It's a good point and an argument for a modern design of bike.

The XT225 Serow has 5 gears and the sprockets on mine are standard, from memory. I've never even bothered to check what HP it is supposed to produce because I know it just ain't a lot, and that is not why I bought it anyway.
(I use the Versys when I want a different riding experience).

I guess all of the old designs in the OP list have 5 gears also.

I've done plenty of long trips on my 250 Serow and it performs really well for 90% of any trip. It's the long trips on fast dual carriage that are the problem. It will do it, at a push. 4 or 5 hours at 65-70 to make the ferry but it's not happy. One thing at these speeds is to keep your eye on the oil consumption, mine drinks a bit when it's thrashed for hours at a time.

The upside though is having the right bike for the other 90% of your trip. Small, light and fuel efficient. Low powered bikes are easy on tyres and chains.

Just goes to show how things have moved on and reading through the TA's spec I'm not surprised it'll sit at 65. Both of the 15bhp 125s I've owned (2- smokers) would just about do the same but it was hard work - you had to row them along on the gearbox. It was great fun for about 20-30 miles and then I just wanted to catch the bus. Years ago I was going to go to Greece - two up - on one of them but sanity prevailed and I took something more sensible instead.
The 12bhp Honda 125 singles I owned were a lot more relaxing to ride but quite a bit slower.

The little 125 Honda Varadero will do 72 mph. with it's 15bhp

vette

:confused1: Is this your own experience, or some "published data"?

Small rider? Just seams a little 'fast'.

===============
Long trips on small bike for me = always take the back roads, then they were fun. If you wanted to get some where fast they were hard work.

xt 250
 

My wife rides an XT250 & we just came down thru Africa. She is only 5'2" & 50kg & the bike was fully packed with her gear & the kitchen sink. The bike itself was bomb proof !!! never had any trouble with it & easily kept up with me doing 100km. We had a spare fuel with her that she did use on occasions.
If you want to see photos of it just checkout our website. She loves it !!!:thumbup1:
Cheers
Paul:scooter:

Nephew has one.

It's not single cylinder.

Guess he weighs about 70kg. so not heavy or light I think.

v

Maybe the OP is looking toward the 125cc size of bike now, but the mini-Varadero is quite a tall bike actually.

:offtopic:
The mini-varadero is an interesting design of engine with a V twin layout and just 125cc (therefore quite possible to rev higher than a single and hence achive a higher road speed).
Unfortunately, the Honda V twins are all being withdrawn and the wing company seem to be relying on parallel twin engine designs, or even 4 cyls relatively small capacity engines in their place.
In the UK, they stopped marketing the XLV1000 last year and now I understand that the XLV700 transalp and the XLV125 are no longer available to the market; maybe somewhere else in the world they can be bought new?

I currently own a DR200 lovely little bike it certainly will not cruise at 70mph I would say about 55mph, but I find it a really comfortable bike and am happy to ride it over long distances never ridden it fully laden though so not sure how it would affect performance!

Hi,

I decidet to buy the Honda CGL 125 to ride 28.000 km around southamerica because it was cheap and it was NOT chinese. It is also the moast comon bike in southamérica so all the parts are easy to get:

http://www.adventure-travel-experien...en_suedamerika

Have fun :)

If that cruising sped is important (and I'm not saying it is), the look at small street bikes. My SR250 (The street version of the XT back in the early 80s here in the USA) will pass 90 with just me and no luggage. With luggage 75mph is about it, but 65 is not a problem and I've done hours and hours at that speed.

It's not as capable off road as a true dirt bike would be, but it's so light it does okay. Carbed it gets 60-70mpg loaded and has a 2.7 gallon tank.

Of course, the sr250 isn't a common bike anymore (most of them have been cafed long since), so parts are expensive. The tire sizes are weird too. While I love mine I can't comfortably recommend it when there are bikes like the Ninja and Rebel 250s out there.