I think that regardless of how techy the uber-expensive trailies get, there will always be a market for a good, do-it-all bike without all the electronic wizardry. a DL-type bike will always have a following. If you want to go even more spartan, there's the KLR650. As long as there are milk crates in search of a home, there will always be KLR's.

I rode my DL-650 to my dealership today, to have the bike inspected, (Just got home.). While there, I sat on the Ténéré......

.....I did not like the fit for me. Because of its size, I feel fairly certain that I would have to change my riding style from what I am used to on my "little" bike. I don't want to do that. I feel that I am fairly "nimble" on my Wee Strom, and can do things that I don't think that I could do with the Ténéré. I would miss that.

BTW Jon, there were the little accents over each little "e" on the fuel tank. So, it is a Ténéré, and not a Tenere. That explains the price differential.




B.

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2007 DL-650 (111,000 + miles)
"A word grows to a thought; a thought to an idea; an idea to an act. All the pieces are put together, and the whole is yours."
1942, Beryl Markham: "West With the Night"
"In most men, there lurks a lesser man, and his presence smells in the the sun."
1961, Ernest K. Gann: "Fate Is The Hunter"

Amen to that.

Hey to answer your question from the other thread: I found the 12GS "fragile" in several ways. Most prominent...

1. It didn't feel planted when navigating rough off-pavement terrain (single or two track). I always felt that if it went over -even at low crawl speeds- it would simply shatter unless I was in sand. To this day the aluminum and plastics are not what I'd call tough.
2. In less than 18K miles, I had TWO instances where the engine/tranny seal failed lending to clutch work - pretty poor build.
3. First gear was ultimately too tall for real off-pavement dancing.

That's the short list. The last one is my fault in that I should've known more about the gearing before buying the bike.

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1942 Brick Bungalow
1968 Dream Wife
2007 Retirement Certificate

LOL - those *&$% accents are expensive!

Thanks. I've got to admit that I'm seriously considering a GS Adventure.

#2 is disappointing to hear, but not entirely surprising. I've not heard of this specific failure being reported frequently, but there's no shortage of other common failures on those bikes.

#3 -- I'm guessing you were on the GS and not the GSA? I've heard that 1st gear on the GSA is much lower, and is a great crawling gear, though not being able to really slip the dry clutch for fear or frying it seems like it could be a disadvantage in some situations.

#1 -- I've been on rides were GS's have been dropped in some really brutal ways. I'm sure that it's possible to damage those cylinder heads, but damn can they take a beating. I was on my KLR at the time, and I had slower-speed get-offs that broke mirrors, scratched up body panels, etc. The GS's I was with shrugged off the big drops and you couldn't even tell by looking at them that they'd been on the ground.

Me too also.

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Sent from my Hewlett-Packard 75C, using the Flying Merkel motorcycle app.

Stromin'Nroman NC28729, USA

DL650A K7 (Greywolf Moto Lab's R&D test mule) June 1, 2012 - present
DL650A K7 April 23, 2007 - January 6, 2012, RIP

"Look here brother, who you jivin' with that cosmik debris?" Frank Zappa, 1975

Just change the sproket.................

.........oh, never mind.

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Sent from my Hewlett-Packard 75C, using the Flying Merkel motorcycle app.

Stromin'Nroman NC28729, USA

DL650A K7 (Greywolf Moto Lab's R&D test mule) June 1, 2012 - present
DL650A K7 April 23, 2007 - January 6, 2012, RIP

"Look here brother, who you jivin' with that cosmik debris?" Frank Zappa, 1975

What's funny is the DL isn't even that simple. Water cooled. EFI. Just recently I discovered it has this funky secondary throttle valve doo-dad. I thought those were reserved for GSXRs.

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I just love these threads that talk about comparing a Glee/Wee/Vee to an S-10. It's a lot like comparing a Mustang to a Corvette. Sure the Mustang is nice, but it's no Corvette!

The S-10 trumps all aspects of the Strom. There isn't a single facet where the Strom outperforms the S-10. The technology of the Strom is at least 10 years older than that of the S-10.

I put 10K miles on my Vee before peddling it off. It only took a 30 mile ride on a S-10 to realize how superior it was in every way. Sure the S-10 costs more, but it is worth it!

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Life is the adventure. Motorcycles just make it more enjoyable.

You forgot to finish the sentence with "to me." There are people who will pay a couple of hundred bucks for a bottle of wine, too.

I would also note (not that I'm directing this at you specifically, no, no, no!) that studies have shown that people's rating of an item is often directly proportional to how much they think it costs. For example, in a blind test subjects tend to rate a wine higher if they are told it is expensive, and the very same wine less tasty if they are told it's from the bottom shelf.

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2007 DL650
"Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?" -- Harry M. Warner, Warner Brothers, 1927