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**colebatch** · #21 21 Jun 2013

Quote:

Originally Posted by boniontheroad

But just curious, could you comment more on this?
It's kinda heavy for off-road, i know... And loaded with long-time-travel luggage on such bikes i would for sure avoid trail tracks anywhere as much as possible :-) Have done some day's on sand(y) tracks in West Afrika, whished i was on a bicycle those day's!

Yes I can comment more on the weight issue.

The dry weight of the outgoing standard R1200GS is 203 kgs.

The dry weight of the F800 Adventure is the same. Its supposed to be a lighter bike - a middle weight bike. It isnt. If 200 kgs is a big adventure bike then middle weight bikes should be 165-180 kgs dry. I cant see how anyone can consider a 229 kg wet weight bike (without luggage) anything but a big / heavy bike.

The problem is when you look closely at an F800, you struggle to find any evidence on the bike have BMW designers been weight conscious. If BMW had put a little effort into weight reduction the bike could easily be 25 -30 kgs lighter

Your Tenere 660 is also about 185 kg dry weight. As far as I am aware, its the heaviest single cylinder bike in the world. Possibly the heaviest single cylinder bike ever built. Again, Yamaha has made zero effort to reduce weight. That bike could be 40 kgs lighter.

Manufacturers make a lot of effort to reduce weight on track replica bikes, on MX bikes and on proper enduro bikes. But they dont make any effort on adventure bikes. And if the adventure bike buying public dont demand lighter adventure bikes, the manufacturers never will bother making any effort to reduce the weight of them.

In response to your debating of F800 vs X-challenge (144 kgs dry), I recommend you read these thoughts from a man who not only owns both, but has done proper off road adventuring on both the F800GS and the XC (each bike for at least 3 months across Siberia and Latin America) - With that experience of both bikes I know of no-one more qualified to give a balanced, objective comparison on real world adventuring on those two bikes:

Quote:

"I used my big and heavy F800GS on this trip to BAM and ROB and it was possible to get the big and heavy bike through there. BUT on the other hand, it would be MUCH easier and MUCH more fun if I had brought a lighter bike more tailored for this kind of adventure riding.

I was riding with 4 BMW G650X bikes on this journey and I saw how much easier they handled their bikes than me. I actually thought that it was more about riding skills than about the bikes itself.

The stage II of my journey from US, through Central America and to South America I bought myself a BMW G650Xchallenge with the hotrod tank and prepped up with the Magadan softbags. Oh man what a difference when you get off the road. This bike is just so much lighter and handles so easy compared to the F800GS (Which is just slightly heavier than the Sertao(?)). One person in our group had a F800GS and I saw that he had the same kind of struggle offroad which I had with mine. Now with my XC it was just so much more fun going offroad and I could keep more in control and balance on the dirtroads. On the asphalt roads the F800GS gives you more comfort and power, but while offroading this is a huge difference. "

ADVrider - View Single Post - Sibirsky Extreme 2012

The same guy, in another post in an answer to a question about comparing the two as adventure bikes, wrote this:

Quote:

"F800 vs XC:
I see that for light offroading, easy dirt roads and mostly staying on asphalt - the F800GS is a more comfortable and powerfull bike which handles that quite well. I feel it is a bit on the heavy side and I dropped my bike from time to time.
Fore more offroading I simply want a bike that are as light as possible. On the paper there is about 50-60 kilos (?) on the XC and F800 which really makes a difference. The XC is also quite narrow and has good ground clearance. Ground clearance is like on a offroad car a good thing. The XC is just much easier to handle in every means.

So if I were to plan the same trip again I would choose XC. I feel that the offroad capabillities in the XC is more important than the better street performance the F800 gives you. I usually don't go much faster than 120km/h over long distances anyway"

Bear in mind he was referring to the F800GS ... the new F800Adventure is 15-20 kgs heavier again!

