CCM GP 450......was it any good?

[The Sarge]

Having just got back from a local bike club meeting I guess one of the things that irritates me about the bike is that I cannot honestly be more positive about it. When you turn up at a bike meet on a new, rare or unusual bike other bikers inevitably ask you about it. I could easily be a salesman for Guzzi when I talk about my Californias, I recognise their weaknesses but the positives far outweigh them and the three that I have owned have exceeded my expectations. Unfortunately I cannot honestly say the same for the CCM, and I really wish I could because I think it is a brilliant design and it comes so close. Someone commented tonight 'You could go anywhere on a bike like that' my honest response had to be 'I would like to think so but my experience tells me otherwise'. We then went onto discuss the inadequacies of modern seats and the stupidity of designing an 'adventure bike' that requires a partial strip down for routine cleaning plus all the problems that I have had with my bike. I really hope their next offering addresses the issues that I and other owners have experienced with the 450.
Cheers Jak

Not to mention the cost to get it to perform correctly Jak (thumbs)

[Jak*]

I totally agree with you there, they should have fitted the power commander for to all bikes as a factory recall. Without the bike is at times quite dangerous. The extra 10 BHP is another matter and if I wanted that I would be quite happy to pay for it.
Cheers Jak

[jonny955]

Having just got back from a local bike club meeting I guess one of the things that irritates me about the bike is that I cannot honestly be more positive about it. When you turn up at a bike meet on a new, rare or unusual bike other bikers inevitably ask you about it. I could easily be a salesman for Guzzi when I talk about my Californias, I recognise their weaknesses but the positives far outweigh them and the three that I have owned have exceeded my expectations. Unfortunately I cannot honestly say the same for the CCM, and I really wish I could because I think it is a brilliant design and it comes so close. Someone commented tonight 'You could go anywhere on a bike like that' my honest response had to be 'I would like to think so but my experience tells me otherwise'. We then went onto discuss the inadequacies of modern seats and the stupidity of designing an 'adventure bike' that requires a partial strip down for routine cleaning plus all the problems that I have had with my bike. I really hope their next offering addresses the issues that I and other owners have experienced with the 450.
Cheers Jak

Hi Jak, I share your passion for Guzzis (we have three between us in the garage) but I've given being a salesman for them because it seems only the high mileage riders who intend to keep and maintain their own bike for a long time will get it. These riders are few and far between nowadays!

Back to the GP450, I know you have experienced problems with your bike that most owners have not but the routine cleaning and maintenance is essential on any bike on an overland trip (assuming poor roads) so is it really any worse than, say, a KTM690 or a G650GS? Perhaps the biggest PITA is having to remove the tanks but those used to doing this regularly (not me) have the knack.

I'm not planning a RTW adventure and I didn't buy my GP450 for that but it's my 'go to' bike for European travel now. Maybe I've been lucky so far but the preventable faults that ours had on delivery were easily and swiftly sorted and I could have put them right myself. As you and I are both Moto Guzzi enthusiasts, we should be used to this ...but I'm not trying to make excuses. The fact is, they are a small outfit and will never have the same corporate approach that the big boys have to automated assembly or updating models for the next 10,000 units. As a comparison, if you speak to GS owners you'll find plenty who think it's the perfect bike and also those (with the same model) who swear they'll never buy a BMW again. Work that one out!

Jon

[Jak*]

I agree with what you have posted Jon and I have come to realise that my expectations were too high. Partly due to believing what CCM told me and partly due to believing that a modern hand built bike would be far superior to a 30 year old machine made in an ancient Italian factory.
I would not advocate owning a modern Guzzi either and after this experience will be sticking to older bikes. For my lifestyle and my style of riding modern bikes seem to offer any real advantages and the costs and complications of running them don't make sense. For me this has been a (very expensive) lesson learned.
There are many aspects of owning the CCM that I enjoy as the fact that for the short journey to the club last night I took the CCM rather than the Cali shows. The original question was 'Was it any good?' to which my answer unfortunately would be 'yes, but not good enough'.
Cheers Jak

[minkyhead]

ive around 900 hours up now on gps average speed 23mph ??
only significant problem was a failed starter motor ..ccm came out and fixed it on site within two hours of a phone call ...
mine has spent 100s of hours off road and i have never ever felt the need to strip i down to clean it and never have ..it gets no better or worse for mud than any other bike i own ??
the seat the high one is much better than the low one but i just strap a pad to it and have done two 3000 mile trips with no bother at all its no better or worse than most ..infct its much better than my crf seats ..but they just get the same pad strapped to them

i have heard of severel gps with feuling stalling problems but mine has never given a moments bother so from my point of view the bike has been a good one
ccm for me need to pay better attention to order details and organisation ..i dont think anything ive ever ordered has been on time .even collecting my 2nd new bike it was the wrong spec and nowhere near ready and id booked the week off and that was a real bummer after gettin the train to collect it .. very poor that smarted badly
nowts forever but i do think what id replace it with ..and there really arnt many options the full braaap ccm working as it should with the rally raid gearbox ..takes abit of beating ..it is as some say what the bike should have been on production ...so you either wait for the perfect bike or you try and create your own ..im in me fourth year on the ccm ....i think i will keep this one as its fairly uniququ with the high low gearspread and bloody hard to recreate and i certainly wont be giving it away on a stealer trade in
tbo looking at the stats for the new 650 ccm that may well be me next bike ...135kgms 650 sounds good too me ..but the price ????
i fear a little as ccm have sold 300 spitfires in no time at all ..they will sit as a prize sunny day bike and will get little use and so very little comback on warranty as a company that must make more sense than backing up a dirtbike for two years ...ktms have 28 days and thats your lot
we will see

