Okay, mickey, you're wearing me down!

[MM300_imp]

Simple answer: I can't afford to keep the Yamaha and add another bike, either in terms of the required space or the cost. Believe me, if I had mickey's money I'd grab an R1200RT, a new Street Triple RS, the CB1100, and the T120. From there, I'd choose a winner between the CB and T120 and sell the loser, leaving me with a big touring bike, a dedicated canyon ripper, and a beautiful retro for daily riding.

I wouldn't get a Speed Triple, in large part for the same reason I swapped my 2014 Street Triple R for the XSR; namely, the seating position. My reconstructed neck won't allow me to do any sort of lean-over at all, not even the Street Triple's or XSR's minimal forward lean.

Thus, the bar risers on the Yamaha. I tried them on the Street Triple and didn't like them. On the Yamaha I don't mind them, except that they slow me down on the freeway by five-to-seven mph.

As for the new Kawasaki retro 900 based on the Z900? If it ends up looking like the first pictures we're seeing, no thanks. There isn't a single piece on that design that I enjoy. Whereas the Honda and Triumph embody the enduring beauty of classic retro design, this new Kawasaki is a prime example of why we (thankfully) moved past the dumpy '70s look.

Speaking of which, now that mickey mentioned it, I think I would change the CB1100 from Megan Fox to Monica Bellucci, since the CB is less of a booty shorts and washboard-abs girl and more of a beautiful, classy, voluptuous, worldly woman. Since the T120 is British, retro, and still crazy-beautiful, I suppose she'd be, hmmm...Elizabeth Hurley?

Works for me.

While watching the Kenny Wayne Shephard concert tonight, I couldn't help but continue to think about those two bikes, and I kept coming up with the things I'd change about them. I was trying to determine whether either bike had more things I dislike, or things I dislike to a greater degree?

This is what I've come up with so far....

CB1100

-Twenty-five more rwhp and ten more ft. lbs of torque. Honda could have easily built this motor to those specs without sacrificing one iota of low-end grunt or easy rideability, and if they had, I would have bought one years ago.

-No speed limiter in the ECU. I don't want to have to re-flash my brand new motorcycle to get the thing to run the way Honda intended. Limiting the top end to 108 mph and fifth and sixth gears to some absurdly low RPM is just anathema to the whole concept of a big-bore Honda I4 that harkens back to various class-leading CBs of yore. It's borderline communist!

-Ditch the 50/50 black/silver engine treatment. Either go all silver, like mickey's 2014 Deluxe, or take that section of blacked-out fins and extend it all the way up to the chrome cam covers. One or the other, please. Pick one. It's a motor, not a bowl of Neapolitan ice cream, or a yin/yang logo.

-Include the factory heated grips as standard.

-For gawd's sake, gimme back the vintage-correct green gauges of mickey's 2014 Deluxe! Why on earth did Honda ditch those?

-Bump that 4.4-gallon tank capacity up to a full five gallons, minimum. The bike already weighs as much as a Rose Parade float, so what's a few more pounds on a bike that's comfortable enough to encourage two hundred and fifty miles per sitting?

I think that's about it. I know mickey would also ask for shaft drive and hydraulic lifters, and I wouldn't turn my nose up at either of those either, but I'm fine with the chain drive and traditional shim-under-bucket arrangement. It's a Honda. Those valves will rarely if ever require adjusting.

As for the T120?

-Forty more rwhp. With both of these bikes I'm shooting for 110 rwhp, which is basically the same as the new Boxer 1200 motor. There's no reason a 1200 cc, liquid-cooled parallel Twin or an 1,140 cc, air-cooled I4 shouldn't make as much power as an opposed Twin of the same basic capacity.

-Since Triumph offers cruise control as an option for this model, just include it as standard. It's already a $12K motorcycle, so why nickel-and-dime us that way?

-Ditch the cheap-looking tank seams. The original Bonnevilles didn't have them, the new Honda doesn't have them, the competing BMWs don't have them, and they represent the one easily fixable aesthetic flaw on what is otherwise a near-perfect retro design. They aren't so bad on the solid black model, but on the silver/cranberry version they stick out like a sore thumb.

-Build it in Old Blighty. Thailand-built is fine for some models, but not for the freaking Bonneville, the marquee model, the brand's most revered name. UK-built vs Thai-built isn't a matter of superior/inferior build quality, not at all. No difference there. It's simply a feel-good thing, and with the flagship Bonneville that crap definitely matters.

-Right-angle valve stems, like the Street Triples. Those things are so nice. Come to think of it, the Honda needs them, too.

-Bump that fuel tank capacity from 3.8 gallons to five gallons.

-Include a helmet lock and bungee hooks, like the Honda.

-Illuminate the front turn signals, like the Honda. It's a funny thing, because I replaced the "Great Pumpkins" on the XSR with smaller, clear, non-illuminated, Euro-spec Yamaha turn signals, but on these two retro bikes I prefer the Honda's illuminated signals.

-Much larger-font numbers on the instruments, please. The numbers and icons are just too small. The Honda dash appears to be much easier to read at a quick glance.

-Solid metal fenders, like the Honda.

I keep adding "like the Honda" a lot here, don't I? Well, yeah. The Honda is just so finely detailed and well built. There are precious few finish details Honda missed or skimped on with this gem of a motorcycle. While both bikes are built extremely well, the pride of ownership factor has to be sky-high with the CB1100.

Yep...still torn.

Yep