Just curious as to what bike was the worst for you ?
The VTX 1800 was by far the worst bike i ever owned.
it was heavy , handled terrible and scraped the pegs in almost any turn. was downright scary to ride and my wife hatted that cushion on the back.
i can not think of a good quality it had other than being reliable.
1983 Honda V65 Magna. Man, what an ugly bike. The back end rose up during heavy acceleration. The front end got really light above 70 mph. The riding position was between cruiser and standard, and transmitted bumps directly up my spine. Working on the carbs was a PITA. Other than that, it would go really fast. In a straight line. I laid it down once. I went into a decreasing radius turn with too much speed. It was either lean more or brake/stand it up/go over the top edge and into some woods. I leaned and very quickly discovered the limits of the bike's geometry. We both slid. I was okay. The bike went crankcase-first into a reflector pole.
I've only owned 9 bikes...none was bad, all were fun. Maybe one didn't fit me well, or maybe one needed more work than another, but enjoyed riding them all whether it's for 10 years and counting (KLR650), or for less than 2 months (Street Twin).
1978 KLE250
1977 SX650
1983 SX650
2004 Sportster
2007 KLR650
2013 Honda CGL125
2014 CB1100 Standard
2017 Triumph Street Twin
2017 CB1100 EX
1953 Indian Chief. "Oh yeah! Wow! Really? Man, wish I had one of those!" People get purty silly at the mention of an Indian. Then I tell'em I never did ride it home. The guy I bought it from brought the bike over to my place, he was leery about letting an 18 yr old ride his Indian until he had cash in hand. It was, of course, foot clutch/hand shift. If you can drive a 2-cylinder John Deere tractor, this Indian was no problem.
But, any time I managed to get the bike started and on the street for a ride, it broke. And I pushed it home, every single time! I got tired of that real quick and tried in vain to sell it. It was just an old motorcycle, nobody wanted those old things when you could get a new CB750 or a Z1 Kawasaki.
1982 Moto Guzzi V50 III. Bought new. I intended it to be my commuter, and it was pretty awful at that. It had a terrible habit of shutting down at inopportune times due to a bad connection at the ignition switch. I recall fiddly points and carburetor adjustments, and an oil leak or two.
Then one day that horrid bike just decided to throw me to the ground when I mounted it in a parking lot. At the time it was only a few years old, with 18K miles and looked like new. I sold it to a friend for $500; he LOVED it and rode it for 12 years, then sold it for $1200!
That bike hated me, and I hated it. Then, in 2014, I made the mistake of falling in love with another Moto Guzzi, a 2003 California Aluminium. That one, at least, wasn't unreliable junk, but the vibration and utterly stupid gearing (way high; you never get out of third gear unless on the highway) made my ardor fade. I sold that one to another friend (who loves it) and the CB1100 took its place in my garage.
The CB1100 is a winner!
2009 Kawasaki Vulcan 1700 Classic - Of the four bikes I’ve owned this was the worst.
I bought it ‘new’, insanely cheap in 2012 as a leftover. Had the little brother Vulcan 900 prior and then I got the ‘need a bigger bike’ bug. Should have never gotten rid of the bullet proof 900...the 1700 was bulky heavy, the transmission was clunky and the engine stuttered when accelerating. Had it back to the dealer a couple times and was told ‘that’s just the way they run’.
Traded it in on the CB1100 and the rest is history.
Of two Suzuki's, one Triumph, two BMW's, and five Hondas there are two that come to mind as being less than spectacular.
The worst was the 60's something Triumph Daytona 500. In some degree of fairness, when I bought it a friend helped load the boxes of parts into his truck. I did ride it for most of a summer but sold it quickly.
The other was an '86 Gold Wing Aspencade SEI with a California Sidecar. I bought it in Phoenix and rode it home. The Gold Wing just didn't suit me as the complexity of the dazzling "features" created a constant series of problems wore me down and the appreciation for the bike faded. The difficulty removing all the tupperware to fix anything simple aggravated me to no end.
Add to the list of bikes I've owned all the odd bikes I rode while working in the Moto industry I think most bikes are pretty well engineered.
Jim
2006 Diamo Cruiser V Twin 250
It was a little chinese bike bought cheap that a friend and I were going to turn into a bobber. Brand new, it never ran for more than 4 minutes. We took it for a test drive on a cold February night and I ended up having to push it the 2 miles back to the garage. We sold it for parts and forgot it even existed. In the 4 months or so we had the bike, we only put about 15 miles on it and pushed it probably just as many miles.
A 500cc Triumph Tiger. Left me stranded in Laconia New Hampshire 375 miles from home. Had to mooch a crate from a local motorcycle dealer to ship it home. Then a long bus trip via Montreal to home.
Sold it after the pistons were replaced. Of the dozen motorcycles I have owned, it was the only one that failed.
1983 Honda Goldwing Aspencade . I will say this, it really isn't this bike's fault it was terrible. I'm sure in 1983 this thing was Glorious to behold and a marvel of modern awesomeness. A status symbol even. in 2015, this bike was a disagreeable old man with irritable bowel syndrome. The brakes, quite often, decided they were going to simply lock up, despite being worked over twice. the battery died several times due to the brakes locking up and causing the always-on brake lights to drain the battery (coupled with some other issue that was never identified). the carbs were impossible to balance and the exercise was futile anyway, because any measure of balance you achieved was out the window after the next 20 miles. because of this the bike would stall while travelling down the highway, any time you let off the accelerator for a moment (which made the battery issue even worse because of how many times it had to be restarted). The bike itself weighed over 1000 lbs, which is just ludicrous for an 1100 cc bike (my CB11 has a bigger, more powerful engine and weighs literally half as much). I hated that thing, and he was named Henry, because it just sounds like the name of an old man you hate. i bought it for 1500 bucks, spent another 2200 at the shop, and sold it a few months later for 200 bucks to a guy who wanted to chop it into a bobber. i hope it burst into flames in his driveway. That's the absolute last time i buy an antique motor vehicle.