How the hell can you tell anything from sitting on a bike?

I went to the dealership yesterday to bring the SV in for its first service, and went upstairs to sit on all the 2005s.

Maybe I'm just too new to this, but all the bikes (sat on all the 2005 600s except Kawi, which my dealership doesn't sell, plus a 1000RR, 954RR, Gix750, 2005 R1, 2005 RC) felt more or less the same. That is to say, fast and uncomfortable.

I don't see how you can tell anything by just sitting on the bikes while standing still. But that's just my uninformed opinion.

 

did you just sit on it? or did you actully put your feet on the pegs and get into the riding position?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by bottle fed &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">did you actully put your feet on the pegs and get into the riding position?</TD></TR></TABLE>

Yes.

I mean, there were subtle diffs, like obviously the F4i felt lighter and less sporty. And of course the litrebikes felt heavier and bigger.

But there was not enough information there for me to make any kind of serious judgement about any of the bikes. Ya know?

 

Quite a bit actually... seating position being the most obvious. You can feel how your body is with the bike, ie are you sitting on top of it or do you feel integrated... you can get some feedback as to how well the bike will turn in as much as the effort it takes to initiate the turn. the relation between the seat position and the foot pegs and handle bars... Thsi is a test that I do not see many people doing but sit on the bike with your feet on the ground in an upright position, not holding on to the hadlebars and swivel yoru hips around to get a real feel of where the weight lies, up high or down low, and how hard it is to get the bike to transition from left to right. But for me the biggest thing is so your can look at yourself in a mirror and see how manly you look
none of this is a replacement for riding the bike

 

If you have been riding for a while, you feel every difference between different bikes when you sit on them.

 

You can tell a lot just by the seating position...

Too high
Too low
Top heavy
Bottom heavy
Too close to the screen
Too far away
Too wide
Too narrow
Legs cramped or not
Arms fully extended, or slightly bent
When you tuck behind the screen, do you fit (like in my case) or NOT
Is the seat comfortable
Do you have a passenger, is that person comfortable and in the proper seating position
Are the controls easy to reach with just a finger or thumb
Is the instrument cluster easy to read while in a normal riding position

And the list goes on and on and on......

But yea, nothing can replace REAL seat time to give you an accurate summation of the bike.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Ag-Eng &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">You can tell a lot just by the seating position...</TD></TR></TABLE>

But on bikes so similar, as is the case with the 600s of today, there really isn't much. At least, not enough to say "I want this bike over all the others."

Although Yamahas do have the crappiest quality switches.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Ross R &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">But on bikes so similar, as is the case with the 600s of today, there really isn't much. At least, not enough to say "I want this bike over all the others."

Although Yamahas do have the crappiest quality switches.</TD></TR></TABLE>

When I went to the bike show 2years ago, I thought the opposite. I was able to eliminate 2 of 4 bikes as I found them uncomfortable right away. The Kawasaki 6R felt like it pushed me forward to much on the seat and the Suzuki just did not feel right. The Yamaha R6 and 600RR were the most comfortable. But for my size, the Honda was the way to go.

I will admit it is not easy to just pick a bike while sitting on them and you really do not have any idea how well them lean into a corner or inspire confidence, but I have not found may dealerships that allow test drives.

 

Just from sitting on the 600's I found that :

I don't like the shape of the tank on the GSXR. It feels like I am reaching around it for some reason so the bars feel very far away.

The ZX6R's tank is cut funny and my knees go over the cut outs unless I sit way forward in the seat. I feel like I have to contort my body just to get on the thing and have all my parts where there supposed to be.

The Honda and Yamaha are very similar for me and both fit very well but I feel like I'm leaning over the front of the 600RR more than the R6.

I also like to lean the bike side to side and all that other stupid **** to see how the weight feels under me. I don't think you can pick which one is best but it does help out a little. Not that it matters much because within a few miles you can pretty much adjust to anything your on unless your the typical overweight nonathletic American