Feature Story
DUAL SPORT DUAL
Story by Anne Van Beveren and Reid Libby
Photos by Tom Van Beveren
Eenie, Meenie, Miny, Moe. After 500 miles of cross-country comparing, you would’ve thought a shoot out between two new dual sporters would’ve come down to something a little more definitive than that.
But when all was said and done, the two mid-size compar ators for 2008—the CRF250L from Honda and the XT250 from Yamaha—leaned on their sidestands and sneered down their silencers as two dusty, trail-worn testers went three rounds of Rock, Paper, Scissors in a last-ditch effort to name a victor.
The day had started with a lot more distinction than it finished. Sitting in Free 2 Wheel’s driveway were two of the latest, and reputedly greatest, in mid-size dual sporters. Our mission was to put them through their paces, running them up hill and down, on pavement and dirt, at high speed and low, through the woods to Grandma’s house, and then rank them. First and second. Great and not-so-great. Winner and Loser.
At first glance, the mission looked like a slam dunk. With the exception of their “mid-sized dual sporter” c lassification, the two motorcycles appeared to have little in common.
For starters, there’s power. The CRF230L is motivated by Honda’s well-proven air-cooled, 223 cc, four-stroke single. Its o-ponent, the equally robust XT, features the same engine architecture as the Honda but steps into the ring with an additional 26 cc (the XT250 actually displaces 249 cc), plus a half point more compression. On paper at least, the bike with the bigger biceps decision goes to Yamaha.
2nd Feature
GOLDILOCKS AND THE GS
Story and photos by Neale Bayly
From the moment I let the clutch out on the new BMW F800 GS and blasted down the hotel driveway, I was totally at one with the machine.
It immediately felt tight, eager and exciting, and, returning to the hotel at the en d of a long day in the saddle, it still felt exactly the same. The way the bars fell into my hands, the relaxed bend in my knees with my feet comfortably on the pegs, and the width of seat beneath me—they made the new GS instantly feel like an old friend. And that was complemented by the powerful and sumptuously smooth parallel, twin-cylinder 800 cc engine, which I was sampling for the first time. Never, in all my years of testing, have I taken to a new motorcycle so fast.
The new F800 GS was introduced to the world by BMW in South Africa, putting a stamp in my passport that truly allows me to say I go to the ends of the earth for my job.
With this in mind, BMW thoughtfully set up a three-day tour before the intro so we journalists fro m afar could acclimate to riding on the left-hand side of the road and get over our jet lag. This had the double benefit of not only allowing us to be fully rested, but gave me the opportunity to hop straight off BMW’s best-selling motorcycle, and the bike most people would be interested in comparing the new F800GS with, the R1200GS.
3rd Feature:
THREE IS NOT (NECESSARILY)
A CROWD
2008 Ural Tourist LX
Story by Peter StarrPhotos by Peter Starr and Clement Salvadori
Thank you John Cleese. And now for something completely different. There is a three-wheel craze creeping out in America and it is “trikes.” Well, my three-wheel craze, at least one of them, has been around a lot longer than trikes and has a following that is as unique as a three-legged race at a May Day fair.
 I am talking about sidecars. I have been fascinated by them ever since I started to attend motorcycle road races in the United Kingdom and watched the likes of Bill Boddice, Pip Harris, Chris Vincent and Owen Greenwood battle it out at my local race tracks like Mallory Park, Oulton Park and Silverstone. All of these racing sidecars were the traditional style of motorcycle with an actual sidecar attached to the left-hand side of the motorcycle (remember the Brits ride on the left-hand side of the road). They were heavily modified to give them a very low center of gravity and were powered by a single-cylinder Manx Norton, or twin-cylinder BSA, Triumph or Norton engine. I further enjoyed my outing s in the “works” utility sidecar while working at Triumph in the early 1960s. It was a heavily used, 650 cc Triumph Thunderbird with a utility box on a sidecar frame and it was used mainly to collect test bikes that had broken down somewhere away from the Meriden factory. That is when I learned to fly the sidecar wheel, by accident I might add!
For more on this story, pick up a current issue of FREE 2 WHEEL at your local dealer, or use the handy order form page found on our web site.
|
Scuttle Putt:
Ducati just won the prestigious Robb Report “Best of the Best-Sport Bike” award for the second year in a row. The Rob Report awards are given to objects of desire on an annual basis and the Sport Bike category is supposed to highlight the pinnacle of performance motorcycle technology. In 2007, Ducati grabbed the award with the 1098 S Superbike. This year’s winner is the Desmosedici RR--the world’s first MotoGP-derived production bike. Unveiled at the Italian Grand Prix in 2006, the Desmosedici RR could be considered the most exotic performance motorcycle on the planet. With 200 horsepower on tap, and such precious materials as magnesium, titanium, and stainless steel draped in carbon fiber bodywork, it represents the epitome of what a sport bike should be: fast, lightweight, and aerodynamic. The June issue of Robb Report reports: “As a complete package of desirability, the Desmosedici RR is without peer.”
Way 2 Go:
MOOTOCROSS IN THE MAKING
Story and photos by Anne Van Beveren
Remember way back when Motocross began?
It was spawned out of the British sport of scrambling, which was big in England back around 1924. Scrambling caught on in Europe, and was renamed motocross by the Belgians in the 1930s--the “moto” part of the name coming from the word “motorcycle” and the “cross” part coming from “cross country.”
Today, motocross has developed into the most physically demanding motorized sport there is , and the demands that it makes on motorcycles have driven development from the converted street machines of the 1940s to sophisticated, high-tech machines that are capable of flying further through the air than the Wright Brother’s Kitty Hawk Flight in 1903.
