The wife's new Kawasaki Vulcan S
Discussion
Today, I rode my bike through a large rain storm (not pleasant with an open face helmet on the motorway), to test ride one of these:
http://www.kawasaki.co.uk/en/products/cruiser/2015...
Basically, an er6 engine, retuned slightly to give a bit more bottom end punch, in a light cruiser chassis. Now, bearing in mind I'm coming off a big brute of a bike (Victory Vegas), and was testing it for my wife who is returning to biking after a few years, so I wasn't really being objective, but I was very pleasantly surprised, to the point that I bought it.
Thoughts:
It is really light and compact, I felt like I was on top of it, rather than 'in it', the bike is a lot shorter, but also nice and narrow. Great for filtering and really flickable for a cruiser, yet still nicely planted. Pegs are high and there is a surprising amount of ground clearance.
Gearbox is smooth, neutral is always where you want it although I felt like I wanted to change up from 6th at 45 mph to start with. The engine is tractable, yet very friendly and will pull smoothly, with just a bit of buzziness in top between 50 and 60 mph, which disappears to creamy smooth delivery at 70 or so. It was spinning at about 6,000 revs at motorway speeds but felt quite comfortable and would pull away from there without drama. Weird to use those sort of revs on a cruiser, but it works.
The demo bike had the normal ergo-fit system and it felt a bit too compact for me, I'd probably go with the extended reach setting, whereas the bike is actually being ordered with the reduced reach setting (£270 odd for bars, pegs and seat adjustments which isn't bad, but it is annoying that it is free in some countries).
Windblast was better than the Vegas, the sloped headlight and instruments seem to deflect a bit of the wind, nowhere near as much as a screen of course, but it wouldn't be an effort to ride it for a couple of hundred miles at motorway speeds.
In short,it is a really well thought out iteration of a popular category - very different from most heavy, slow revving cruisers, but no worse for that (and better in many ways). The dealers are finding it hard to source the bikes and you can see why - they've been snapped up by quite a broad demographic who seem to want comfortable, economically, light, friendly bikes that can still manage a bit of everything,(except really fast stuff). It seemed to be good at commuting, travel and gentle bimbles.
We pick it up on Saturday, so it'll be good to see if this positive impression stays - I seriously hope so, as we've bought it on my impression of the test ride, despite it being a bike for my wife, I'm doomed if she doesn't like it.
Pics to follow when I can get them off the phone.
http://www.kawasaki.co.uk/en/products/cruiser/2015...
Basically, an er6 engine, retuned slightly to give a bit more bottom end punch, in a light cruiser chassis. Now, bearing in mind I'm coming off a big brute of a bike (Victory Vegas), and was testing it for my wife who is returning to biking after a few years, so I wasn't really being objective, but I was very pleasantly surprised, to the point that I bought it.
Thoughts:
It is really light and compact, I felt like I was on top of it, rather than 'in it', the bike is a lot shorter, but also nice and narrow. Great for filtering and really flickable for a cruiser, yet still nicely planted. Pegs are high and there is a surprising amount of ground clearance.
Gearbox is smooth, neutral is always where you want it although I felt like I wanted to change up from 6th at 45 mph to start with. The engine is tractable, yet very friendly and will pull smoothly, with just a bit of buzziness in top between 50 and 60 mph, which disappears to creamy smooth delivery at 70 or so. It was spinning at about 6,000 revs at motorway speeds but felt quite comfortable and would pull away from there without drama. Weird to use those sort of revs on a cruiser, but it works.
The demo bike had the normal ergo-fit system and it felt a bit too compact for me, I'd probably go with the extended reach setting, whereas the bike is actually being ordered with the reduced reach setting (£270 odd for bars, pegs and seat adjustments which isn't bad, but it is annoying that it is free in some countries).
Windblast was better than the Vegas, the sloped headlight and instruments seem to deflect a bit of the wind, nowhere near as much as a screen of course, but it wouldn't be an effort to ride it for a couple of hundred miles at motorway speeds.
In short,it is a really well thought out iteration of a popular category - very different from most heavy, slow revving cruisers, but no worse for that (and better in many ways). The dealers are finding it hard to source the bikes and you can see why - they've been snapped up by quite a broad demographic who seem to want comfortable, economically, light, friendly bikes that can still manage a bit of everything,(except really fast stuff). It seemed to be good at commuting, travel and gentle bimbles.
We pick it up on Saturday, so it'll be good to see if this positive impression stays - I seriously hope so, as we've bought it on my impression of the test ride, despite it being a bike for my wife, I'm doomed if she doesn't like it.
Pics to follow when I can get them off the phone.
dugsud said:
Just out of interest.....why didn't you organise a test ride for your wife too? I understand why you rode it but it seems logical for her to try it if she has a full bike licence...
She's flat out at work at the moment so couldn't get a test ride without a fair bit of juggling. She tried it out for size at the weekend and has been doing a refresher course on an er6 so knows that it fits and knows what the engine is like, plus she's still coming back from a few years away from biking so didn't feel confident taking someone else's bike on a test ride - her only concern was the buzziness of the er6, but that seems to be a result of her riding a leggy school bike. When we go and pick it up, she's going to come under on the pillion with me and we'll take our time heading back so she can get used to it.
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