What are big Adventure bikes for?

[WIBO]

I am pushing 55
I have had over the years many Motorcycles since pasing my test in 1980

This Is an issue that has been mentioned many a time.
We are all different, man goes round world on a Yamaha R1
I have toured Europe on a XT12 S10, Triumph Tiger 955i, a mate was on a 2006 Fireblade and never complained once.

so the age old question..... what is an adventure bike????

I was once told on here... the bike you ride..


I get it but some on here don't




BB

This....

An anecdote...

I was sitting on the window sill at the front of my house,in between moto's and having a beer with an American GS BMW friend, who was also in the same situation.

I live on a renowned tourist route and more or less every day there's heaps of moto's that ride by come the summer season. I love it. From Germans in May to all others from over Europe tailing off come October.

An asthmatic Fantic Cruiser type bike???...rode up the hill past my house......well designed with a round down tube frame in keeping with the engine...some one will ID it no doubt....d'oh! ....can't for the life of me remember the model....anyhooo it rode by on Italian plates with some light luggage and my friend subsequently ridiculed it, after it had passed......


My response verbatim?

"He has a moto........we don't"





Yes, we all like to banter.......but turn up on any bike to ride with me, and you'll ride with me...(except BMW's and Hardleys....you'll get laughed and pointed at. :whistle: :whistle: )


Tongue......cheek......one of, for the sensitive pussy's :laugh: :laugh:

It's about me meeting up with you for a blether , not your moto.








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[SteveW]

A genuine question since I've never ridden an adventure bike,but doesn't sitting bolt upright put more weight down through your arse? I find my sports tourer comfortable even after 9 hour days with my weight spread between my shoulders and bum. :unsure:

Your sports tourer would be a pain In the arse navigating the poor minor roads out East.
I like to get away from the busy major roads and explore the smaller routes.
These roads are hard work and slow going on a conventional touring bike.
With an adventure bike it's nice to stand on the pegs and use the extra travel suspension and larger wheels on rough roads plus your legs are like another shock absorber.
The higher, upright riding position allows you to look ahead and pick your lines on rough roads.

I wasn't slagging off adventure bikes that's why I said it was a genuine question.I'm still happy to tour western Europe and have no need to pretend I will be standing on the pegs but how many adventures bike riders would say the same if they were honest with themselves? Obviously it depends on every individual but I don't see adventure bikes as being the Holy Grail for touring western Europe.

I'll try again, I'm saying this.........
Smaller off-road style bikes are great at dealing with dirt/gravel/extremely damaged tarmac, but not so good at 1000's of miles of motorways/autobahns.
Sports Tourers are great at 1000's of miles of motorways/autobahns and touring Western Europe's generally well maintained road surfaces, not so good on mile after mile of broken potholed Eastern European back roads.
"Big Adventure Bikes" do a bloody good job of carting you and your kit 1000's of miles across the autobahns to get to places like Eastern Europe, then when you get there and stray off the well maintained tarmac, they do a bloody good job of dealing with crappy broken road surfaces.
If your travels don't involve knackered tarmac then your sports tourer's the dog's bollocks.
......another thing, the "Adventure" bit in "Adventure Bike" for me that's just a term for a style/type of bike.
A combination of Longer travel suspension, upright riding position, skinnier larger diameter wheels, big fuel range and carrying capacity. You can have an "Adventure" on any kind of bike, infact you don't even need a bike to have an adventure.
....and yet another thing :laugh: Big Adventure bikes are still brilliant even if you don't stray off perfect tarmac. (thumbs)

[SteveW]

Really guys, the UK has billiard table tarmac compared to Eastern Europe, don't you think for a minute our U.K. roads are badly surfaced for mile after mile.
You can easily tour the UK on any road bike.
I'm just saying, once you leave Western Europe......my experience is mostly Romania, Ukraine, Bulgaria and other Balkan countries.....the extremes of temperature between Summer and winter, plus generally less road maintenance money available means the tarmac can be extremely poor and damaged, certainly on the more minor routes.
The big Adventure bikes have the capacity to get you from the UK in comfort and they are fantastic at dealing with the poor roads you'll find out East.
Big Adventure bikes are great on UK roads, don't get me wrong, it's just when you get to say Bulgaria they make even more sense, you see another side to them, you appreciate the increased wheel diameter and longer travel suspension.
You can float over the potholes rather than weaving in between them.

steve your bang on about the roads it was a bit of a shock to my system when i first encountered them,but as you said the big adventure bikes even my gs 800 seem to be made for them.standing on the pegs for 4 or 5 miles at a time wasn't uncommon on my trip.never had to do that over here.mind you my front wheel bearings are fecked so some nice new SKF ones going in this weekend.have a good one steve we will have to catch up for a ride round the dales soon (thumbs) cheers tony

I agree Tony, the first time you encounter mile after mile of knackered tarmac, a light comes on in your brain......"now I understand what this bike can really do!"
The GS800 was the perfect bike for your trip.
I need to get some miles on my new Ducati 950 Multistrada, so a Dales ride would be great.

