Motorbikes are great , just bought my 14th this year , but they aren’t for everyone , as others said why not have an off road experience day , mate just did a motocross day somewhere near Cannock said it was great , see if you like it .
If you do then , if you can do an advanced riding course post test , they are well worth it , and take your time building up experience , the danger to begin with is having more confidence than ability , and yeah ride like everyone is out to kill you .

yourguitarhero – Member
I had motorbikes for years, and loads of pals with bikes.
Noone died. We had fun.

YMMV .

RIP, Noone. 😥

My KTM was reliable and an absolute hoot, road legal wets made it huge fun! Trackday at Oulton Park consisted of a speed weave down the straights followed by nearly plowing into the back of the 4’s as they wobble round the corners.

I musta got unlucky as I was treated like a guineapig with my new’un.
Plus the fault I experienced is documented largely as a problem on many bikes of theirs.

Like I said shame as they are good when working.

allthegear – Member
Twins do sound good. When I park up, i get to listen to the sound they make whilst they try and catch up with me on my inline 4…

Rachel

Not catching up with, just on our second lap 😀 Unless you’re referring to Harley Davidsons but we don’t talk about them.

I rode trials and things when I was younger and when I was old enough to drive I did. I wanted something different and have never had my own bike on the road.

But now I want one as the itch needs scratching. The weird thing is that although I like small, fast, raw cars I’m not sure that seat-of-the-pants experience is what I want from a bike.

I rode a 1920’s AJS last week, weighs nothing, less than 20bhp, girder forks, tiny drum brakes and loud as hell. I loved it, hand gear change an all. Proper back to basics stuff.

The whole Harley thing is a bit tragic, brand loyalty, and for what? Image..
Though at the risk of a lynching I’ve been looking at a late eighties Sportster 1200. No chrome, no tassles, no airbrushing. It’s got flowed heads, lumpy cam, firmed up suspension etc. It’s not fast but it is quick, I like it.

I’m a Harley fan, I’ve rented a few, but never owned one. There was a nice XR1000 at Cadwell a couple of weeks ago, looked and sounded great.

Greatest experience ever was when I was 21 riding my Kawasaki Ninja; I was unbelievably brave then.
Nowadays road riding is my buzz.

The whole Harley thing is a bit tragic

I’m reasonably sure that most people who buy Harleys do so because they like polishing things. That and they live in a country that doesn’t have bends.

redsox – Member

The moment of realisation came about 10 minutes ago, a guy at work just bought a new bike (Honda Hornet) and I was having the usual look around/sit on it. Nothing felt right about it at all and all I could think was how alien it felt.

If you’ve not ridden one before, how else would it feel? I remember my first ride on my bike- I’d had a 125 for a couple of years, done my direct access, but even then jumping on my SV was weird, it was a funny shape and the throttle was snatchy and none of the mirrors were right and I couldn’t get it round slow corners, horrible. I ended up doing 50000 miles on that thing, took it on track more times than I can think, won prizes with it, tuned the baws off it, even managed to get its wet weight to be almost exactly what Suzuki claimed its wet weight was. If it had any orifices that weren’t jaggy or rusty or full of dubious chemicals I’d probably have ****ed it. But day one, it was orrible, and why would it not be? There’s nothing really intuitive or instinctive about motorbikes, and road bikes are different enough from pushbikes that it’s kind of unhelpful.

Of course it will feel strange if you’ve never sat on one before. What did you expect?

Do your CBT it won’t cost the earth and you’ll get a taste for a small bike and then one a bit bigger if you opt for direct access.

Millions of people ride bikes every day, they survive in much the same way that most car drivers do. You don’t have to ride like a nutter, well, not all of the time anyway.

I’m reasonably sure that most people who buy Harleys do so because they like polishing things.

If you like polishing you dont need a Harley. I have a 78 Honda GL1000 with plenty of chrome anyone is welcome to visit and ploish any time. I’ll put the kettle on! Its a flat 4 too so doesnt sound like a tractor!

Its a flat 4 too so doesnt sound like a tractor! have a soul

We have Europe’s biggest Harley get-together here every year – around 3,000 bikes. Many turn up on trailers, towed by motorhomes, fully covered when they arrive and only ridden for the shirt distance of the ride-outs.

It’s got to be a great place to be if you suddenly needed surgery or financial advice though.

Many turn up on trailers, towed by motorhomes, fully covered when they arrive and only ridden for the shirt distance of the ride-outs.

Thats because they’d break down!

Its a flat 4 too so doesnt sound like a tractor! have a soul

Get over 90mph on it and its got something, not soul maybe, but something.

On the autobahn obviously!

Get over 90mph on it and its got something, not soul maybe, but something.

Great, so in order to have fun you need to be in licence tossing territory? Nein danke.

V-twins: nice noise, great engine braking, fun below 90 on the back Scottish roads… 😆

Yours was your dads wasn’t it A-A? I’d keep it too in that case

Great, so in order to have fun you need to be in licence tossing territory? Nein danke.

No actually get up to those speeds and the gargantuan weight in combination with 1970’s frame technology and any sortbof bend or road imperfection makes it pretty scary!! It is far more fun at about 60 and it looks bloody great.

I would love to go back to a big single for twisty roads. Could have some real fun on the old F650 beemer I had.

Back to the OP.

If it didn’t feel a bit “alien” at first then it wouldn’t be as exciting and rewarding in the long term.

As a recent returnee to motorcycling I’d agree with the v-twin idea. They tend to be narrow, well balanced and remarkably easy to drive due to the torque delivery.