State of the Streetbike
State of the Streetbike
UP FRONT
David Edwards
MOTORCYCLES WILL TEACH YOU LESsons if you let them. Feature Editor Mark Hoyer and I were elbows-deep in such erudition this past May at the fourth-annual Cycle World Rolling Concours (see “Unholy Rollers,” page 72).
Temporarily between Nortons, Mark had borrowed my 1967 Atlas 750 caféracer for the 50-mile wine-country round trip. I was at the oars of my flamed BSA Gold Star, an illustration of which graced this very page for a decade or so before making room for my high-pipe Dreer Commando. The Atlas-alloy rims, breadloaf tank, bumstop seat, zoomy exhausts, etc.-is a time-capsule custom, identical to the day it was fabbed 30-plus years ago, save for new tires, shocks and the hidden primary belt I've added. The Goldie is a time-piece, too, straight from the be-bop days of the late Fifties, its only concessions to modernity a set of Works Performance shocks and a $75 off-the-shelf Dell’Orto carburetor that works better than any Amal ever did.
Underscoring that last point, Mark pulled alongside as we neared the concours loop’s finish and pointed down at the Norton’s now duff-sounding motor. At that point, I had my own problems. The Beezer had gotten progressively slower over the day-maybe 6000 miles of breathing unfiltered air had finally caught up to the old girl. But scanning the Atlas’ engine bay, I could see Mark’s malady: The left-side carb top had unscrewed itself, turning the rorty vertical-Twin into a sickly Single.
Off we pulled. “Welcome to the Wonderful World of Vibration,” I said as Mark de-gloved and laid hands on the offending Monobloc. Turns out I had my own personalized reception committee. Upon start-up, my BSA refused to, displaying all the compression of a vegetable colander. While I mentally tallied the expense of a top-end rebuild, Mark R&R’ed the trouble. A locking nut on the compression-release cable had backed off, enough that the exhaust valve wouldn’t seat. I carry a toolbag for just such roadside rehabs and a few turns of the spanner had us back on track, both bikes running better than ever.
But the point had been made. Motorcycling’s so-called Golden Era may be a nice place to visit, but you wouldn’t want to live there.
Truth is, today’s streetbikes are so good riders don’t know much about the debilitating effects of vibration, and rarely do they have to delve into a toolbag. Romanticism aside, your neighbor kid’s run-of-themill Suzuki SV650 is a better motorcycle than T.E. Lawrence’s beloved Brough Superior could ever hope to be.
As noted in last month’s “World’s Best Streetbike” shootout, when it comes to new-model choices, classics be damned, we ’re living in the good old days. And it’s only going to get better. For that, you can thank Baby Boomers’ expanding beltlines and their overly indulged grandchildren.
Allow me some explanation.
Until recently, one of the laments of motorcycle marketeers was that there was no new blood coming into the sport. Over the past decade, the age of bike enthusiasts has continued to grow—the average subscriber to this magazine, for instance, is now nudging 40. It’s the old “rat in the boa constrictor” analogy: Many from the great surge of new riders in the 1960s have stayed on two wheels, moving down the line as the years roll by. And some of those who split off to cater to careers, cohabitators and kids have come back to the fold, known to industry-watchers as “re-entry riders.” Good news is that these graying riders, less sprightly than they used to be and several pant sizes wider, have forced a new diversity in motorcycle types. Where before there was on the one (wrist aching) hand screaming-fast repli-racers, and on the other lukewarm retro-cruisers, now we have a broadening band of “sweetspot” streetbikespower-cruisers, sport-tourers, superstandards, adventure bikes, etc .-that, to use vernacular their owners understand, are capable of multi-tasking.
And just where do the Gen Y’ers come in? Well, have a look at the burgeoning off-road playbike market over the past couple of years. “It’s huge!” enthused a Yamaha higher-up I talked to. “And there doesn’t seem to be an end in sight. We’re building more and more, shipping more and more, and the dealers just keep asking for more and more.” How far-reaching is this recent phenomenon, made up of both boys and girls? Until recently, Yamaha’s PW80 minibike was the company’s best-selling two-wheeler. Now the TT-R125 is number one, outselling the Pee Wee by a factor of two!
“ft can only mean good things for the industry in the near future,” said the Yamaha man about this playbike growth spurt. See, trailriding tends to be a family affair, and children who grow up around dirtbikes will have more affinity for-and fewer parental objections against-buying a streetbike when they come of licensable age.
What kind of machine will these young new road riders be interested in? Certainly, some of the more testosterone-laced will be drawn to hardcore sportbikes, but purchase price and hefty insurance premiums will drive most of them away. Cruisers? Nope, too much like Dad’s ride.
Let me suggest the kids will be very receptive to the just-emerging streetsupermotard type of bike, machines like the surprising Suzuki V-Stromwhich almost walked off the winner of our “World’s Best Streetbike” contestthe upcoming KTM Duke V-Twin or Ducati’s 2003 Multistrada.
There is some precedent here. Many tiddler trailbike pilots of the 1960s grew up to buy dual-purpose “scramblers” in the early 1970s, so much so that for a few years half of all new bikes sold were D-P models-though in truth these were primarily streetbikes wrapped in offroad styling.
History may be just about to repeat itself.
