2017 BMW F800GS (Revisited)

So my bike went in for it’s 10,000km service at Donford Motorrad in Cape Town on Wednesday and they were nice enough to provide me with a brand new, as in never been ridden before just out of PDI, F800GS.

Now if you read this blog before you’ll remember I rode some mates’ F800 GS and GS Adventure last sometime last year and had some good things to say. At least I seem to recall I had good things to say but I’m purposely not re-reading that post so it doesn’t skew my opinion this time round.

First things first just getting on the thing was daunting because it’s so bloody tall. I’ve gotten quite use to getting on my RS like a horse since the stand is rock solid and even since I’ve been trying that on all bikes. However with this 800 being so tall and upright this was much more of an experience but doable.

I’m literally on my tippy toes when keeping the bike upright, which isn’t the end of the world as you can lean it over for planned stops. What worries me are the unplanned stops where you suddenly need to put a leg out and for that very reason I can’t see myself ever attempting offroad with this configuration and would need to chicken out on a lower seat or even lowered suspension.

That being said, off I went on my way and a little bit wobbly at that probably to the dismay of onlookers. Immediately the bike felt a little odd in steering and I soon realised it was probably the lack of a steering dumper which I never had before but became very used to on the RS.

What I also didn’t know at the time was that it was brand new and so the tyres were nowhere near run in and still very waxy. Leaning onto her left ear it felt downright unstable and dangerous as if the neck bearings weren’t there at all. Much later I fiddled with the electronic suspension settings and put it into Sport mode from Normal and I must say after that it was much better but by then I had also spent some time with it.

Only in trying to find the bloody odometer reading did it come to my attention that the bike was brand new because this unmarked number and the trip meter were the exact same. Really Germans…couldn’t you have simply written ODO next to it?

I don’t know who the person is designing the dashboards in Bavaria but I’d love to have a long conversation with them about where their brain was at the time.

Beyond not putting in basic information like ODO they also go about using stupid little icons to indicate average fuel consumption and average speed etc. It’s a bloody LCD why not just made little text bars exactly like the riding modes for  rain, road, enduro etc and put them next to the relevant readings.

At least on this bike unlike my RS there is a full analog rev counter and speedometer and both are easily legible quite possibly because they are much closer to my face. The only thing I found odd is that 120 is at a dot instead of a line but that’s just me being silly.

It was a relatively windy day but I was very surprised by the stock standard windscreen which is not only smoked but also does a really good job throwing the air over your head, especially considering the fact that you sit bolt upright.

Back straight and arms up gives you a massive amount of leverage and it’s maybe this combined with the lack of steering damper that made it feel somewhat unstable. The XR offered a similar riding position and that I would imagine has a steering damper and while much better than this I also didn’t quite trust it.

Problem is for all the comfort the upright riding position offered my back and arms my ass was sore after less than twenty minutes on the bike due to the plank of a seat. It’s way too hard and way too narrow. This is meant to be a grown up bike, not a motard. It also forced you forward and doesn’t offer much room for movement so I see figured out why GS riders are almost always standing and that’s because they can’t actually sit down at all.

Funny that a year ago I didn’t understand the point of cruise control and here I was yearning for that button on the left because all I wanted to do was tie the straps on my backpack that I forgot to do up because I’m used to having a top box now.

Getting the mirrors right is a bit of a struggle, much like my own bike, but once you have them sorted out they are quite superb. I love the golf club shape as it shows you more without making the surface area and housing massive and retains a reasonably sexy look.

On the topic of sexy…this is far from it.

I looked at it long and hard from every angle and I still simply cannot love the look of this thing. Those asymmetric lights constantly make me think it’s falling over and from any other angle there just isn’t much to love. That being said I do like the seat, “tank” and then petrol filler areas purely because they are so different from everything else. Since the Honda N700/N750 frunk came about though I feel it’s a missed opportunity for BMW not to copy the concept.

