I am about as mechanically inclined as Mary Poppins. I can operate a motor vehicle reasonably well, but cannot tell the difference between a connecting rod, a crankshaft, and a camshaft.
Show me how to make the thing go, stop, and change directions, and I’m good to go. Everything else is just fluff I don’t need to know. Blow a tranny? Not a problem. Just call roadside assist.
Which is why picking out a motorcycle as my first bike – for a noob – is like trying to figure out how to put together a nuclear reactor. Where do I even begin?
A year ago, after getting the Vespa, I would have wagered my right kidney that this nimble little scooter was the only thing I would ever need to haul my rather ample posterior all over Malaya. It made perfect sense – it’s light, manoeuvrable, so easy to use that even a circus monkey could operate it, economical, and with low running costs. And with no fiddly carburettor, it was as reliable as a light switch.
The problem was on long hauls. While the Vespa is great as a city carver, and on B roads and back alleys, on highways, it doesn’t exactly inspire confidence. With the throttle pulled back to the stops, she’ll only do 109kph. Not even 110kph. Just 109, and only 109kph. At those speeds, your dental fillings come loose, and because of the small wheels, it’s a boneshaker. Imagine being strapped onto an earthquake simulation device and riding it all the way to Penang.
The other main issue is, it just doesn’t have enough grunt to get you out of tight spots. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve seen a ‘Hailak’ in my side mirror hurtling towards me and could not veer out of the way because I’m boxed in. I couldn’t bang on the throttle either. Because she will only do 109kph. Not even 110kph. Just 109, and only 109kph.
The other important criteria is Reliability. After a year of fuss-free puttering about on the Vespa, I have been ‘spoilt’ by the reliability it affords me. Cold starts are never a problem, the engine fires up with every push of the start button, every single time. In the 12 months and eight days that I’ve had her, she’s failed to start only once, and that too, after a gruelling, non-stop, four-hour ride from Ipoh to Kuala Lumpur, with the throttle firewalled. All it took was a short, 10-minute break by the side of the road for the powerplant to cool down, and then she was back in business.
Simplicity is also key. I once asked Mikhail Waldenburg, designer of the MiG-29 fighter, what was the best system that’s in the ‘Fulcrum’.
His reply was, “The one that is not on the airplane”. Perhaps seeing the puzzled look on my face, Waldenburg added, “Because it can never fail”.
Modern motorcycles have a bunch of ‘riding aids’ – from ABS, to ‘ride-by-wire’, traction control, and the different riding modes – typically, Sport, Road, and Rain. All this, ostensibly, to “enhance the riding experience”. Somehow, the thought of fiddling with the owner’s manual, endlessly thumbing buttons to step through the different modes and settings, missing a step, and starting over, just takes the appeal away from swinging a leg over the seat, thumbing the engine ARM switch, pressing the starter button, kicking it in gear, and just ‘go’. Too many things can go wrong.
In these fiscally challenging times, where you have to think twice before cracking an egg to make an omelette, Affordability and Low Running Costs are very important. You want a machine that is bulletproof, has a high mean time between failures, can take a beating and still chug along, and takes frugal sips of that sweet RON 95. The last thing you want is to end up with a ‘hangar queen’.
But ultimately, you want a motorcycle that fits your riding style, you temperament, your capabilities. Sure, it would be easy to get the 2,293cc Triumph Rocket III or the 998cc Kawasaki Ninja H2, but the likelihood of me ending up wrapped around a tree would be very high. The key is to find a balance – a bike that is easy to handle, not too much of a wild mustang, but has the poke, if and when you need it.
Like everything else in life, choosing the right bike is a compromise. Arriving at a series of compromises that you can live with for the long haul … now that’s easier said than done.
