Another example of fine British engineering.
speedo miles and km for usa models...by law?
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Serious. Absolutely true, I couldn't believe my eyes at first; "Those needles are jiggling?" There's no way needles in a modern electronic gage jiggle, they're damped and well-controlled. The Street Cup's bounce like the old-school gages. Not hard to program. It's funny.Ulvetanna_imp said:
The CB was purposely designed to have an uneven, lumpy idle and off idle engine ‘character’ so it would be more like the old ones. Bouncy needles are a piece of cake compared to that.
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Ulvetanna_imp
Road warrior
Serious. Absolutely true, I couldn't believe my eyes at first; "Those needles are jiggling?" There's no way needles in a modern electronic gage jiggle, they're damped and well-controlled. The Street Cup's bounce like the old-school gages. Not hard to program. It's funny.Capo_imp said:
The CB was purposely designed to have an uneven, lumpy idle and off idle engine ‘character’ so it would be more like the old ones. Bouncy needles are a piece of cake compared to that.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk I never heard of a Thruxton or T120 doing it. It's just one of those weird things some designer thought would look cool. I could hardly believe my eyes the first time I noticed it.
Designers do all kinds of strange things to give that vintage cachet.
Of analog gages, I sure remember the cable-driven gages on many of my older 80's bikes bouncing, mainly the speedo.
It's interesting that you would bring this up Capo as I was reminded of this very thing when I read about Triumph's gauges. I have to say that that I simply don't appreciate these marketing driven decisions. Such things must drive engineers absolutely bonkers. Whether it's Honda trying to develop "character" into their otherwise wonderful modern air-cooled inline four cylinder engine or Triumph trying to cause their gauges to vibrate or their fuel injection to look like carbs or claiming the cylinder fins on their water cooled bikes to be purposeful (Kawasaki can now also be included with this group), it's all rather sad in my book. Honestly, I find it all to be a bunch of marketing-driven BS. None of these things needed to be done, but manufacturers must feel that these things are needed as a way to get old, nostalgic guys to part ways with their money. Maybe they're right, but I personally could do without any of these things and would have much more respect for these companies if they'd just skip this sort of nonsense.Capo_imp said:
emptysea
Road warrior
My needle jiggles. Not sure why you all need to know that, though.
the Ferret
Road warrior
Checked with my brother tonight at dinner, no jiggles in his needles on his T-120. Also told him one of you guys said there was an ECU reflash to fix the stalling problem. he's going to call the dealer and check.
Ulvetanna_imp
Road warrior
That's what the current service bulletin is supposed to do. I don't think it's quite a recall, not sure.The ferret_imp said:
It's interesting that you would bring this up Capo as I was reminded of this very thing when I read about Triumph's gauges. I have to say that that I simply don't appreciate these marketing driven decisions. Such things must drive engineers absolutely bonkers. Whether it's Honda trying to develop "character" into their otherwise wonderful modern air-cooled inline four cylinder engine or Triumph trying to cause their gauges to vibrate or their fuel injection to look like carbs or claiming the cylinder fins on their water cooled bikes to be purposeful (Kawasaki can now also be included with this group), it's all rather sad in my book. Honestly, I find it all to be a bunch of marketing-driven BS. None of these things needed to be done, but manufacturers must feel that these things are needed as a way to get old, nostalgic guys to part ways with their money. Maybe they're right, but I personally could do without any of these things and would have much more respect for these companies if they'd just skip this sort of nonsense. It's what Millennials want. They don't have any idea of what actually makes anything function. They like cassette tapes, and vinyl records, and all that junk because certain kinds of old school are very cool. Those are the people buying most stuff now.Guth_imp said:
I know one young guy who was going to go do his demo album by first recording all the tracks on 2" 24-track tape and then transferring it to digital. I told him to skip it, the digital is so good now the extra step is not needed. But studios keep these old dinosaurs around to attract customers who just think old stuff is cool.
These younger folks are social-media driven. They will flock to an unknown hot dog joint and wait in line a couple hours, taking selfies and checking social media status all the while, not even knowing if the hot dog is any good.
Everything is driven by style and popularity now.
I notice that the Millennials in my neighborhood seem to be making more money this year, and they're probably going to spend every cent on having fun. I doubt many will put aside a nickel. Also they frequently have huge student loan debts to pay off, which are far from being paid at present.
So a bike that looks cool, seems to do the watusi, and has the right branding will sell.
I am happy that despite the silly gage jiggling and fins that are said to help with cooling (the physics of it means they have to do at least some work) the Triumphs I have are absolutely stellar motorcycles in every meaningful way.