These are the sorts of interesting facts you’ll discover, or rediscover as the case may be, at Motocross America, an exhibit by the Motorcycle Hall of Fame Museum that is currently showing at the San Diego Automotive Museum in Balboa Park.
The display will be in San Diego, the first stop on a national tour, until June 25, so dash on down and check out 30-something very special machines.
Ask the Sergeant:
I am planning a road trip on my “Adventure Touring” bike. I will be camping and staying in remote areas, so I need to pack enough to be self sufficient for a few days at a time. The bike came equipped with large sidebags and a top trunk, and has tankbag mounts, and the accessory catalog has enough trinket mounts to supply a small Army. Are there any limits to how much I can pack as far as the size or weight of the load?Tom Muntz,Hacienda Heights
I also have an “Adventure” bike as one of my personal motorcycles and love the capabilities that it has and the places I can go with it. It came standard with a pair of saddlebags that could swallow a week’s worth of clothes and souvenirs, and enough food to keep a cop like me in doughnuts for a month. The bags on this bike even have provision to store water between the inner and outer shells for those deep Sahara treks the bike was designed to do. What will they think of next?
The first part of your question has to do with the size of the load you can carry. All vehicles are bound by the California Vehicle Code to limits on what are called “Load Projections.” These limits apply to the front, the rear and both sides, plus to height.
A saddlebag is first and foremost not classified as a projection since it is an integrated storage compartment on the motorcycle. Saddlebags do not count towards the additional “projection” width that is allowed but once you start adding onto the bags with duffels, water bottles and camera tripods, these extra items become projections.
All single vehicles in California are limited dimensionally to a width of 102 inches (excluding the addition of mirrors for RVs, tires, and even things like door handles, warning placards, and awnings that can bump the width to 120 inches), a height of 14 feet (except double-decker buses, which can be 14 feet 3 inches tall) and a length of 40 feet (with a whole laundry list of exceptions that are mainly commercial applications). So within that box of 102”W x 14’H x 40’L your motorcycle must remain.
To the front you may only have a projection that extends three feet beyond the front of the tire (or bumper), while to the rear, you can’t exceed 2/3 of the wheelbase beyond the rear of the bike with exceptions for poles and pipes. Once you exceed four feet beyond your taillight you need to have a 12 inches square (meaning 12 inches wide by 12 inches high) red or fluorescent orange flag attached to the end of the load during daylight. At night you are required to have a red light at the end of the load.
On the sides you can’t exceed that magic 102 inches. CVC 35111 states that “No passenger vehicle shall be operated on any highway with any load carried thereon extending beyond the line of the fenders on its left side or more than six inches beyond the line of the fenders on its right side.” The first question for this section to apply is whether or not a motorcycle is a “passenger vehicle.” CVC 465 states, “A ’passenger vehicle’ is any motor vehicle, other than a motortruck, truck tractor, or a bus (as defined in Section 233) and used or maintained for the transportation of persons. The term ‘passenger vehicle’ shall include a housecar.” As you can see the Vehicle Code is pretty specific and states that as long as your vehicle is designed for “persons,” you have a passenger vehicle. This would include, all cars, SUVs and motorcycles with two sets of pegs.
But now comes the difficulty of defining a ‘fender line’ for a motorcycle. The last time I checked, my bike was built with bodywork already in violation of this rule. Suffice it to say that as long as you keep the load within six inches of the furthest hard-mounting point (be it saddlebag or fairing) you will be safe. You are not limited to how high you can stack your load within the 14-foot maximum, but don’t stack the load in front of you as this could obscure your vision, and don’t load tank bags in such a manner that they limit handlebar movement.
On a couple of trips, I have had more than one riding buddy comment that I look like the ‘Beverly Hillbilly’ mobile and that the only thing missing is the rocking chair for granny. Some people just don’t appreciate the value of bringing it all with you.
With respect to weight, your first limit is what the motorcycle is rated to carry by the manufacturer. Your owner’s manual will specify the limit for what you can carry and it is spelled out as a GVWR, which means Gross Vehicle Weight Rating. It is the sum total of the motorcycle weight, the weight of the rider and passenger, and all cargo including fuel. This is your absolute limit and you can be cited for exceeding this. An officer even has the authority to take you up to five miles to a location where a scale is kept to check the weight. The next limit is the load rating of your tires. All DOT tires have a load limit stamped into the tire next to the inflation pressure. If you exceed that limit, you can also be cited.
No matter what you carry on your bike, always remember to make sure the load is secure and will not shift or present a hazard while you are operating the vehicle. CVC 24002(a) is a great ‘catch-all’ section that says if (in the opinion of the officer) a vehicle is unsafe or unsafely loaded, you can get a ticket. You are then prevented from legally continuing on your trip until the condition is fixed.
Back in high school, I worked at a local motorcycle dealership as a lot attendant, parts counter helper, and the guy called on to lift heavy things. On occasion, I was sent to pick up parts at other dealerships using one of the shop’s bikes. I once found myself in a situation where I unexpectedly had to return to the dealership with a set of tires for a dirt bike. The tires were not going to fit anywhere on the little 350 two-stroke I had borrowed and I was faced with a real dilemma. So I wore the tires back over my body. Thank goodness they were 18 and 21-inch tires; modern 17-inch rubber would never fit around me, ever.
You would have thought I was the ‘Michelin Man’ incarnate. Loads can be carried in all manners, just as long as you keep within the limits of what is legal and secure.
Ride safe, keep smiling, and take care of yourselves and each other out there.
For more on this story, pick up a current issue of FREE 2 WHEEL at your local dealer, or use the handy order form page found on our web site.
|