[Paul_C]

Interestingly I have an old Guzzi too. 78 LeMans II I've had since 81. Only let downs have been bent exhaust valves caused by my own over enthusiastic right wrist. As to the CCM I'm pleased. Caution is caused by reading about the problems had by others but, kiss of death, mine's been ok. One broken mudguard stay. A crack in the bash guard, replaced by CCM. A few tweaks to make it fit my needs too. I have the standard height and high seat. I chose this for more comfort as my 29" legs find it a bit of a stretch.
On and off road it does exactly what I want.
I've had it since September. Done nearly 6000 miles. Only gets a decent clean occasionally, otherwise it's just a jetwash to get the mud off.
Sunny Sundays I can pose on the Guzzi. Two up I can eat miles and do easy lanes on the GS. The CCM gets the most use. Power Commander was needed and I think it should have been significantly discounted.

[Philiptigerrice]

Me and the wife both test rode the CCM - we were looking for a bike she could commute on and that I could get dirty on ideally.
It seemed to fit the bill, but neither of us liked it. The factory team were nice enough, but as they even admitted themselves, it was essentially a pocket money job to keep a bit of cash flow coming in, in between military orders. There was no production line, just literally, boxes of bits, and some tools on the the floor in the corner of the workshop - it was just a sideline really.
The bike felt like a trial run to us - it didn;t feel solid - wasn't very comfy, and there was all sorts going on with the lights - we got a bemusing speech about how the light were being changed out, and this and that was being changed out - it just didn't feel 'ready'.
That said - I thought the facility was great and the team were great, and they've probably learned some great lessons from this. They're definitely a really capable company.
The costs must have been overwhelming though - I think they were sending blokes in vans up to Inverness and down to London to service bikes at one stage - add in the warranty work, and the costs must have been huge, where the margins weren't enormous.
I think and hope that they have found a niche with the Spitfire stuff, and I hope they make and sell a lot more bikes.
I know I'd go back, if they had the right bike for me (thumbs)

[The Sarge]

It's interesting that everyone has had a different experience with the GP 450 good and bad, what it tells me is that the Company is not geared to supplying a big market and that they have serious continuity issues. As a manufacturer myself, I can sympathise with them to a point, as mentioned in many posts they offer a good service when things go wrong, but to me it would be better that they ironed out the problems in the first place. My second issue with them (as a company not the bike), is that their expectancy of their customer base, that once an owner you will accept whatever service they give you, my own business experience is that doesn't happen for very long. Missing delivery dates, poor PDI's/ stupid QC problems, and the ill fated Power Commander issue will come back and haunt them, of that there is no question. Those that were late into the hapless GP450 fold have benefitted on the woes of others ( Minky aside, as he was their test-pilot and lived close enough to solve problems when things weren't right). Multiple owners also benefitted as CCM (Cash Cow Motorcycles as my Mrs calls them) bent over backwards to get multiple sales, (the deals done earlier in the year made my eyes water! ) but when all is a said and done the Bikes are ' Bitsa's' made up of whatever engine and components they can get there hands on, just as the Company started and as long as you are aware of that from the start and don't expect anything like the bikes produced by the big boys, you won't be disappointed !
Now where are the keys to me 950 Adv or DR650 my DR350 or my rebuilt, re-engineered CCM 644 ?????
(thumbs)
Sarge

[Tramp]

i think when and if they release a 600cc version lots will give it a miss as there has been lots of negative press about the 450gp....
anyone heard how the army boys are dong in south America on their`s ...and most ccm bikes are bodged together 404,604,644 but we still love them once sorted....must be something to do with English love of tinkering (thumbs)

[Richard Simpson Mark II]

All very interesting...the good and the bad.
But, we should not forget that buying a bike from a major manufacturer (KTM/BMW or even the Japanese) isn't always a painless process.
For instance, the early production 950 KTMs had lots of issues, major and minor, BMW quality control took a hammering when they decided to go mass market (and I don't mean the Aprilia-built bikes), and they had a multitude of issues with their rendition of the 450, and I was unlucky enough to buy a brand-new Husky TE610E which was a pile of rubbish. There also seemed to be a lot of gripes with early examples of the new Africa Twin.
What's the moral of the story?
Never buy the first version of anything. And (in my case) never buy another Husqvarna...except a lawn mower!