So seeing as my Street Triple had to go in for a bit of work this morning and I only needed to come into work late I figured in my search for comfort with my next bike I’ll take up Mike Hopkins with their promotion of the Tiger 800 and go for a little spin.
After weeks of scorching death of course today would be the first sign of rain and even after checking the weather forecast I didn’t actually expect water to physically fall from the sky. Needless to say I got to the dealership more than a little bit wet, but not really uncomfortable for it as it’s the lovely summery variety.
When I got to the bike I was informed that the seat had been lowered all the way to the bottom, I’m guessing because they may have had a few people keeling over on them. I was mock offended at the notion that I’m short arsed, but then again I’ve almost seen my arse in front of their shop more than once due to the road camber so I did appreciate the notion. If I were to set it up as my permanent steed I would probably jack it up a little bit for some better leg comfort while on it, especially long distance, but it certainly was easy to manage and not uncomfortable. Much easier to lift off the stand compared to the GS’s I rode recently, but then again I also learnt my lesson there to use my arms more and not just my legs as I do on sport bikes. So no ass muscles were pulled when setting off this time.
The pleasant rain heading in had now become a little bit more angry and the wind was also picking up. Most dealerships probably wouldn’t let people out with their demos in this kind of weather, so I guess a longstanding relationship of not crashing does go a long way towards mutual trust. These are really the perfect conditions to test a bike in as it paints a truer picture of day to day riding and if it performs well in wind and rain it will perform even better on normal days.
Heading out from the shop I was immediately fighting the throttle as it just seemed way too sensitive and matching it with the clutch was way more tricky than expected going from one Triumph to another. It seems this bike is ride-by-wire whereas my STR is old school cable operated still, but beyond being sensitive as hell it also just seemed way too revvy for small inputs. The clutch on the other hand did at first seem much softer than mine, but through the ride it became a bit more taxing as it’s bite came in pretty far out where I prefer it almost on the bar. Easily adjustable but I wasn’t going to mess with the settings on such a short ride.
I hit the famous De Waal Drive and was immediately surprised by the surprising amount of wind hitting my head. I purposely didn’t wear ear plugs so that I get the completely raw experience, but I could almost swear it was worse than my STR which has virtually no windscreen simply because it’s more compressed or channeled towards your head. Oddly I don’t recall experiencing this on the GS and GS Adventure I rode some weeks ago which I pushed to 160 km/h quite comfortably. Granted I don’t recall if I had earplugs in on that day or not, probably did.
The seat is very comfortable as expected and generally the leg to peg ratio is also lovely but like I said earlier could probably be enhanced a little by jacking the seat up slightly. Oddly I found that where the STR gives you no options to move around, here you almost have too many options which isn’t necessarily a good thing as it doesn’t hug you as well. By this time I also noticed the rather odd and completely square mirrors which had the bizarre notion of making me spot the top box on the back and each and every time thinking it’s a car sitting right on my ass.
I also noted that the bike in question didn’t have heated grips, but it did have cruise control presumably as standard. An odd configuration, but at the same time I’ve always believed that with hand guards fitted the need for heated grips is somewhat irrelevant in our African climate and riding in this weather with my summer gloves on did confirm that somewhat.
Granted I can’t really compare this cruise control setup to any other as it’s the first time I’ve ever used it on a bike, but it was very strange. Firstly the button placement next to the throttle seems strange to me as it’s tricky to hit them and hold the throttle steady. Fitting it on the left would make it so much easier to operate. I’ve never used cruise control in a manual car either, but I would have assumed that you could change gear without it disengaging, but then I guess that would cause the car to rev up so probably not, which might explain why it disengages here when you touch the clutch. I’m not sure I would use this very often on a day to day basis, but with those long trips and the endless straight sections in the Karoo it could certainly be life changing.
It’s round about this time hitting the M3 and settling into some lane splitting due to traffic that I realised just how much bigger the Tiger is, or at least feels, than the GS800. It just feels very wide and bulky and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if there isn’t all that much difference between the 800 and the 1200 versions or that they share some frame parts.
It’s a lighter bike than the GS from a lifting off the stand, top heavy perspective, but it does feel like it needs a bit more input to the bars to get moving. The GS seems much more prone to steering through weight shifting while the Tiger wants direct control input from the bars and leaning doesn’t seem to do much.
I’m being a little unfair towards the Triumph here as I road the two GS’s on a short trip in a balls to the wall fashion without too much contemplation to what it was doing. On the Triumph I was doing real world day to day riding and therefore had time to contemplate and evaluate the bike much more deeply.
