Possible Replacement Bike

Seeing as how the weather is not good and am not allowed to ride if it was good have spent time perusing the sales listings at what is available out here and what peeks my interest ................. spoiler alert it's not another Triumph! OK that's a lie of course I would love another T140 but the budget just does not enable that so it remains a dream, have just rechecked the sales site and found one Bonnie America 800 listed at just beyond the budget limit but again it's an import and not registered and the taxes and fees put it beyond the budget plus it's not in that great shape whoever transported it here did a shitty job it seems as the right side of the tan as several scratches that show up in the photos another negative for me it's Black with some Silver panels I DON'T WANT ANOTHER BLACK BIKE!

Anyway what I really like and am hankering after is another lowrider style bike what Americans refer to as a Cruiser but not Dresser type the drawback is that most of these are not exactly lightweights and probably weigh as much if not more than my Trophy 900 but the weight is lower down of course o have been doing a little research on the various makes and models and getting the low down on what to look for and an old problem has raised it's ugly head .................. modding/customising seeing a nice std bike and right away thinking Ooooooooh I could just do this and it's needs to be a bit lower in the rear . So have been looking at the following bikes:-

Honda Shadow
Kawasaki Vulcan
Suzuki Intruder
Yamaha Drag Star/V-Star

Leading the pack so far is a 2004 Honda 750 Shadow Black Widow:-

https://www.mobile.bg/obiava-51749133192508943-honda-shadow-black-widow

It's higher mileage at 70,000km but it looks very clean and maintained it's also a chain driven on not shaft, never had a shaft drive bike and from my research both Yamaha and Suzuki can have issues with splines stripping chains I know it's at the top end of the budget but it's registered just need to pay the transfer fees no import taxes and it's been for sale for some time, not unusual here, they have dropped the price once already in September and it's winter now so hopefully there will be room for haggling and here's hopping it does not sell before I can get down there to have a look at it. Will need a day as it's 250km away so realistically it will e the new year before that can happen and the weather could scupper that if we get lots of snow and I would really like to get a test ride so need to get a new helmet first.

Plezier

 

Well I am no expert on them but the Shadow 750 Spirit/ Black Widow is a V-Twin I believe that the VFR is a V-4. The Black Widow on 2004 is still on carbs not sure if it's a single or twin set up also need to figure out what crank set up it has as they did two versions one of which gives a distinct Harley tick over and sound that is often claimed to be a single pin crank it's not really but you know how things stick it makes little difference from what I can find it makes no real difference to the way it actually runs and performs but it really pissed off Harley who it seems tried to sue Honda several times over it. This one is chain drive they also offered them with shaft drive so far have discovered that they offered six models some shaft drive other chain drive the models are:-

ACE
Custom
Aero
Phantom
Spirit
Black Widow

As it's at the official Honda dealers there is a hope it has service documentation although my experience with cars and service records is that they are often falsified and not to be trusted. It's not a powerful bike in fact was surprised to see how modest it is on power it only has abot half the power of the 900 Trophy. Have found a couple of things that can cause problems none are large or expensive to sort one is the connector plug for the stator over heats and fuses/melts not sure if the rectifier is prone or not but at this age might be something to look at renewing?

Another of course is aging ignition coils and leads normal for a 20+ year old bike.

Plezier

 

Although I sometimes totally fail I do try to research them when buying a bike but then again it's hard not to get impatient and just jump right in my nephew does not understand my obsession with "Two Wheeled Death machines" as he calls them nor when I had put the Ducati up for sale after buying the Trophy 900 and now I am looking at other bikes .

While I really like the Trophy and love the way it handles twice now it has hit the deck on the left side first time was my left foot slid out when I was trying to back it up on a adverse camber second was when doing a U-Turn again on a camber at a junction and stalled it down we went. So my thought is that a lighter bike or at least one with the weight lower down as the Trophy is rather top heavy and it's going to take effort to build myself up once the arm etc is finally healed.

Just had a rather sobering thought that if I had actually known about these bikes before buying the Triumph though they are in fact more than I paid for the Trophy I might have been swayed that way even though I got a cracking deal on the Trophy this Honda is almost twice the amount the Trophy cost. The Triumph Trophy is not a popular bike here it seems which keeps the prices down. The trophy is also the very first bike with a fairing that I have had!

Plezier

 

I think there is some confusion here I already bought the 97 Trophy 900 end of May start of June this year it current;y has 41,275km on the clock



This was taken just after getting it home.



