12 July 2011

47.653/ 41.325

Two Honda GoldWings-
One, a 1200cc four cylinder.
The other, a 1500cc six.
When I bought the bigger, newer bike, the intent was to start trying to sell the older bike right away. Well, it hasn't quite worked out that way.
The newer bike is wonderful. It rides like a dream and the onboard stereo system sounds as good as most cars. Sara Jean loves the thing and rides pillion with a broad smile on her face. But...
In many ways I like the old bike better.
It probably weighs close to 100 pounds less than the newer bike. That makes it much easier to maneuver at slow speeds and also shows up in the miles-per-gallon figures.
Driving to and from work, behaving myself, the four cylinder 'Wing gets 47+ mpg.

The newer bike is smoother and a little quieter. By smoother, I mean like the nearly unnoticeable difference between a car with a great new wax job and a car that has been worked over with a clay bar. There is a difference. It's not a big deal.
And under the same conditions the calculator showed the 1500cc bike covered 41.235 miles on a gallon of fuel. That's far better than any of our cars, so I save a small chunk 'o change each time I ride to work, but I'm still looking for a machine that will use about one gallon of gas on the 64 mile round-trip.
That's gonna require a bike with a much smaller engine.
And I'm still looking.

I left home for work tonight with some concern about the weather. I intended to ride the 1500cc 'Wing, and hoped I could drive the 45 minutes to work and arrive before the coming deluge struck. I tuned in "The Weather Channel" to get a quick update on what I'd be facing, only to find Peter Lik spouting off about how to get a great shot of a volcano in Hawaii.
So much for the foremost experts on weather, huh?
It's a bit like Headline News these days...
Want Headline News? How 'bout a little Nancy Grace instead?!

Fifteen minutes into the ride it was pretty obvious I was gonna get wet. The complete horizon ahead was dark gray with occasional cloud-to-ground lightning.
Twenty-five minutes into the ride, the bottom fell outta the bucket.
It poured.
But for a while I stayed relatively dry. My arms got wet first. Then the water caught up in the turbulence forming behind my helmet started trickling down my back, eventually pooling on the saddle and soaking my crotch. The temperature dropped from 95 to about 65 degrees and I actually was uncomfortably cool for the first time in days. But then the rain stopped, the temperature rose, and I was ALMOST drip-dried by the time I pulled into the hangar.
It was bound to happen eventually... a pop-up storm drenching me on the way to or from work. And I'm less fearful of it happening now than I was before. The big fairing does a pretty great job of protecting me.

If I'm going to get a bike that gets 65 mpg or so I've got to first sell the older GoldWing.
Anyone out there want a bike that rides great, is smooth as silk, and gets 47+ mile to a gallon of gas?
Call BR549. Let's talk.

7 comments:

cary said...

My accountant says "no". My daughter, who gets a ride to the babysitter most days from me, says "no". I go to the warehouse most every day to pick up a few things here and there, so the boss says "no" also.

How much you want for it?

Old NFO said...

At least you HAD a fairing... Saw a couple of HOG types today parked under a bridge both were soaked to the skin and obviously NOT happy. I'll pass on the bike, can't carry my long guns on it :-)

cary said...

Old NFO - you just need the right leatherman to work you a decent set of saddle scabbards ...

THINGS YOU'D NEVER GUESS ABOUT ME said...

Hey, talk about getting around...I don't have a bike but I've got a new blog. I've been hacked, keylogged, screwed and hoisted up the flagpole, but I'm still here.

Bloviating Zeppelin said...

Don't know your inclination to this, but Kawasaki's Ninja 650 isn't what you may think it is. For one thing, it's a parallel twin with an ergonomic riding position that's much more upright than you could imagine. If you think it's a laid-over cafe racer only, you'd be wrong. It is clearly a solo bike, but with its great power-to-weight ratio, narrow profile, you can split traffic lanes and keep an eyeball peeled for upcoming problems. I was thinking of getting one of them for my previous commute. It's fast, small, zippy, and comfy.

BZ

P.S.
Where are the photographs? You can never have enough photographs. More photographs. More bike photographs. Did I mention the bike photos, and how you need more of them in your blog?

cary said...

Accountant has run the idea through with the sharp lance of practicality.

Dang it.

Cody said...

Such a great article which newer bike is wonderful. It rides like a dream and the onboard stereo system sounds as good as most cars.That makes it much easier to maneuver at slow speeds and also shows up in the miles-per-gallon figures.