The engine is a strange creature. More so for me jumping from the 675cc version but also compared to the GS. I found the GS engine very boring as the torque delivery was so linear and at the same time it didn’t make much of a noise at all. The GS Adventure had a Remus pipe on and was much better for the noise factor and could be heard at cruising speed while the stock one was whisper quiet. The Triumph is very quiet at lower revs and seems oddly gutless compared to my Street Triple but then it starts to make a familiar and lovely sporty noise when you rev it out and gets moving properly. It’s with regards to the engine that I wish I had ridden the road going version without the knobblies on and larger wheels as it may have delivered a very different road bike experience that I was looking for. As much as I disliked the GS engine on the day, I feel that the Tiger engine in this form is less usable for daily road riding. My offroad nutter friends believe the same thing for offroad use and that’s why they all have BMW’s.
Another thing that is painfully obvious is that Triumph is new to this whole fuel mapping electronic throttle business by virtue of the fact that is was pretty tricky to understand without prior instruction and a bit finicky. Granted if you owned the bike you would read the manual and get to know it intimately, but from a first contact point of view it’s very troublesome. My understand from messing around with it is that there are three preset profiles, one for Offroad, one for on road and then a Rider mode which should read as “Custom”. Essentially you need to go fiddle in the menus to set the Rider mode where you can then put traction control on and off as well as ABS and I recall in each of them there was a road and offroad version as well. Then there is the fuel mapping which was Sport, Normal and I think Rain but don’t quote me on that. So there is no way of quickly jumping to Sport for instance on the fly, unless you happen to have configured your Rider mode as that beforehand.
I stopped at the other side of Hout Bay just above Llandudno to take these pictures and messed around with the riding modes because as I mentioned earlier the engine was feeling a bit gutless downstairs. I still suspect I didn’t actually have it in Sport mode as I hit the corners along the coast on my way back to Cape Town, and suffered a bit of placebo as it seemed to be better somewhat.
With the sun out and the wind somewhat more predictable and now being comfortable with the bike it was time to push it a little bit. Maybe because the knobblies were still quite new with less than 2000km on them or purely because of the bike, I felt much more comfortable on these tyres than the KTM and GS’s I rode recently where they had a very definite step mid lean.
Here I was only really weary of the tyres being a little narrower and so didn’t want to overextend myself. An odd notion of understeer was apparent in some corners and I was constantly modulating it with the rear brake to keep it in line. Maybe it’s my road bike sensibilities pushing a little too fast into corners and holding onto the front brakes a bit too late into cornering since it did seem to dissipate when going a little bit easier…but what’s the fun in that. Either way, it didn’t feel quite as immediately confidence inspiring as the GS did which I rode just as hard if not harder, also on very familiar roads.
Suspension wise the bike was very soft. There is so much fork dive, especially in town, that when I did some brake tests later I locked up the front wheel for the first time ever in my bike riding memory. The rear brake locks up for any reason at all, but I’m lead to believe this is by design for offroaders. The deeper issue is that this bike doesn’t have electronic suspension adjustment. Not from a too lazy to lift a spanner perspective, but from a value point of view which I’ll also touch on later.
As I was heading up the hill from Camps Bay I figured out the Rider mode thing and this time I was sure it was in Sports mode properly. Revved it out properly passing some cars and I must say it does pick up speed very well and is probably a whole lot faster than the GS in sheer all out acceleration, but in overtaking from 80-120 or 120+ in same gear there probably won’t be too much between them. It certainly is much more exciting on the higher revving engine and it makes a good enough noise to keep most people happy.
It’s a tricky beast to launch hard from a standing start, but I think mostly just because I still find myself concentrating heavily to miss the super wide pegs on these kinds of bikes without hanging myself on them in the process. Even by the end of the ride I still didn’t quite get the clutch and ride-by-wire to match naturally and needed to make a conscious effort to pull away nicely. Sure through ownership one acclimatizes and your own bike is always best, but this has been one of the most challenging ones I’ve just jumped onto.
Back at the Mike Hopkins ranch I was taking a stroll through the showroom and my fundamental conclusion is that the Tiger 800 isn’t a bad bike in any which way, but even as a Triumph die hard you would be silly to buy one. Why? Because it’s just not a great value proposition. 2015 models are standing on the floor for R 159 999 and that’s without any extras while at BMW you can have the 800GS for R 137 345 and it comes with Heated Grips and Electronic Suspension standard. For R 156 680 (still cheaper than the Tiger 800) you can guy the 800GS Adventure which is probably a waste of money too. But forgetting the competition if you have Triples in your blood stream you can for R 5000 more than the Tiger 800 get the 2015 1200 Explorer model that is on special right now with Panniers, Hand Guards and Heated Grips. Sure I haven’t ridden it (yet) but it seems a much better deal considering the extras, more power and the fact that it’s shaft driven meaning no messy chain lube nonsense.
In conclusion it’s not a bad bike by any margin, but you can do much better for the same money. If you were to venture outside Triumph I would simply get the BMW 800GS and spend the difference in price on adding a nice exhaust and a top box and/or panniers to the mix.
South African Motorcyclist 