quote:Originally posted by mudmonkey
wow geeto,
you HATE the sv650!? please enlighten me as to why you have such an extreme distaste for a bike that is loved by so many (myself included). i love vintage style bikes just as much as the next guy, but i also love the time i'm currently living in, and i love all the advantages modern bikes have to offer. when it comes down to it, performance is equally important as style, and honestly that thruxton is a "retro styled" performance turd compared to the sv. the sv650 is the modern cafe racer.
It is a personal thing. The SV650 is too small in displacement and in seating. I did ride an sv1000 once and I thought it a good bike (better suited for me than the 650) but that for the money there were better out there. It isn't a styling thing, I think the sv650 looks ok, it just didn't gel with me as a comfortable bike.
Surprisingly (or unsurprisingly) I find my ducati more comfortable than the sv650 I rode (an 02 model in Los Angeles). This probably has to do with the fact that I am 6'5 and the reach to the bars on the duc is really long (riders under 6' complain about it a lot), where as the compactness of the 650 had me kinda balled up. My 75 cb750 was a couch compared to the sv and really there is no noticable power difference.
My 1978F makes almost as much hp as the SV and feels like you are going 10 times faster.
The other thing I didn;t like was the bike was too neutral. It had no real quirks to speak of. I prefer bikes with quirks. The most neutered UJM I ever rode was a honda 450 hawk. No balls, no road feel, it was a bike that was for lack of a better term too easy to ride. It did everything mediocre and nothing really well. With the exception of the no balls part (the sv seems to have a decent sized pair) the sv reminded me of that. It had lots of potential and I could see why people love to use them as track bikes, commuters, etc...but for my tastes it was to sterile. Up till that point my only other suzuki v-twin experence was a TL1000R (ironically enough that was at my local ducati dealer as a used bike and I took for a test ride) and that had character in spades. It was the opposite of the sv650.
Bottom line, if a bike doesn't make me feel like I am cheating death just a little when I ride it, then I don't really like it. For some reason a lot of the new middleweight nakeds do this to me. I liked the honda 919, but despised the 599. Love the z1000, hate the new z750. The break from this is the Ninja 650 - rode one in vegas and that bike was just a ball of fun.
BTW, if you haven't noticed I bogart bikes any and every chance I get. Dealer Demo days, shows, bike nights if someone wants to hand me keys I am gone. To me bikes are like a good pair of shoes, you never know if you are going to like them until you try them on. If any of you all are local I am just as generous with my bikes, with the exception of the ducati, my ninja, and my cb750. The ducati because it isn't paid for yet, the ninja because my family has owned that bike for 20 years in pristine condition (my father is the original owner), and the 75 cb750 because that is my daily driver (and I do bend the rules on my 75 if you can demonstrate you know how to ride a big bike).
