Adventure Bike Rider Forum

Anyone know when the next Magazine is due out?

Last one I got was March/April. Getting withdrawal symptoms.

PS.
Finally managed to re register my account after the new format.
Thanks admin team.


Cheers Dave.

You missed May/June then .... nearly time for July/August


web linky ... https://www.adventurebikerider.com/shop/

This January ABR mag is great! The best in a long while.

I’ve just picked it up today and there’s loads of good overland features.

I don’t really care about gadgets and kit; a jacket’s a jacket when all’s said and done. Chuck a waterproof over it and a puffa under it and it’ll go anywhere, but I do like to read about proper overseas trips.

This mag has Morocco, Norway and a whole raft of trips for 2020. Perfect for whiling away the Jan/Feb snow blues.

Well done the ABR crew!

I cancelled my subscription with ABR magazine, I just find that a lot of stuff and bikes in it are to expensive for the average person to buy.... I would prefer to see a more realistic world ......

All the best for 2020

Tink wrote: ↑Tue Dec 31, 2019 8:18 am I cancelled my subscription with ABR magazine, I just find that a lot of stuff and bikes in it are to expensive for the average person to buy.... I would prefer to see a more realistic world ......

All the best for 2020

Good post. This is why I stopped buying bike mags. I used to, at one time or another, subscribe to ABR, Bike, Ride, and TBR mags.

Pretty much all of them are based on the newest bike, horsepower, 0-60 or standing quarter speeds. Pretty much being supported by ads for new bikes.

New bikes are great for those who can afford them or replace every few years. However, no new bikes, excepting the T7, have caught my imagination in the past 15 years. I really don't want the latest thing with fuel pumps and electronics and I couldn't really care less if the R1250GS is a second slower than the KTM 1290 over a standing quarter. I even sold my R1200GS and replaced with the 1150 as it's more maintainable. My off road bike is a new build 1985 based bike. The high tech on that one is heated grips! All fixable out in the middle of Africa by a clever bloke and some metal. (Not that I'll ever go as I'm too scared) But I make the point that the higher the level of tech on an adventure bike, the harder it is to fix when it goes wrong. I can't remember all of the blogs or YouTube videos I've watched when a KTM fuel pump fails.

I realise that there has to be progress and this is tempered by regulation on noise and emissions, but still, what large tech advances have happened in recent times. ABS? BMW have been scrapping engines because the paint peeled off. What does that tell us. Where is the design and testing of these things? It's a £15-20k bike. A top end luxury item which isn't designed (in the old engineering sense of the word) for being kept outside and used as a motorbike. For example, there is a thing called a bike drier. If I'd had one of those 20 years ago I'd have been laughed at. Especially as I kept my bike on the road then.

Very few magazines cater for the commuter, dealing with commuter and day to day issues as mileage between services and the cost of servicing and why it's so different and expensive compare to cars' reliability, servicing and parts. Pressure on manufacturers to keep things as simple as possible, increase security features etc.

Bike journalism got sloppy and magazines were full of the same articles time and time again, just with different bikes. What's your favourite knee slider for making sparks???

I feel like I've had a bit of a rant, and apologise if I've got it completely wrong as I've not read a bike mag for 10 years as for the previous 20 years of reading them put me off so much. So when I next get a chance, I'll buy a copy of ABR and I'll do a review to see if things have changed at all over the last 10 years. I'll be happy to say that I've been a misguided fool and I've been missing out, but somehow, I can't see that things will have evolved too much.

I might even write an article!!!!

Tink wrote: ↑Tue Dec 31, 2019 8:18 am I cancelled my subscription with ABR magazine, I just find that a lot of stuff and bikes in it are to expensive for the average person to buy.... I would prefer to see a more realistic world ......

All the best for 2020

Same reason I cancelled mine

tuftywhite wrote:

Tink wrote: ↑Tue Dec 31, 2019 8:18 am I cancelled my subscription with ABR magazine, I just find that a lot of stuff and bikes in it are to expensive for the average person to buy.... I would prefer to see a more realistic world ......

All the best for 2020

Good post. This is why I stopped buying bike mags. I used to, at one time or another, subscribe to ABR, Bike, Ride, and TBR mags.