That was taken when was balancing the carbs it had less than 39,000km on it when I bought it. Oh it came from Switzerland. I am not getting rid of the Trophy the Honda will just replace the wrecked Ducati totally different I know but have ticked the Ducati box now and for long distance and maybe a bit of touring I have the Trophy.

Now the sales market is really strange here they do not really consider mileage it's all on age .......................... weird and something that does my head in and the market is pretty slow and I am really hoping that this means when I can move on this and go take a serious look at it that it's still for sale.

As for the weather here it's also weird to me yes the summer is hot we had temps on 46c and the thermometer is shaded from the sun as under the "lean to" that covers/shades the entrance but we can get nice periods during the winter too December 26th 2017 was sitting on the patio in Tee-Shirt as it was so warm two weeks later we had snow. Today it's 6c I have not been to Sunny Beach or very far south at all we are located about 3 hours from Varna the coastal town and I have been there but it was winter with snow as had to take Mum to the eye hospital there.. Intend to visit the coast in good weather in the coming year need to persuade the nephew to look after the hounds for a few days also plan on riding up into the mountains in good weather.

Plezier

 

Indeed I had been looking at the Aprilla Pegaso listings but the thing is that I no longer ride in inclement weather there is no need for me to do so not like when I used the Bike to and from work in fact in 78 I was seriously thinking of a Ducati 900SS Desmo but as you said the electrics were rather poor so I went with a new Triumph T140E UK version but now having had the 620ie Monster the Ducati box has been ticked incidentally have always wanted a Harley but they were always so expensive I did actually go to a big Harley dealership enquiring about a 1340 Lowrider I love the original Sturgis even if it is Black was in a good job but the price was still high and the finance was stupidly high interest at the time was high but they were being GREEDY. In 93 a friend bought a new 883 Sportster and I rode on the back of it several times the only reason it was the 883 was that he could not get insurance on the 1200. Anyway Harley is out as they are beyond the budget plus they are so damned heavy no one has even been able to tell why Harley's are so heavy!

Now the Shadow is heavier that ideally I wanted but the weight is lower down so more manageable for me and I really do love the lowrider style that's why I built that one back in 87/88. That was hard tail though and oddly enough it was really comfortable and I rode it all over the south of England of course I was 40 years younger then . Now even longer ago than that I did ride a few trail/enduro type bikes as had friends that were into that I would have been all of 18 years old then but they never grabbed me an unlike these adventure bikes those trail/Enduro bikes were stripped down to be light now it seems everything has to weigh half a ton.

Plezier

 

The only Sporster that is only 1,000 bgn above the price of the Shadow I am looking at has a dented tank and it's not registered the next is 2,000bgn over the Honda that's a 1200 sporty from 96 now add another 500bgn on top of that and we have a 2004 again unregistered here so more money on top.

I did look at other makes just checked the Kawasaki VN and found this:-

https://www.mobile.bg/obiava-51741031168288175-kawasaki-vn-koledna-promotsiya

https://www.mobile.bg/obiava-51753438676595263-kawasaki-vulcan-800-perfekten-22-600km

For some reason the Kawasaki VN are cheaper that the Honda Shadow's? Again many are fresh imports from Europe so need registering but that Blues one on offer is basically 3.000bgn cheaper than the Black Widow Honda I like. There is another VN800 a 1995 chain drive on with 51,000km on the clock that is 2,700bgn cheaper than the Honda then of course there is Yamaha Drag Star the more one looks the more confusing it gets.

Plezier

 

No am not in the winter sports area your thinking Bansko am in the Veliko Tarnovo region that was the capital in the medieval period and the cit of VT has a huge fortress besides the gorge of the Yantra river.



Took this from the road below on ride out on te Ducati have never actually visited the fortress as yet and yes it has a lare church inside the walls..



Those outer walls go for miles. They have a huge historical re-enactment festival there covering many periods the Romans were here for a long time on Emperor wanted to move the empires capital to the Black Sea near Burgas.

Ahhh but I like those aftermarket pipes on the Shadow plus if you look at photo No7 of the Blue VN the tank has a really nice dent in the right side and another smaller one towards the seat same side. Shame but probably why it's special offer. You see am trying the keep the budget to 7,000bgn there are no Harley's at that price point that are not damaged at least. As I am a pensioner there is limits to what I can spend on toys. If things were different finance wise I might look the Honda Fury but those are about double the budget.

Plezier

 

You have to watch road conditions a bit more than most places though they are repairing more roads now than when we first arrived one road we use to go a nearby town to do shopping is still a little rough but it easily passable in a normal car now unlike the first time we travelled it then the Land Rover Discovery found it rather testing in places. But yes we have some really nice sweeping roads, oh yes they seem to love adverse camber bends here something to watch for, it's fairly easy to find nice quiet roads to ride and some nice scenery to look at.


