Two Bikes Are Better Than One

[CMX]

There are three bikes of late whose (often partisan) adherents claim particular usefulness in both town and country. As is the case with most posters, I have ridden a lot of bikes but unlike most, for a longer time (50’s). I have concluded if they’re speaking about here in Thailand, and if they suppose that I can optimize my riding safety and exceptional experiences with one bike they are wrong. And I’ve tested here in Thailand most of the middling contestant bikes, excepting the Boxer 250RS. Still, I want to suggest that for most of us, two bikes are the better choice.

Ego aside, one of my difficulties in being objective is that my own experience is not balanced - so I am biased. (I may not be alone in this.) That is, I have driven for a very long time larger bikes using clutch and gears and enjoying fat tires/tyres. I usually have used them in nations with conditions more calm, whose drivers are not so frenetic and independent minded when driving as Thais. Yet when riding here in Thailand in the countryside, hills, and mountains, I find that the same qualities and higher power (relative to “little” bikes here) improve my fun and control enormously; also, I get from place to place more quickly when I’m not just touring. Even modestly powered bikes such as the CBR are a delight running up hills and around curves (a little busy, of course), compared to the PCX or Nouvo. One has a wonderful feeling of Control, not to say Power with the capital P. Ah, Control.

Opposed to the character of these fulfilling experiences, I have driven 125cc scooters in continental Europe for 4 years, three of them with automatics – though the designs there for scooters have a different geometry than those in Thailand and the European offerings are closer to 15 bhp. And for four recent months, I’ve ridden little bikes, a variety of city bikes, in Chiang Mai. So I come away from these useful episodes with strong prejudices for the little auto-transmission bikes in traffic -- and the bigger manual shift motorcycles in their better roles. (I leave it to others to determine their sports vs cruiser preferences.)

*Not incidentally, it tickles me the number of “big” (read gears with manual clutch) bikers who suppose that by careful and experienced driving, they will already be in the correct gear for an emergency condition in city traffic (which I had imagined means EMERGENCY! - a totally unexpected and instantaneous change in driving conditions for which it is impossible to prepare). In spite of lively expressions by those who have not lived in concert with automatic transmissions in heavy city traffic for a long time (may have tried it some), I know that all the practice in the world will not fully replace complex controls with simple ones nor will larger size and weight be superior to small for circulating through mobs of vehicles. I have to admit that the temptation to go more slowly with a little bike is a safety factor too.

No matter: I have taken typical circle tours away from Chiang Mai on the lightweight city bikes that I have used successfully in town (Staying Alive), and miss every element of the joy and excitement of a bigger ride – not to mention use of power with real downshifting and real UP as choices. To characterize the new PCX, or the Nouvo Elegance, as rides particularly suited to the hills and country, is plain exaggeration, born of love, however much fun they provide – and they do. On balance, however, they just cope fairly well.

If I had any sense, I’d get as a city bike a Honda 110i Click Forward, a second hand “repo,” with top box for the city, and shift that same box to a country bike also now in domestic production, also second hand, after THE SHOW, with its possible (downward) effects on second-hand prices due to new, improved, and price-competitive models from near and far. Such a compromise (two bikes) would be less of a compromise and, assuming careful shopping for mainline bikes, cost not a lot more than any of the new “all rounders” that call for @ 70K baht, if one includes depreciation. Best for everyone, I might shut my gob, being too busy riding.

[Fishenough]

Ok than.

Happy riding! (three bikes would be even better!!!)

[ray23]

Two always gives me something to tinker with