[Tonibe63]

For me the bike is a tool for a job and that's why I bought a 1200GS 9 years and 54k miles ago. The job I had in mind was to load up the bike with kit plus pillion and ride whatever road I choose to which is exactly what we have done.
Would a sports tourer have done the job? It probably would but I may have lacked the confidence to plough through the rougher stuff and be worried about dropping it.
Would a Tenere have done the job? Again it probably would but it would have been less comfortable on the long motorway days and ultimately the pillion may not have wanted to go again.
I bought my GS with an idea to ride to Morocco and maybe ride the Stella 2up which it has done plus lots more besides.
Did it need to be a GS? No.
The important thing is I had a job in mind and bought the tool for the job ..... the badge on the tank doesn't matter.

[anthony29040]

Really guys, the UK has billiard table tarmac compared to Eastern Europe, don't you think for a minute our U.K. roads are badly surfaced for mile after mile.
You can easily tour the UK on any road bike.
I'm just saying, once you leave Western Europe......my experience is mostly Romania, Ukraine, Bulgaria and other Balkan countries.....the extremes of temperature between Summer and winter, plus generally less road maintenance money available means the tarmac can be extremely poor and damaged, certainly on the more minor routes.
The big Adventure bikes have the capacity to get you from the UK in comfort and they are fantastic at dealing with the poor roads you'll find out East.
Big Adventure bikes are great on UK roads, don't get me wrong, it's just when you get to say Bulgaria they make even more sense, you see another side to them, you appreciate the increased wheel diameter and longer travel suspension.
You can float over the potholes rather than weaving in between them.

steve your bang on about the roads it was a bit of a shock to my system when i first encountered them,but as you said the big adventure bikes even my gs 800 seem to be made for them.standing on the pegs for 4 or 5 miles at a time wasn't uncommon on my trip.never had to do that over here.mind you my front wheel bearings are fecked so some nice new SKF ones going in this weekend.have a good one steve we will have to catch up for a ride round the dales soon (thumbs) cheers tony

I agree Tony, the first time you encounter mile after mile of knackered tarmac, a light comes on in your brain......"now I understand what this bike can really do!"
The GS800 was the perfect bike for your trip.
I need to get some miles on my new Ducati 950 Multistrada, so a Dales ride would be great.

let me get the bits sorted on my bike and there will be a dales bimble on the cards.it should be ready for next weekend so any time after that.

cheers tony.

[chrisjk]

Really, who gives a flying feck what you call a bike? Names like adventure bike, sports-tourer etc. give one a clue to their appearance, style, type and whatnot. Beyond that it seems truly pointless to debate the issue.

[Simon_100]

Interesting topic and very timely. Normally I only ever ride on secondary roads - and lanes and of course trails - from my 'base' in the Pyrenees, but yesterday I rode my X-Country from my 'home' in Tarragona to Tortosa, which is about 50 miles down the coast, to look over an R1100S.

I first rode inland on the congested N-420, some of which has been resurfaced but mostly badly rutted by heavy truck climbing steep hills in 35º temperatures ...

Then the even more horrible C-12 down the Ebro valley to Tortosa, where the Delta starts and finally back up the coast on the absolutely horrible, and very dangerous, N-340.

The sporty Beemer wasn't the bike for me for various reasons, but among them the consideration that all of that day's riding would have been a PITA on that bike and ditto most of the roads that I ride around Spain, which from Steve's description are often similar to eastern Europe, or fantastically well surfaced! But none of these would have given the 1100 its legs whereas the X-Country just adapts to all conditions - sadly my meagre hams don't but I have a very high pain threshold ...

So that comes down to motorways - the last 40 kms back to TGN from l'Hospitalet are now a brand new 'Autovia', the A-7 and it was easily capable of whinging along at the permitted 120 kph plus the occasion burst in overtaking mode. The only trouble being the lack of a screen, any hints gladly received, and wearing my beaked adventure crash helmet so I got serious buffeting, not helped by my chronic neck and shoulder injuries, but that's my problem ...

As for longer trips, well I go 'ride about' for a month at a time whenever I get a 'pass' from SWMBO and have no problem with carrying enough camping kit - after all that's down to how to pack just what you need, but that0s another topic methinks ... :whistle:

Therefore the answer is, yes, a so-called Adventure Bike is just that, capable of riding in comfort - well you could always go by car - on virtually any road conditions.

Regs

Simon

PS looking again at the title I wonder what people mean by 'big'?

[SteveW]

Really, who gives a flying feck what you call a bike? Names like adventure bike, sports-tourer etc. give one a clue to their appearance, style, type and whatnot. Beyond that it seems truly pointless to debate the issue.

I agree it's totally pointless to discuss our bikes on a motorcycle forum.
Far better to talk about politics and such.
Did you get up on the wrong side of the bed this morning? :laugh:

[Cone]

I recently had a debate with myself on changing bike. I'm a bit of a novice but love riding off road and currently do so on my f800 and the bike has done everything and more than I ask of it. I couldn't put a name on a bike which would replace the 800
Although it always hits the ground hard and is a bitch to pick up. But could I get another bike to do what it does for me.? A recent trip down to east France to do a little off road fully loaded in comfort. Commuting 80 miles a day. And popping down local lanes and taking part in rallies when I can. I could never have done that on my zx10r which always asked to be ridden hard rather than chugging along having fun at a reasonable speed.
To summarise I love my f800 (at the moment) a perfect adventure bike for me.

[Simon_100]

The X-Country is the bike for you