTM’s 390 Duke) and 701 version (based on the 690 Duke) are both coming. The report also confirms…

WE’VE ALWAYS BEEN up for an adventure on Bike . And a good story. Two years ago it was Bike to Japan, riding a Suzuki V-Strom 1000 from Peterborough, back to the factory where it was made, 16,000 miles across Europe and Asia, through Azerbaijan, Tajikistan and Mongolia to Vladivostok, then to Suzuki’s plant in Hamamatsu. Last year we attempted Bike to South Africa, but only achieved Bike to mid-Africa. Our £1000 Kawasaki Tengai, bought unseen on eBay, smoked its way down through Morocco, Senegal and Nigeria before we abandoned it in Cameroon. Anyone want a used Tengai? Buyer collects. So what to do this year? As always, the best ideas come about in the pub where, after a couple of pints of Old Brewery bitter, someone realised that Suzuki…

‘To make better riders of us rather than off-road demons’ TRY BEFORE YOU buy, test before you invest and crash before you part with cash? Not everyone wants the expense or trouble of owning a dirt bike. Most ‘Try-Outs’ are geared up for any level of rider; fish around and you’ll find them spread right across the UK. This is a list of tried and tested options, but there are more – your local off-road dealer is the best resource for this info. You’ll need kit for dealer try-outs (helmet, boots and gloves minimum) but most others have kit available. 1 Kawasaki UK team up with Bike Safe for their training to make better riders of us rather than off-road demons – dirt bikes being the best way of learning…

‘Well developed sense of his own worth, a lot of talent and a big mouth’ AT THE START of the 1976 Grand Prix season Sheene was a cocky (and Cockerney) 25-year-old with a well developed sense of his own worth, a lot of talent and a big mouth. He’d almost won the 125cc World Championship in 1971, had won the FIM’s Formula 750 Championship in 1973 and had scored multiple UK race wins and titles. But he was more famous for crashing; injuries sustained in get-offs in ’71 may have cost him his first World Championship. And in ’75 the massive Daytona crash in March filmed by ITV turned him into a bigger name than another win at Snetterton ever could. He was racing again seven weeks after the huge…

>> The base-level Multistrada 1200 Enduro is £16,690 in red. Grey and white are £200 extra. The pack options are also extra but offer plenty of goodies. We like the ‘enduro’ pack plus we’d opt for the Termignoni silencer and aluminium water pump cover from the ‘sport’ pack. Urban Pack £853 >> Aluminium top case >> Tank bag and locking flange >> Cable for USB socket Enduro Pack £799.64 >> Bar protectors >> Lower chain guard >> Rear brake guard >> Radiator protector >> Oil radiator protector >> Auxiliary fog lamps Sport Pack £917.10 >> Billet reservoir caps >> Ducati Performance by Termignoni >> Homologated silencer >> Billet aluminium water pump cover Touring Pack £1493.60 >> Aluminium side panels >> Handlebar bag >> Heated grips…

The GS Trophy is not a race, insist its organisers. But it’s certainly a competition and an alternative way to see the world without quitting your job. It happens once every two years, each time in a new off-roading mecca, and comprises a week of tough and technical trail riding on nearly-standard R1200GSs – 114 bikes in total take part. The first event took place in Tunisia… South America and Canada have followed. 2016’s enduro-type event made use of the trails surrounding Thailand’s northern city of Chiang Mai. Routes like Day 3’s twisting 165 miles from Mae Hong Son to Mae Sariang were pretty tortuous. Team UK ended up sharing second place with Team Germany. Teams are chosen in regional qualifiers, and one team from each country makes it through…

‘There was a distant lorry so I panic-parked the bike, leapt off and went charging into the road’ AFTER TWENTY-FOUR HOURS drinking Three Horses Beer, getting my camera stolen, sitting over twelve hours on a minibus, exploding in some of the scariest toilets on the planet – and explaining to the Madagascan hire shop that I intended to ride their Honda round the island – they withdrew their offer and told me to bugger off. Their excuse? It was the rainy season and most of the roads were impassable. I tried countering that these were exactly the conditions their little SL200 was designed for – but I found myself sitting on the pavement, their door slammed behind me. An hour later I was in a little bike shop and had…

FIT A well-fitted open face helmet should feel similar to a full face, snug yet not uncomfortably tight – you need to feel the helmet’s liner touching all the way over your head. Measure round your head at the widest point to find out what size you need, but bear in mind not all helmets use the same fitting guidelines. For example, Davida helmets come up small so you may need a size up. Just like Shoei and Arai suit different types of head shape, so Davida suits a more narrow head. BRANDS Caberg, Scorpion and Spada have the entry-level market covered and a lot of their designs include decent features that the high end manufacturers have been slow to adopt. Of the premium manufacturers Arai’s X-Tend (£300) is a…

This month: Honda CRF250RE Other bikes ridden: Ducati Multistrada Enduro, BMW R1200GSA Miles ridden: 29 MOUSSE FIGHTING ISN’T a well-known sport outside enduro circles. And no, I haven’t spelled mousse wrong either. A godsend or a bastard, depending on your point of view, a mousse is a sponge tube you fit inside an enduro or motocross tyre, effectively an unbreakable inner-tube. They’re awesome because you can hit any rock, log or step as hard as you like and not worry about getting a puncture. Brilliant, so long as you never have to fit one. If you’ve the hands and forearms of a caveman and/or an expensive mousse-changer things are relatively pain-free but I have neither. The tyre can’t go on basically because of the pressure the mousse creates inside. You…

‘Ignition barrel stuck out like the sorest of very sore thumbs’ This month: Yamaha XSR700 Other bikes ridden: Moto Guzzi V9, Yamaha T80 Townmate Miles ridden: 98 THE ASCOT’S PROW – all barmy 1980s Japanese cubism – looked ghastly on the otherwise svelte, dirt-track stylee Honda but replacing it with summat prettier proved challenging. The 52° V-twin leaves no room under the tank for anything but the dual Keihins’ airbox, so Honda’s engineers stashed much of the electrical gubbins behind an ugly plastic panel and a horrid square headlamp, and with no obvious alternative, that’s where they’ve stayed. And after all the messing about, impinging on the goodwill of skilled craftsmen and general exhaustion of favours, you have to wonder if it was all worth it. Forever the nagging $64,000…