So I soldiered on through Hout Bay and out to the famous Chapman’s Peak where I needed to pay a toll fee and again the pain in the arse that is a backpack was a swift reminder that getting a topbox was the best decision I’ve ever made.

By now the clutch was downright irritating me and the engine wasn’t really very inspiring. Yes I’m sure as an offroad bike it may or may not be superb, but how many people buying these ever actually do that?

As a road bike it’s quite terrible.

Someone recently also mentioned to me that they didn’t like the R1200 boxer engine because it vibrated to much and therefore they got the 800. I found quite the opposite and unlike my R1200 the vibrations were quite apparent on this one and any speed.

I was quite surprised by the fuel economy figures which I had reset before leaving the workshop. I was averaging 3.7/100km and that was while riding it like I stole it in most parts so credit where credit is due on that front.

After stopping for a quick brunch at The Daily Coffee Cafe in Noordhoek which I can highly recommend I finally made my way to work over Ou Kaapse Weg and by now had discovered Sport suspension settings which made for a stable and reasonably trustworthy run over the mountain.

Having forgotten there’s no quickshifter a couple of times I made many an uncouth downshift but the gearbox didn’t seem too bothered at all by it. Apart from the cable clutch being very heavy I can honestly say the gearbox is smoother and quieter than my RS and the lever travel also feels shorter. Granted it’s putting much less torque through there but that was a pleasant surprise.

Cruising into the parking lot at work I did my 1st gear clutch out riding on idle test and it did this happily even into 2nd gear but I suspect because the fuel injection hunts for idle and pushes it up a bit. I then noticed an odd thing where when closing the throttle it’s somewhat delayed as if on an elastic. Not a major concern but I couldn’t forget about it once I noticed it.

Couple of hours with a truly and properly numb ass at my desk I got the call to set off again to fetch my own bike. Hitting proper lane splitting traffic now I must admit the very tall and upright riding position does give a bit of an edge in traffic as you can see over everything and in these situations the light almost twitchy steering is a good thing if I could ignore the impending doom of extreme seat height every time I stopped.

Playing in traffic also reminded me of the issue I had riding the 800 before and that’s the fact that there is so much heat under and between your legs that your ass is on fire in no time when doing slow speed stuff.

Build quality is somewhat questionable as well, with of plenty of squeaks and rattles as you go about your ride. Maybe it was just this specific bike as I don’t remember it from the other two I’d ridden, but those were much shorter trips as well and at the same time they had plenty of owner modifications on. None of the Triumphs I rode while owning my own ever rattled.

So then I thought maybe I was being a bit of a biking snob and being horribly unfair to a bike that is half the price of my own. Only problem with that thought pattern was that the price isn’t anywhere near half.

This bike costs R157 990 now…which is absolutely mental. Sure I know that the rand is dodgy and Trump is cocking it up for everyone and all that but currency drama aside compared to it’s peers it just seems monumentally expensive.

Considering the height problem the Triumph Tiger 800 XRx Low is thirteen thousand rand cheaper at R145 500. BMW charge you extra for lowering kits and other shenanigans so the gap is actually much wider in reality. It also comes with cruise control (which isn’t even an option on the GS) and a sump guard out of the box. The Triumph doesn’t have the electronic suspension adjustment though…but then I never felt I needed it on that bike.

Sure the Triumph Tiger X800 XCx is R2000 more expensive but then even if you are vertically challenged as I was by the GS then that bike might work for you out of the box which means it’s still cheaper than the lowered GS yet again while offering more.

Especially if you are going to do mostly road riding I think the Triumph Tiger is by far the better bike, at least from my memory of having ridden one. Even then when you are going offroad I can’t imagine the difference will be that massive between the two, but then I know nothing about all that mudslinging stuff.

If you have no intention of ever going offroad then I would have to wonder why you are burning money on either of those bikes and not buying a Honda NC750 instead.

Actually come to think of it, even for offroad use you should consider visiting Honda and taking a look at the Africa Twin. I just haven’t ridden it so can’t comment on it’s feasibility but it sounds like a very good bike.