Honestly, I find it all to be a bunch of marketing-driven BS. None of these things needed to be done, but manufacturers must feel that these things are needed as a way to get old, nostalgic guys to part ways with their money. Maybe they're right, but I personally could do without any of these things and would have much more respect for these companies if they'd just skip this sort of nonsense.Guth_imp said:
It is Marketing- driven, but I don’t think it’s BS. If you think about it, every element of the modern retro bike is marketing- driven. There are certainly no performance benefits to dual shocks, air cooling, 550 lbs of bike in a steel cradle frame, etc. I find much of what you listed as innocuous, and ties these bikes back to their forebears.
Bouncy needles are kinda stupid,though.
Regarding the ECU flash update on the Bonnie/ Thrux, it’s not a recall but they definitely want owners to do it. I have not had the stalling but will get it done in spring.
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Serious. Absolutely true, I couldn't believe my eyes at first; "Those needles are jiggling?" There's no way needles in a modern electronic gage jiggle, they're damped and well-controlled. The Street Cup's bounce like the old-school gages. Not hard to program. It's funny.Capo_imp said:
The CB was purposely designed to have an uneven, lumpy idle and off idle engine ‘character’ so it would be more like the old ones. Bouncy needles are a piece of cake compared to that.
Even so, any model-year CB1100 is still smooth as silk. Bouncy needles are just plain bad.
The shame in Ulvetanna's recording example is not that the young musicians decided to record to analog, but that they wanted to master the recording digitally. If the intent is to make the music available in an analog format then just skip the digital portions of the recording chain all together. The real problem with this scenario is that very few people have a decent enough playback system anymore to hear the difference between a recording made with low-end digital recording equipment and one made meticulously with an all-analog process (and that's if they even care). Most people now tend to listen to music through their computer speakers or via crappy headphones so it doesn't really matter that much to them. When it comes to recording music, if the desire is simply to make your music available for the masses via any of the digital based formats then don't bother with going to the trouble to incorporate analog technology into the mix, just let the music stand on it's own. Whether it's recorded music or motorcycles —I'd much rather see manufacturers leave the bogus stuff out/off.
Vinyl albums that were digitally recorded are exactly the same to me as a water-cooled bike sporting "air-cooling' fins, or using offset cylinder timing to create some unevenness in an otherwise amazingly smooth engine. Just like digitally recorded vinyl records, these things are done for no other reason than to sell more product (typically to people that don't know any better). Millennials go for this kind of thing with their music, as di some of us old farts with our motorcycles. Obviously I'm not thrilled with Honda's decision to intentionally make the engine run rougher. I will tell people that I bought the CB despite such a decision by Honda. In the case of Triumph, of course the fins add "some cooling' by the nature of physics, but they could have just as easily been left off. This along with the fuel injection being tarted up as carbs is exactly the same as digital recordings being transferred to vinyl records. The difference isn't so much the products involved but the age groups that they are being marketed to. Most vinyl records these days are being sold to millennials and most retro motorcycles are being sold to older guys. Either way, the marketers are counting on these different sets of consumers to buy into the image that they've worked so hard (and in the examples above, have gone above and beyond) to create.
Vinyl albums that were digitally recorded are exactly the same to me as a water-cooled bike sporting "air-cooling' fins, or using offset cylinder timing to create some unevenness in an otherwise amazingly smooth engine. Just like digitally recorded vinyl records, these things are done for no other reason than to sell more product (typically to people that don't know any better). Millennials go for this kind of thing with their music, as di some of us old farts with our motorcycles. Obviously I'm not thrilled with Honda's decision to intentionally make the engine run rougher. I will tell people that I bought the CB despite such a decision by Honda. In the case of Triumph, of course the fins add "some cooling' by the nature of physics, but they could have just as easily been left off. This along with the fuel injection being tarted up as carbs is exactly the same as digital recordings being transferred to vinyl records. The difference isn't so much the products involved but the age groups that they are being marketed to. Most vinyl records these days are being sold to millennials and most retro motorcycles are being sold to older guys. Either way, the marketers are counting on these different sets of consumers to buy into the image that they've worked so hard (and in the examples above, have gone above and beyond) to create.
Ulvetanna_imp
Road warrior
The one thing about the CB1100 which I have said quite a few times is that it really is an air-cooled inline four. It feels like it, runs like it. It's about as close to vinyl as one could get. It's not modeled. So you are in fact experiencing the real thing so to speak.Guth_imp said:
The Royal Enfields are also air-cooled and pretty retro from all I can see. The twins should be really nice bikes.
Ulvetanna_imp
Road warrior
I would never have purchased one, er, two had they not had the look. I've got a Z650 which is an example of pure efficiency and light weight. It's a very different kind of bike. It'll run circles around the Street Cup but isn't the same thing at all.Capo_imp said:
The one thing about the CB1100 which I have said quite a few times is that it really is an air-cooled inline four. It feels like it, runs like it. It's about as close to vinyl as one could get. It's not modeled. So you are in fact experiencing the real thing so to speak.Ulvetanna_imp said:
The Royal Enfields are also air-cooled and pretty retro from all I can see. The twins should be really nice bikes.
