Take Along Cycle Cover

Take Along Cycle Cover

As a practical matter, motorcycle covers have a lot in their favor. Even those of us with garage space for the bike have occasional need of protection from the weather, while on tour or parked during the day in the rain, or in climates that don't let you ride all year, which forces the bike into a corner of the garage.

Water isn’t that bad for the machine, dust can be washed off. but even so, having the bike covered when not in use can save work later on, and having it covered during the rain will make it easier to start and more pleasant to sit on.

^ All of which has been true since people began draping the motorcycle with a tarp or drop cloth or whatever else was around.

We’ve come a long way. Shown here is the Take Along Cycle Cover, a rather long and cumbersome title for a motorcycle overcoat. We expect it’s given the name ^because the TACC is portable. Also it's stowable, and it’s tailored, although along the lines of ready-to-wear instead of custom fit.

These are advantages because they are „ improvements. Most of the covers we’ve seen in the past were more like dust shields, heavy cloth that wouldn’t withstand rain or wind. Or they have been plastic; waterproof but difficult to pack into tight spaces and liable to damage from hot exhaust pipes.

Or they just sort of draped over the bike. No help in a wind and again, hauling one along was pretty much like trying to take the living room curtains in for cleaning.

The TACC has taken care of most of the above. It’s water-resistant, actually waterproof except in certain ways and places to be explained in a minute. It’s a fabric, which lets it squash down into a reasonably small package, and the fabric used doesn’t scorch or burn, even on a pipe, which we proved for ourselves by trying to burn it.

And it’s the shape of a motorcycle. The makers cut pieces to a pattern and joined them together. The shape is approximate, that is, there are two models, one for 350900cc road bikes with two regular mirrors, and one for lOOOcc and up with full fairing and saddlebags and rack. Naturally the cover is cut to fit all bikes in each category. Your Z-1 or CX500 will fill the cover more snugly than your RD400 or R65 and the same goes for a CB750 vs FLH80 Classic.

Because we have all sizes most of the time, we got the large model, and we’ve been using it for the past six months on whatever was in use. from GS550 to FLH 80. A small bare bike gets lost, the middleweights with fairings look baggy and the cover covered the Harley, so you do get what you expect.

The big model has what you’d call bulges, for the fairing and the bars in front and the rack and bags in back. When you’ve unrolled the cover from where it's carried, you simply locate the front and the back and unfurl the cover. A bit of tugging here and there and the seams line up and you tie the little straps behind the front wheel, beneath the engine and in front of the rear wheel. The GS550 sat outside during a thunderstorm that couldn’t have been more fierce if we’d ordered it. The wind didn’t bother the cover a bit. Still in place after one full day, and most of the bike was dry.

Most? Yes. Although the fabric is waterproof in the usual sense, meaning water by itself won’t get through, places where the cover is drawn against a hard surface, in our case the top of the fairing and the ends of the grips, the tension let water seep through the weave. No harm done. When the large cover was used on a smaller, bare bike, the fabric sagged onto the seat and water got through there. Not a fair test, because the cover was the wrong size, but a factor to consider.

Stowage also has a limit. The company says the cover can be stowed in the underseat compartment of most bikes. True in some cases, but there are bikes that don’t have underseat compartments, and our large cover was a bit too much for the GS550’s cubbyhole. Further, some of us have other things we’d rather carry there.

The best and easiest method is with a full fairing, where you have a choice of pockets and can simply plan to pack the cover in one place, perhaps next to your rainsuit or heavy sweater. And the smaller cover naturally would be easier to stow on a smaller bike.

In sum, it’s a good cover. We can’t predict total life but it has held up well for months, it has kept off most of the rain, and if you plan ahead you’ll be able to figure a place to carry it.

There’s also the emotional satisfaction of knowing your bike, the one that’s carried you all this way and will take you home, isn’t sitting out there in the rain.

From Good Products, 4924 Beatty Dr., Riverside, Calif. 92504, $34.95 for the small size and $51.95 for the large.