Horst
10-23-2005, 06:40 PM
One Year of Ownwership...
Last month marked the first year I've had my beautiful 2002 Wineberry ST1100A, and I thought to record my impressions here for the benefit of other ST1100 owners. Feel free to chime in with your experiences and thoughts.
My other recent bikes were an older GL1500 and more recent R1150R, so comparisons to those bikes seemed obvious. After riding the STeed home the first time, I felt like riding on a cloud - but some time later a few shortcomings made themselves known. Here's a list of changes I made, most of them in the first few months.
Farkles - 1) Corbin Seat, 2) Honda backrest, 3) Throttle Meister, 4) H4 bulb upgrade, 5) Ventura light guard, 6) Electric Vest wiring harness.
Maintenance - 1) EBC HH brake pads, 2) BT020 tires, 3) All fluids changed.
These changes cured the problems - now I was free to ride. And I did - to WA and OR and of course many miles in Beautiful BC. True to it's sport touring nature, the entire package comes down rougly half-way between the plush but over-porked GL1500, and the light, nimble, and quick Beemer that has absolutely NO weather protection.
The ST has adequate power, not crazy like, but the 4-6K midrange is superb - gobs of passing power and will cruise at 90 mph all day if required, and in fair comfort too. Not many bikes can do that. Handling is almost like the smaller VFR, not quite. Gas mileage is excellent - I got 56MPG one time (CDN gallon) - 5L/100km. Luggage is great, the bags are big and not 'cut in' like the Beemer's. Weather protection is great - both wind, cold, and rain just miss me and I get a bit of rain over the shoulders, that's it. And the brakes - the ABS really works and there are the best brakes I've had on a vehicle except for the Beemer's. They are that good, and predictable. And, the bike looks good with or without luggage :)
As for colour, I've seen red, green, and black ST11's but Wineberry is still my choice :)
Last month marked the first year I've had my beautiful 2002 Wineberry ST1100A, and I thought to record my impressions here for the benefit of other ST1100 owners. Feel free to chime in with your experiences and thoughts.
My other recent bikes were an older GL1500 and more recent R1150R, so comparisons to those bikes seemed obvious. After riding the STeed home the first time, I felt like riding on a cloud - but some time later a few shortcomings made themselves known. Here's a list of changes I made, most of them in the first few months.
Farkles - 1) Corbin Seat, 2) Honda backrest, 3) Throttle Meister, 4) H4 bulb upgrade, 5) Ventura light guard, 6) Electric Vest wiring harness.
Maintenance - 1) EBC HH brake pads, 2) BT020 tires, 3) All fluids changed.
These changes cured the problems - now I was free to ride. And I did - to WA and OR and of course many miles in Beautiful BC. True to it's sport touring nature, the entire package comes down rougly half-way between the plush but over-porked GL1500, and the light, nimble, and quick Beemer that has absolutely NO weather protection.
The ST has adequate power, not crazy like, but the 4-6K midrange is superb - gobs of passing power and will cruise at 90 mph all day if required, and in fair comfort too. Not many bikes can do that. Handling is almost like the smaller VFR, not quite. Gas mileage is excellent - I got 56MPG one time (CDN gallon) - 5L/100km. Luggage is great, the bags are big and not 'cut in' like the Beemer's. Weather protection is great - both wind, cold, and rain just miss me and I get a bit of rain over the shoulders, that's it. And the brakes - the ABS really works and there are the best brakes I've had on a vehicle except for the Beemer's. They are that good, and predictable. And, the bike looks good with or without luggage :)
As for colour, I've seen red, green, and black ST11's but Wineberry is still my choice :)