So…my GF is looking to do her bike test and is after something she can commute from Loughton to Central London on (approx 15 miles).
In the meantime, I’ve been after a dirt bike to play around on at weekends, and I was thinking maybe there is something out there that can satisfy both of our requirements?
DRZ-400? Any alternatives I can look at? Does anyone have any experience of commuting on one of these?
Anyone know what BHP that produces? Can she ride it on a restricted license, can/should it be restricted otherwise? Or shall she do DAS?
I rode a DRZ-400 off-road and a little bit on-road on a recent holiday and thought it was great for the stuff we were doing (mostly quite fasty, open trails & some twisty road sections) but it is a bit heavy for what it is and the seat is pretty high (might be worth checking that the girlfriend is comfortable on it). I’m 5’11" and I wouldn’t have wanted the seat much higher.
I could see it being a good commuter apart from the wide bars possibly being at wingmirror height - Premises 187 on here rides one, you might find something in his posts.
It’s over 33bhp so would need restricting if you don’t have DAS - if you’re doing the test anyway, an extra day for DAS is a better option I’d say
Edit - just a thought, wouldn’t you spend half your life changing tyres if you were using it for both commuting & offroad? Or would you just use knobbly tyres for everything?
From what I’ve seen and heard it’s a really good all rounder and pretty bullet proof so maintenance costs won’t be too high… GP takes his offroading and he seems to like it - speaking of which, he’s selling his
Though knobblie tyres might not be the best to commute on… might be worth also getting SM wheels to swap over
only thing about sharing a bike with your gf using it weekdays and yourself at weekend is who’s going to be responsible for cleaning the thing and maintaining it :Whistling: i can picture the muddy bike greeting her on a monday morning
your best bet is buy a moped for the GF as it will be easier to ride cheap to run and then buy my DRZ :rolleyes:
this is the sort of question that happens a lot on mtb forums. people realise they are going to be buying a small framed bike for their mrs and so they go for a jump bike (they get to play on it on the dirt jumps then). the point is, the mrs is never that happy with what they are riding and end up giving up.
she needs to be really comfortable with a bike she’s going to use everyday in all weathers. let her choose her commuter and get an off road bike as well if you can afford it. otherwise sort her first and save up a bit!
drz are grate for both you can get lower seats and lowering kits if shes not that tall =] i know from my dt the handle bars are over the mirors and a drz should be the same offroady bikes make better commuters
GP - Yeah, I saw your ad, that propmted me into thinking along these lines, but I’m in the proccess of buying a house, so I’m not ina position to do anything about for a while yet…
theprawn - I think your right, she should decide what she wants herself, I think this is probably best tackled as two seperate issues, I wouldn’t have appreciated a bike being forced onto me.
What are the alternatives to consider alongside the DRZ?
