08-19-2019, 06:49 AM
I read a very positive review of the 650 REs in Australian Road Rider magazine the other day. Sadly the article is not available on line. This para may interest you:
Quote:No short-term ride can really tell you much about long-term reliability, but certainly we rode these bikes as fast as they would go in ridiculously hot conditions for a couple of days on the launch, stopping and starting for photos and crawling through the urban sprawl to get there and back without a single issue. Then we hung on to one for the best part of two weeks, during which time it had the pants thrashed off it in an attempt to provoke some of its insides to appear on the outside. I lost count of how often I bounced the peachy motor off the rev limiter in search of maximum drive and top speed, and many a time I parked it in my garage stinking of hot oil and clutch plates. Did it fire up on the button every time? Instantly. Did a single drop of oil besmirch my garage floor? No it did not. Did it blow a bulb, pop a fork seal, have a problem finding neutral? Did it once overheat in traffic, the knobs fall off the switchgear, the brakes fade or the electrics have a freak out? Not a bit of it. What it did do was behave like any thoroughly modern, well-sorted and well-built European or Japanese motorcycle and for this money I don’t see how you can argue with that.
Quote:No short-term ride can really tell you much about long-term reliability, but certainly we rode these bikes as fast as they would go in ridiculously hot conditions for a couple of days on the launch, stopping and starting for photos and crawling through the urban sprawl to get there and back without a single issue. Then we hung on to one for the best part of two weeks, during which time it had the pants thrashed off it in an attempt to provoke some of its insides to appear on the outside. I lost count of how often I bounced the peachy motor off the rev limiter in search of maximum drive and top speed, and many a time I parked it in my garage stinking of hot oil and clutch plates. Did it fire up on the button every time? Instantly. Did a single drop of oil besmirch my garage floor? No it did not. Did it blow a bulb, pop a fork seal, have a problem finding neutral? Did it once overheat in traffic, the knobs fall off the switchgear, the brakes fade or the electrics have a freak out? Not a bit of it. What it did do was behave like any thoroughly modern, well-sorted and well-built European or Japanese motorcycle and for this money I don’t see how you can argue with that.