A further interesting observation related to weight from one of us HUBBers riding around the world on a KTM 690 (138 kgs dry) at the moment. He was last month in the stunning scenery of Tajikistan ...

Quote:

"Soon after the tunnel I met a guy from Germany on a brand new BMW 1200. I told him about the tunnel and the southern route along the Pamir. He said he would skip the southern route because he is not confident in his ability with this heavy bike. I wanted to ask him why? Why have a big bike if it will limit your trip?"

ADVrider - View Single Post - RTW with Noah on a KTM 690

Why have a big bike if it will limit your trip?

To me this is one of the ultimate questions that I see people who are new to Adventure Motorcycling failing to ask themselves. Certainly there are some very skilled riders for whom a big bike will not limit their choice of routes. But they are a tiny minority in the world of adventure riders. For the rest (98%) of us mortals, we need to seriously consider weight.

You should not be limiting your adventure because of your choice of a heavy bike. If a person limits their adventure because of the weight of their bike, then the adventure itself was not their priority. Maybe image is? Maybe something else? (not that there is anything wrong with that)

My experience when it comes to bike selection, gear selection, tyre selection etc .... is you should plan for the toughest parts of your trip. If a guy is riding from London to Cameroon, across the Sahara, the experienced man will not select his bike, his tyres, his luggage as to what will work best on the motorways of Europe. If the hardest part of that planned trip is the dunes of the Sahara, then he needs his choices to first and foremost, be compatible with that. Any adventure bike for a given trip is a compromise. But the selection criteria you should compromise the least, are those required for the hardest parts of the trip. A wise choice is not an even compromise between all aspects of your trip, its a compromise heavily biased towards the hardest parts of your trip.

You should plan (and select gear) for the toughest parts of the adventure you want to have. Any bike, any luggage, any tyres can deal with the easy stuff ...

Here are more observations related to bike weight from another HUBB writer a few weeks ago in Mongolia:

Quote:

"I stayed at the Oasis in Ulaanbaatar and tryed to find out the road conditions by talking to other bikers who came via the south route.
...
A guy,who hasn't ridden a bike for years,did it on a XT250 and discribed it as pure fun.
Others on XT660 described it as challenging but O.K.
Then there were two guys on BMW 1200 GS Adventure who ended up on a truck."

Whats clear from those observations is that the amount of fun was totally connected to the weight of the bikes.

Here's another story from last year and Mongolia - written from the perspective of a different guy on a KTM 690 (138 kg dry):

Quote:

"After a few hours we saw some bikes approaching (we'd seen nothing for hours) and realised it was a couple of overlanders. We pulled over together and said our hellos.
This was a couple of German guys ... on their mighty behemoths [Yamaha 1200 Super Tenere and BMW 1150 GSA], with every bolt-on goodie you could imagine. The guys had some English so they asked us what lay ahead and when we told them of the mud and crossings they had the look of seriously worried men. They were traveling at about 40kph (25mph) as the bikes were so heavy they daren't go much faster. ... [the author was travelling in a group of mostly 650cc BMWs and KTMs at over twice those speeds]
These guys were having their holiday ruined by the amount of kit they'd brought to make their holiday better. We'd been having a ball on the run through-
they were seriously worried.
The guy on the Super Ten looked at our setups and the nearest bike and said " I want that bike!"
Take heed anyone planning a first trip."

ADVrider - View Single Post - Sibirsky Extreme 2012

[edit] A new comment just in from UB, from another adventurer, whose 1200 GSA was too heavy for the job and ultimately arrived into the Mongolian capital on the back of a truck.

Quote:

Don't do Mongolia on a fully loaded 1200 if it is raining... its a nightmare

http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hub...mongolia-71550

The reality is, as soon as you get off the asphalt, weight is a very very important issue. Lose 40 kgs and its a totally different experience, as the guy comparing his experiences between the F800 and the XC pointed out. The difference between suffering / enduring somewhere like Mongolia and enjoying it, is 40-50 kgs in bike weight.