Consumer Reports's 1st motorcycles report. You agree??

Speaking from personal experience, Suzuki and Kawasaki bikes I've owned gave me way more trouble than 3 Hondas altogether. For that reason and because of higher quality fit and finish I've observed, Honda is now my preferred brand, although I would not shy away from others if I see a good deal.

CR has to be taken with a grain of salt. No point getting upset over it. It's not exactly a scientific study.
 
DemonPig: You raised a good point. I will qualify here that my Suzuki was actually built in Japan and not Thailand or China. Maybe that is part of the difference for fit and finish.. Perhaps they had a few extra Japanese ST250 type E models and decided to test them in a new territory as an experiment. My TU250X is the same as the Japanese ST250-E.
 
They don't seem to define what a 'problem' is and keep in mind that what is a problem to one, isn't necessarily for another. For example I've been told that BMW riders seem to consider the wrong colour of oil filter to be unacceptable.

And you don't?! ;)

Yes, and others will find living with a highly susceptible to failure final drive, acceptable: just part of the deal. But propeller heads are not dissimilar to any other owners who simply love their brand of bikes and are loyal to them. They all learn to live with them, warts and all and wouldn't consider other brands.

There's more to motorcycles than low maintenance and reliability...much more. No use having a dead solid, reliable bike, that leaves you feeling flat before or after a ride.

Nothing about that in any CR or most other reports put together by "visitors" to the brand/bike who just pass through to take a look and spout off about them like they are experts.

Want experts? Visit the dedicated forum for the bike you're interested in owning, and forget the magazines/reviews: all of them.
 
Last edited:
They don't seem to define what a 'problem' is and keep in mind that what is a problem to one, isn't necessarily for another. For example I've been told that BMW riders seem to consider the wrong colour of oil filter to be unacceptable.

Speaking from experience, batteries that last 2 seasons, security system that rejects your key and leaves you stranded, stalling issues, clutch issues, recall after recall, etc, etc, etc...
 
I love my Daytona...even though Dave affectionately named it "the White *****". :)
 
I laughed so hard at this.

Really Consumer Reports??? You think so? Could the possible explanation be because touring bikes actually get ridden while cruisers hang around Tim Hortons and Port Dover.

Or ... could it be that Touring bikes have far more ancillary systems than a cruiser, leading to more potential points of failure? I'm not surprised that (of the street bikes) the order of least to most problematic is cruiser -> sport touring -> touring. This directly correlates to the pecking order of electronics. CR even made this point in the report.
 
Or ... could it be that Touring bikes have far more ancillary systems than a cruiser, leading to more potential points of failure? I'm not surprised that (of the street bikes) the order of least to most problematic is cruiser -> sport touring -> touring. This directly correlates to the pecking order of electronics. CR even made this point in the report.

Tis but A joke. Perhaps next time, more smiley faces.


?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Back
Top Bottom