What's a shame?
It will be a tough, ultra reliable travel bike. You don't see many (or even any?) SMW's in that role
What's a shame?
so my PayPal account tells me as well NickNico-D wrote: ↑Tue Jan 26, 2021 5:55 pm Calm down Dave, it's 208 kg kerbweight which is only a couple more than the 660 tenerlady single, plenty of folks have managed to go places on those and in the US at least the old KLR had a big following.
It's a cheap workhorse bike, probably run forever on not much fuel or maintenance .
I owned the small tank 'euro' model, KLR650C, not a bad bike and actually perfectly capable on easyish trails, suspension was basic but up to the job within limits.
Yes many of us would like to see a reasonably priced lightish modern Jap dualsport/trailie but let's face it, it doesn't look like it's gonna happen..
Chunky you do know the X challenge is only 148 kg before you add the bling...
Yeah, fair points about it being a solid workhorse etc, Nick. I'm sure it'll be that. What I'm saying is that Kawasaki is one of the greatest engineering companies in the world, capable of amazing things at the cutting edge of design and tech. They build ships, aircraft, trains, robots, energy plants etc etc. In terms of motorbikes they gave us stuff like the ZXR750, the B1h ZX6R, and the WSB multi-championship winning ZX10R. And some top-level motocrossers too. If they can produce ultra-lightweight bikes out of high-tech materials, which they can, then when they deliberately knock out a heavy bike it's because they don't feel the need to try any harder. They know they'll sell them anyway, to people happy with a reliable lugger (which is fine). It's just a shame that they didn't use a new model as a chance to move the sector on a bit, or at the very least back to the figures these kind of bikes used to weigh. The one thing you never hear a long-distance all-terrain biker saying is "I wish my bike had been heavier".Nico-D wrote: ↑Tue Jan 26, 2021 5:55 pm Calm down Dave, it's 208 kg kerbweight which is only a couple more than the 660 tenerlady single, plenty of folks have managed to go places on those and in the US at least the old KLR had a big following.
It's a cheap workhorse bike, probably run forever on not much fuel or maintenance .
I owned the small tank 'euro' model, KLR650C, not a bad bike and actually perfectly capable on easyish trails, suspension was basic but up to the job within limits.
Yes many of us would like to see a reasonably priced lightish modern Jap dualsport/trailie but let's face it, it doesn't look like it's gonna happen..
It’s a shame it’s not lighter - nothing more, nothing less.