This is looking at a gorge from a road some 150 yards back from it's edge. The red blob just over half past the center to the right is a person walking the trail along the opposite edge no visible from where I was there are several water falls at Honista where there is parking for people to use when visiting the falls and gorge with a cafe/bar for refreshments.



This one got closer the edge to take only on the phone need t got with a proper camera one day. The darker line across the bottom of the sky is not cloud but the distant mountain range there are three that cross Bulgaria.

Now back to bikes ................. not sure if I showed you the light blue VN800

https://www.mobile.bg/obiava-51753438676595263-kawasaki-vulcan-800-perfekten-22-600km

With a fat boy style front wheel ... OK could live with that some of the chrome addons like the pigs head would have to go along with the licence plate mounting. Not sure what's with the air intake would need to look closer at it in person an research what it is but the headlight peak would probably be gone and those mufflers need to hear them the Trophy is way to quiet don't need another whisperer.

Oh yes did a quick search to see if a replacement undented tank could be found for the reduced Blue VN800 cold only find more damaged tanks and some silly greedy prices for some of them.

Plezier

 

That yellow TT600 has been for sale for at least a couple of years people on thee very forums advised me to stay away from it the price was and is rather attractive. Now that cheaper pale blue N with the Hyper charger fitted ( had to do a little web surfing to find out what that is once a youtube vid revealed that is was called a hyper charger) anyway that is an import from Italy. Now this is purely my guess work but it's possible it was brought over to Europe by US service personel have seen a Honda Magna 65 listed that the seller obtained from a US base in Germany where it had stood in storage for a decade or more.

There is a US base down south I am told a lady whom I got my Draahthar hound from sold her house to a soldier based there so unless she lied?

Importing from another EU country is quite easy for the legals my Trophy was unregistered it was Swiss registered how difficult seem to vary of which district you reside in although the law is the same the officials seem to run their own little kingdoms the process for that Italian pale lue VN would be go to the local KAT office where it's for sale now it's with a dealer so they would most likely handle this it means sitting around waiting while they toddle off and deal with this part and they comeback with temporary transport plates these last a month you get insurance on the chassis number put the plate on and off you go the transport plate cost about 25bgn (12 euro) then within the month you got to your local KAT office to get it registered this is where they hit you with the taxes, ECO tax, Import tax and even VAT which is actually illegal as thee is no VAT on second hand goods!!! then the chare for the licence plate now not being able to speak an write Bulgarian I require the services of a translator the one I have used in the past has gotten greedy and is now charging about 4x what he used to he now charges for a day even if it only takes a couple of hours he used to 25bgn if it only took a couple of hours now he charges 100bgn and will often deal with multiple clients a day he is supposed to provide a receipt for his services but I have never been given one so he is stiffing the tax man. The registration process also gives you a test certificate bikes only require testing biannually not annually like cars bikes are also exempt from the vignette (road tax) ut still liable for the Municipal tax that you have to pay for the privilege of owning a vehicle. When you pay you property tax it will include the tax for all and any vehicles registered to you property.

Just to complicate things sometime they refuse the transport plate then it means a trailer or van to move the vehicle to KAT Oh yes and once registered the vehicle MUST be insured once you get the proper licence plate you get the insurance amended to show the licence number not just the frame number if you let the insurance lapse after a period of time they will de-register the vehicle and that's another whole ballache to deal with my Ducati had been de-registered to avoid the tax we had to book a special test at a special testing place after it passed that we had then to go to KAT and go through the normal registration process which involves another test am going to be de-registering the Ducati again so don't get lumbered with the tax for 2026 provided the insurance company does not get uppity about it.

OK that's covered that I have pretty much settled on a Cruiser style bike (what I know as lowrider/street fighter yes I am old) now I have my eyes on these:-

Honda Black Widow 750DC (Nice Blue)
Kawasaki VN800 Vulcan (Pale Blue) with Hyper Charger.
VN800 the blue one with dented tank (must be able to get that dent out?)
Yamaha Drag Star 650 and now the
Suzuki VZ800 Marauda and
Suzuki Intruder

This one is actually fairly local to me:=

https://www.mobile.bg/obiava-51757921186579975-suzuki-intruder-vs800

So might be able to look at and see what I think of it in the "flesh so to speak" mileage is on par with the Honda Black Widow that started all this.

Plezier