Posts: 23,470
Threads: 697
Likes Received: 582 in 260 posts
Likes Given: 760
Joined: Apr 2025
Ooohh it does look polished. I missed these pictures somehow. Thanks Guth...and CA.
Notice the turn indicators..little bitty things down by the ign switch inside of the select and reset buttons. Those are going to be hard to see when you are driving down the road with your blinker on.
They didn't really put black plastic plugs in those polished handlebar clamps did they? ( they make chrome plastic plugs you know)
Posts: 559
Threads: 18
Likes Received: 5 in 3 posts
Likes Given: 1
Joined: Apr 2013
(02-10-2014, 11:30 AM)The ferret_imp Wrote: Ooohh it does look polished. I missed these pictures somehow. Thanks Guth...and CA.
Notice the turn indicators..little bitty things down by the ign switch inside of the select and reset buttons. Those are going to be hard to see when you are driving down the road with your blinker on.
They didn't really put black plastic plugs in those polished handlebar clamps did they? ( they make chrome plastic plugs you know)
I think those plugs are plastichrome ferret
I think the camera flash made them look black
Posts: 641
Threads: 42
Likes Received: 0 in 0 posts
Likes Given: 0
Joined: Mar 2013
ferret it was just the lighting,same old plastic chrome plugs.
[/img]
Posts: 23,470
Threads: 697
Likes Received: 582 in 260 posts
Likes Given: 760
Joined: Apr 2025
Oh good, thanks CA. Do you think your photos represent the color well? And do you have more photos you haven't shown us yet LOL
Posts: 364
Threads: 12
Likes Received: 0 in 0 posts
Likes Given: 0
Joined: Jan 2014
Rear suspension could certainly use a bit more travel. I noticed pretty early on that bumping up the ride height in the rear improved the handling substantially. Those of us with zero intention of giving up our 2013's for a few new gimmicks (heh heh) can quite easily increase the rear wheel travel by spec'ing out a new replacement shock with more travel than the original. I've held off on doing anything but tires but when I inevitably order up some shocks, I'll spec them at a half-inch longer than the stockers. The BT45 150/70 gave me a third of an inch increase in ride height, which was very beneficial to handling for my weight and setup. Lengthening the shocks to increase ride height is a good move, I suspect that is how Honda went about things.
The front forks reduction in travel might be OK, if they get the spring rates and damping right. I like to see about 5.0" of suspension motion in a road bike at both ends to get good compliance and allow for two-up or touring weights. But this is not a bad move, 4.5" or so up front is not unacceptable.
Any mods needed to revise the suspension on the '13 to match the '14 -- if desired -- would be chump change compared to taking a bath on a trade in. I'm even considering going with Racetech Gold Valves in the forks and Works Performance shocks on this thing, to my specs. It's very much worth it.
To echo Deanohh's remarks re: trail...if the fork was redesigned, the reduction in effective trail (trail being dynamic whilst riding) is most likely due to a slight change in the front end geometry with respect to the wheel/fork. Increased ride height alone in the rear reduces both rake and trail, too.
I don't know about this info. Looking at the images of both years closely, there is nothing that would indicate any increase in rear suspension travel. A full inch is huge, requiring some significant redesign if seat height is to be retained. The seat height is actually lower on the 2014, according to the specs. Now, if we increase the suspension in the ass end, the seat height is also going to increase by the same amount, roughly, unless the seat has been cut down, and here again the images don't support that notion. I think we are dealing with misprints.
Posts: 2,542
Threads: 125
Likes Received: 0 in 0 posts
Likes Given: 0
Joined: Mar 2013
Red, it was a false alarm. Please see post #11. My apologies.
I thought about removing this thread to avoid confusion, but I didn't want people thinking that I was taking liberties as an admin trying to cover up my embarrassing contributions (which in my case would take far too much time anyway). Then some other interesting content popped up and now here we are.
Posts: 364
Threads: 12
Likes Received: 0 in 0 posts
Likes Given: 0
Joined: Jan 2014
(02-11-2014, 01:40 PM)Guth_imp Wrote: Red, it was a false alarm. Please see post #11. My apologies.
I thought about removing this thread to avoid confusion, but I didn't want people thinking that I was taking liberties as an admin trying to cover up my embarrassing contributions (which in my case would take far too much time anyway). Then some other interesting content popped up and now here we are.
Not your fault in any way. It was widely reported by the press that the '13 had only 3.5 inches of travel, which was apparently wrong. Thanks for bringing all this up; now I can start to wonder whether maybe my BT45 150/70 did in fact contact the inner fender...
