of rides due and new

[Cormanus]

Got in late last night from an 8 day trip to Fla with my wife. We went to do some birding on Sanibel island and to celebrate our 42nd wedding anniversary and my latest birthday (the 2 events are 1 week apart). Great trip except for the heat 88-100 degrees everyday between 10am and 7 pm), bugs (mosquitos, sand fleas and no-seeums), expensive airline tickets, car rental, resort room and expensive meals (breakfast lunch or dinner, didn't matter, seemed like it cost $35-$40) lol. The really bad part was no riding for me for 8 days and you guys know how that went over with me. While I was gone my younger brother picked up his new 2016 Triumph Bonneville, so this morning after watching the MotoGP, I rode over and met him for a more reasonably priced lunch ($4 double cheeseburger with pickle and catsup and fries..) and a short 104 mile ride on some nice country roads. He even let me ride his brand new bike with 70 miles on it (review to follow)

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The 2016 Bonnie is a nice machine. Very smooth, slick trans with 6 speed (which I never got into 6th..barely into 5th), light clutch, good brakes, light handling, and it was easy for me to touch the ground. Better seat than the previous Bonnie, and it comes with gaiters, nice sounding pipes, a grab rail and a center stand, all options on my 2003 Bonnie. It feels bigger than the previous gen Bonnie too. All of the visual cues on the new triumph are much better than the previous version. Power starts building exponentially at about 3000, but since we weren't taking it over 4K during break in, I didn't get to feel just how strong it was, but it likes being over 3k rpms. As a matter of fact if it gets below that point it feels like it wants to be down shifted, and the engine feels more comfortable when that is done. As we never got over 55 mph on todays ride that meant spending all our time in the first 4 gears. Strange for me. On my CB I would be in 5th or 6th even and my brother would be in 3rd or 4th. So far he has only made it into 6th gear once. Couple of strange things on the new Bonnie, the clock is a 24 hour clock and it can't be set to a 12 hour clock. So 1 PM is 13:00. Since my brother doesn't ride at night we set his clock to read 3:35 at 3:35 pm instead of 15:35. Maybe that will work for him, so all the military numbers will be after midnight. Of course early morning rides will be messed up but he's a late sleeper anyway lol. In lieu of that Motion Pro or someone makes a 12 hour bolt on clock he can get.

Secondly both the speedo and tack are registered with numbers which read 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70 and it's confusing to tell which is the tach and which is the speedo. On my brothers first 30 mile solo ride after trailering the bike home from the dealer, he told me he kept it under 4K rpms but in reality was keeping it under 40 mph lol

It's a beautiful bike, but I prefer my CB.

He just wanted to ride your CB

Seriously, thanks for the review. Sounds like a great bike. Sure looks good.