Pretty much all of them are based on the newest bike, horsepower, 0-60 or standing quarter speeds. Pretty much being supported by ads for new bikes.

New bikes are great for those who can afford them or replace every few years. However, no new bikes, excepting the T7, have caught my imagination in the past 15 years. I really don't want the latest thing with fuel pumps and electronics and I couldn't really care less if the R1250GS is a second slower than the KTM 1290 over a standing quarter. I even sold my R1200GS and replaced with the 1150 as it's more maintainable. My off road bike is a new build 1985 based bike. The high tech on that one is heated grips! All fixable out in the middle of Africa by a clever bloke and some metal. (Not that I'll ever go as I'm too scared) But I make the point that the higher the level of tech on an adventure bike, the harder it is to fix when it goes wrong. I can't remember all of the blogs or YouTube videos I've watched when a KTM fuel pump fails.

I realise that there has to be progress and this is tempered by regulation on noise and emissions, but still, what large tech advances have happened in recent times. ABS? BMW have been scrapping engines because the paint peeled off. What does that tell us. Where is the design and testing of these things? It's a £15-20k bike. A top end luxury item which isn't designed (in the old engineering sense of the word) for being kept outside and used as a motorbike. For example, there is a thing called a bike drier. If I'd had one of those 20 years ago I'd have been laughed at. Especially as I kept my bike on the road then.

Very few magazines cater for the commuter, dealing with commuter and day to day issues as mileage between services and the cost of servicing and why it's so different and expensive compare to cars' reliability, servicing and parts. Pressure on manufacturers to keep things as simple as possible, increase security features etc.

Bike journalism got sloppy and magazines were full of the same articles time and time again, just with different bikes. What's your favourite knee slider for making sparks???

I feel like I've had a bit of a rant, and apologise if I've got it completely wrong as I've not read a bike mag for 10 years as for the previous 20 years of reading them put me off so much. So when I next get a chance, I'll buy a copy of ABR and I'll do a review to see if things have changed at all over the last 10 years. I'll be happy to say that I've been a misguided fool and I've been missing out, but somehow, I can't see that things will have evolved too much.

I might even write an article!!!!

Well said
1150's are the future - all for between £2-4K

must admit … these new bike `designs` and huge prices, live in a different world to me, which is admittedly in the past, and I stopped reading bike mags many years ago … but I read reviews on-line, and am very impressed with the technological advances and engineering innovations, even tho they are relatively small compared with the basic bike design

.. innovations like fuel injection, ABS, radial disc brakes, cartridge forks, monoshocks .. (yes, I am old) .. not to mention GPS, sat navs, route planners, poi's, .. even where to find petrol ………… all these `now basic` things did not exist when I started biking so long ago now …. it is a different world.

Bikes are getting bigger and more powerful .. while I am going in the opposite direction

But best wishes with all the magazines and all their followers

Is it just me or is there an increase in the journalistic equivalent of product placement? Plus a significant increase in what might be called waffle. I find it makes me less secure about believing an opinion about a product. Pretty sure I'll be moving from subscription to an occasional buy after a quick browse in Smiths. I find the longer travel articles of interest, plus the green lane guide and photography section. Otherwise, it's sometimes a struggle to read it all.

As a former motorcycle journalist, I can confirm that there is 'product placement' to the extent that you get sent kit for evaluation. You write an appraisal of it (usually fairly honest) and if it's any good then you tend to use it ...including when riding in front of cameras.
Periodically, you do come under pressure to mute criticism of certain aspects of a bike. Many years ago a junior writer on a certain magazine wrote a test of a significant new bike from a major manufacturer...in which he mentioned that there was an issue with a weave at high speed in an otherwise positive article.
Much to his surprise, that paragraph was removed from his article at some point in the production process. What followed was a storm of epic proportions: people bought the bike on his say-so, then encountered the weave and phoned him up to complain he hadn't tested the bike properly. He became fiercely protective of his copy after that, and who can blame him.
I'd be far more suspicious of the amateur youtube testers, who are often given stuff to sell on ebay in return for a gushing on-line video review.