My first gen, V-Strom 650. The bike that got me back on the road.
At the time of writing this post, I have three bikes in the garage in all. I've already posted up the Ninja 250 Race bike which is my most recent acquisition. My daily rider is this 2007 Suzuki V-Strom DL650. I got it in February of 2014 with only 1911 miles on the odo for $6000.00 out the door from local dealer. I paid too much, but the pristine condition was driving up the price and I didn't know how reliable these bikes could be. If I had, I might have just gotten a Craigslist buy with 20,000 or so miles for $2,000 - $3000 less. In the time I've had it I've put almost 10,000 miles on it through a combination of commuting, SoCal canyon twisties and Central California touring.
The Good: Its versatile. I've had her leaned over dragging knee and I've been straight up and down burning miles on the freeway coming back to Ventura from San Diego. It has good useable power and decent torque down low. It has a huge gas tank at 5.8 gallons. I only fill up before a big ride and usually don't have to stop when my friends usually do. It has a good community of support on the internet.
The Bad: It loses a little steam on the top end and likes to stay below 80 mph. I can't keep up with my liter bike friends when they want to get on it. There are not many performance products available. Most of what is out there is for Adventure Bike riders. Adding hard bags or crash bars which would only make the power problem worse. I don't put much stock in the bike's ADV credentials. The only thing going for it ADV wise is the 19" front tire that makes it hard to find good sticky street tires. The front suspension is too soft. I need to upgrade the stock fork springs with a higher spring rate.
Upgrades: I've added a few farkles to make the Strom my own. I put on a fork brace and mirror extenders from Adventure Tech. LLC. I added in a 12V power outlet. I put on a new Speedometer gauge face that actually reads accurate speeds. The only real performance addition I made are the 2003 GSX-R 750 front brake calipers that really have improved the braking. The bike stops better, but the brakes have really made the front dive worse due to the soft forks springs.
I usually get 46 mpg and when touring I can get over 50 mpg doing the freeway miles. I put on a set of Michelin Pilot Road 4 Trail tires and have 6500 miles on them, but noticed at the 5000 miles mark that they are started to cup and I really need to replace them. I love the bike and would recommend it to anyone. I expect to get many more miles out of her before I switch out to something new.
Old Blue
The Bad: It loses a little steam on the top end and likes to stay below 80 mph. I can't keep up with my liter bike friends when they want to get on it. There are not many performance products available. Most of what is out there is for Adventure Bike riders. Adding hard bags or crash bars which would only make the power problem worse. I don't put much stock in the bike's ADV credentials. The only thing going for it ADV wise is the 19" front tire that makes it hard to find good sticky street tires. The front suspension is too soft. I need to upgrade the stock fork springs with a higher spring rate.
Upgrades: I've added a few farkles to make the Strom my own. I put on a fork brace and mirror extenders from Adventure Tech. LLC. I added in a 12V power outlet. I put on a new Speedometer gauge face that actually reads accurate speeds. The only real performance addition I made are the 2003 GSX-R 750 front brake calipers that really have improved the braking. The bike stops better, but the brakes have really made the front dive worse due to the soft forks springs.
I usually get 46 mpg and when touring I can get over 50 mpg doing the freeway miles. I put on a set of Michelin Pilot Road 4 Trail tires and have 6500 miles on them, but noticed at the 5000 miles mark that they are started to cup and I really need to replace them. I love the bike and would recommend it to anyone. I expect to get many more miles out of her before I switch out to something new.
Old Blue
