New Transalp Owning Member - Me and My Bike

[steved1969]

Just thought I would stick my head in and say hello to everyone and also introduce myself and my bike.

Me: As 40 rapidly approaches I finally grew out of sports bikes and fell for the Long Way Round marketing dream instead, so gone are the sports bikes of old to be replaced by a 'dual purpose' RTW steed instead. A quick look at the dual purpose market revealed a few things:
1. GS1150 Adventurers are bloody expensive
2. Varadero's are bloody ugly
3. TransAlps are quite reasonable, and supposedly last forever.

With my research concluded it was off to the nearest Honda dealer some ten months ago where a new Honda TransAlp 650 was purchased.

Ten months and 7000 miles on from then the first step in the RTW dream is about to happen, just not round the world, round Britain (mainland) instead, although when I say round I actually mean end to end in a nice relaxed fashion, plodding along at 350 miles a day or so taking the scenic route.

My thoughts on the Transalp so far:
1. Proper good laugh - fast A roads and lake district narrow paved roads are all taken in it's stride.
2. Not that good fuel economy, really expected more than 175 miles to a tank
3. Uncomfortable bike - Really not finding the seat comfortable, have tried fitting a gel pad, didn't like that, also have an airhawk seat cushion on it at the moment, but can't say I am too impressed with that either - next step is to add some better foam to the existing seat.
4. Vibrations are a pain - My god the engine on this bike vibrates a lot (adding to the discomfort). Used to be that I could only ride it for about 120 miles before my fingers were tingling from the vibes, changed the grips to some aftermarket ones now and that appears to have resolved the issue (at least for my hands).

All that said I still think it's a great bike, the bits and pieces like seat comfort (lack of) will all be sorted eventually.

Changes made to the stock bike (so far):
1. Scottoiler
2. Honda 12V DC Socket, located in a sensible spot though rather than the recommended location, so now I can actually ride with things plugged into it!
3. Handlebar raisers
4. Aftermarket grips
5. Airhawk piles cushion
6. Givi side racks for Givi luggage
7. Screen modified by bolting on a spoiler from an old Fazer screen, works pretty well
8. Official Honda center stand - slightly concerned about the stability of this though, a slight breeze when the bike is on the stand is enough to roll it off the stand, may have to fine tune the fittment (aka Grind some metal away to make it less upright when on the stand).
9. Garmin Quest Sat Nav fitted

Think that's everything, if anyone is really interested in any of the above I can grab some photo's and go into them in more detail.

Steve

[Lutin]

Hello and welcome to the site.

Can't say that I have a problem with the Honda centre stand on my 2004 TA. There's no way that a "breeze" would have it rolling off the stand. In my opinion when the bikes' on its centre stand it's rock solid.

And yes the standrard seats are a pain.

[steved1969]

Hello and welcome to the site.

Can't say that I have a problem with the Honda centre stand on my 2004 TA. There's no way that a "breeze" would have it rolling off the stand. In my opinion when the bikes' on its centre stand it's rock solid.

Hmmm - May have to have another look at mine then, as when it is on the center stand the stand is almost straight up and down - my mechanical aptitude can be summed up by the motto "there is nothing that can't be fixed with a big enough hammer applied to the correct spot" so it isn't against the realms of possibility that there has been some error in the fitting process!

[fatowl]

Welcome to the site ! I second Lutin about the stand. I have a grenuine Honda stand, and it's rock solid.

[MCsanandreas]

hi and welcome to the madhouse!!

i own a 600T/A and the seat of the 650 put me off buying the bike. it just felt "wrong" mine is much better(but i would say that?!!)

[steved1969]

It's a bizarre situation - with all of the money that companies such as Honda have available to spend on R&D you would have thought they would have been able to make a comfortable seat by now (not that it's just a honda issue). Maybe for ickle Japanease riders they are fine, but us chunky monkeys ride bikes also !!!

Still, sorting out all of the little niggles and making it right for me all goes towards making the bike mine I guess.

[pale rider]

Hi Steve
welcome to the site mate..i'm in the process of fitting a power socket on my transalp and at the moment it is still in the planning stage i would welcome any pictoral help to do this and your offer of photo's to better illustrate the job you did would be much appreciated..

Derek..

[nick]

afternoon....

I picked up my 700 yesterday in Lincs and drove it back to Surrey and the vibrations were definatly noticable than my last bike.... What are the aftermarket grips you got ?

When you say modified screen have you put something on the standard screen or the touring one? Ive got the touring one and I'm 6'1" and there seems to be a lot of turbulant wind coming off of the top of it and hits me right in the face and cant really ride with my visor up anymore which on a day like today was a tad warm ! Have seen a guy at work with a Touratech "Spoiler" on the top of his (BMW GS) and wondering of that might made a difference or just get the lower seat.... Any thoughts ?

Only put a few miles on the bike but loving it so far.....

[steved1969]

OK, this should work (fingers crossed).

12V DC Connector, in the following two images, the circled area is the recommended mounting point care of Honda - The shiny screw with the arrow pointing to is is where I ended up fitting it, just drilled through the plastic, grabbed a nut and bolt and fastened it on!






The screen is a tweak using an old MRA Vario screen that I had for one of my old bikes (Honda Fazer) - The screen has an adjustable spoiler on the top of it, all I did was unscrew the spoiler from the fazer screen, drilled four holes in my TransAlp screen and bolted it straight on - Seems to make a huge difference to me, reducing buffeting to an almost none existent level.

[steved1969]

Anyone who likes the idea of one of those Vario screens, they are available from HPS for a huge range of bikes. Linky Linky