One could argue that Honda dropped the ball and doomed the CB to the marginal sales success that it is by hewing too close on authenticity and delivering an underwhelming performance envelope. I get the design brief and labor of love that the CB is, but from a marketing standpoint, Honda’s conservative take on the CB, particularly considering how earthshaking the CB 750 was, to me is much more bothersome than fake fins.
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Guth_imp said:
Regarding music, people have traded fidelity for portability. And it’s a darn good deal. I enjoy vinyl as much as the next guy...my buds and I have monthly vinyl listening nights... but I’ll take Spotify and 30 million songs at my fingertips anywhere I am on earth, for $14/ month, over having to plop myself down in my den to listen to a record. Every day. I’m failing to see the link between fins on water cools motorcycle engines, and the consumption of music.
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I don't lose sleep over it. But I do find it irritating that people would think it has anything to do with something other than aesthetics as Triumph has tried to claim. That's the BS part I'm referring to. Of course it would look ugly if they had left the fins off, so does the radiator for that matter, but not nearly as ugly as most radiators. That's why Triumph went to such great lengths to try and hide the true nature of these new bikes. To me, It's really no different than digitally recorded vinyl albums. I don't lose any sleep over it. I just get irritated whenever someone (Triumph in this case) tries so hard to convince me otherwise.
It reminds me of the commercial a few years ago where these three old ladies are sitting around talking about the Internet. One of these ladies gets irritated with another and announces that she's going to unfriend her as she pulls the photo of her friend down off of the living room wall. I feel like the third woman sitting in the room saying "that's not how it works, that's not how any of this works", lol.
The difference when it comes to the CB!100 is that Honda never claimed that there were any performance gains to be made with respect to the dual shocks, the steel cradle frame or the air-cooled engine. In fact, they went to great extremes to set the opposite expectation and point out that performance isn't what they were going for. The most notable thing about the CB1100 is that air-cooled engine was the first Honda had developed in over twenty years. Not for performance gains, but for providing a retro experience. Obviously that doesn't sell so well, but again, I don't think that this was Honda's driving point when it comes to this bike unlike Triumph which is very heavily dependent upon the Bonnevilles.
It reminds me of the commercial a few years ago where these three old ladies are sitting around talking about the Internet. One of these ladies gets irritated with another and announces that she's going to unfriend her as she pulls the photo of her friend down off of the living room wall. I feel like the third woman sitting in the room saying "that's not how it works, that's not how any of this works", lol.
The difference when it comes to the CB!100 is that Honda never claimed that there were any performance gains to be made with respect to the dual shocks, the steel cradle frame or the air-cooled engine. In fact, they went to great extremes to set the opposite expectation and point out that performance isn't what they were going for. The most notable thing about the CB1100 is that air-cooled engine was the first Honda had developed in over twenty years. Not for performance gains, but for providing a retro experience. Obviously that doesn't sell so well, but again, I don't think that this was Honda's driving point when it comes to this bike unlike Triumph which is very heavily dependent upon the Bonnevilles.
Consumption of music is one thing. Trying to pass off digitally recorded vinyl albums as being superior to say CDs is another thing all together.Capo_imp said:
olite golf applause:
the Ferret
Road warrior
I just wish they would stick to one format. I have had to buy my rock music collection 3 times now, Vinyl, 8 track and CD lol
Nortoon_imp
Road warrior
Now you have to buy it on-line, and throw away your turntable, 8-track player, cassette deck, CD player, MP3 player, last year's I-Pad and cell phone. Gotta have the latest device or the young droids will frown upon you.The ferret_imp said:
The ferret_imp said:
Just get Spotify. Even the crustiest old music fans I know have thanked me profusely after nudging them to it. Every song, artist, playlist, bespoke station, and sounds much better than compressed files.
If any of you are interested, go to my FB page ‘The Isle of Man Music Indulgence Society’ and get a taste of the collaborative playlists we build each week.
Keep the vinyl and get rid of everything else, Ferret!
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I would never have purchased one, er, two had they not had the look. I've got a Z650 which is an example of pure efficiency and light weight. It's a very different kind of bike. It'll run circles around the Street Cup but isn't the same thing at all.Ulvetanna_imp said:
Precisely. I don’t think the retro models are trying to fool anyone, other than those who don’t know they aren’t old bikes, and approach us and say, ‘man, nice restoration!’
I live in a town with a good number of Dutch Colonial homes, and many newly built homes attempt to go retro by using mansard roofs. Most folks aren’t fooled, and even fewer take umbrage.
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