On a pure spur of the moment jaunt, my mate invited me to join him this morning to test ride the Honda NC700X from Honda Cape Town.
Since he actually wanted to try the dual clutch automatic version and they only had a manual transmission demo they offered him the VFR1200FD which uses pretty much the same dual clutch automatic system and that’s where I ended up tagging along.
I got on the NC700X first and was initially caught off guard by what I can only assume is a throttle cable in need of adjustment as the bike would only really respond at a rather large throttle opening…so I stalled like a noob.
Of course having that massive storage space where the petrol tank should be goes a hell of a lot way towards practicality. A full face helmet goes in there easily facing upwards with the visor towards the sky but more importantly I suspect you might very well get a 15-inch Macbook Pro in there with a little bit of creativity. Smaller laptops will be no problem at all and add a metrosexually questionable man-bag to that and you’ll never need any luggage or backpack for your daily commute.
Once on our way up towards Kloof Nek I was immediately impressed by the engine because it didn’t feel even remotely as underpowered as I expected from the 44kw mentioned on the spec sheet. It’s all torque and you can leave it in a higher gear forever and a day just riding it on the throttle which is very responsive once you are moving.
The clutch and gearbox combination give the bike’s price-tag away rather quickly but there’s nothing really wrong with it apart from being a bit clunky. Every shift is a true one and it would be impossible for a beginner to get it wrong.
I think the brakes are perfect, because I have absolutely nothing at all to say about them, which tells me they were doing what they were supposed to…stop the bike without drawing attention to themselves. Very smooth and progressive, not grabby at all and I never felt like I needed more. It’s probably helped by the general sense of lightweight that the bike possesses so it never feels like you need super brakes to slow down a train.
And that lightweight notion is what brings me to the handling. I was genuinely surprised by how easy this bike was to ride, it literally requires no thought to just chuck it into corners and not once did I feel I was over thinking my riding like I’ve found myself doing on some bikes in the past. It’s not hard work, it’s just a natural progression which encourages a surprising pace.
We didn’t have any highway to ride heading towards Llandudno so I forced it into a steady 120km/h at one point to get a feel for what it would be like. My partner in crime claims I must not have been in top gear because it felt pretty good to him, but my opinion is that it felt like it was working a little too hard to maintain that speed.
On the topic of highways and commuting, I guess I’ve spent too many years on naked bikes because anything with a windshield seems to simply concentrate air straight onto my helmet and I found the NC700X uncomfortable in this regard compared to the Street Triple I rode a few weeks ago which had nothing even resembling a windshield in comparison.
Naturally I can’t really comment on the fuel economy after such a short ride, but there are enough statistics out there that proves this is an astonishingly cheap bike to run as a daily commuter.
All in all I was very pleasantly surprised by the “little” Honda and it went from a massive compromise of fuel over fun in my mind to my new favourite beginner/commuter bike, stealing the crown from the ER6 I usually recommend to people starting out.
Why wouldn’t I buy one? It pretty much comes down to the price vs features. The fact that the manual NC700X doesn’t have ABS as standard is a disgrace in my opinion, especially being marketed towards beginners who need it more than most. Especially when you consider other bikes for less money like the KTM 390 Duke which comes with ABS as standard for less money and probably about the same power to weight ratio even though it has a smaller engine.
On the flip-side the dual clutch automatic does come with ABS…but costs R17 000 more than the manual version according the Honda’s latest pricing as of April 2013…which unless you absolutely must have an automatic makes it a silly bike to buy for the money.
And here’s why I don’t need an automatic…
I was wondering why the VFR1200FD was holding itself back behind me and I just assumed that I was going much too slowly for its tastes. Then we stopped and had a chat and apparently I was cranking the little NC over like it was on a racetrack…didn’t really feel like I was putting that much effort into it.
And then I got on “The Tank” which requires all the effort in the world just to get around a little corner.
Firstly I should say that I’m not against automatics by any means, I drive a dual clutch sports car after all because it makes a lot of sense on so many levels. Not only is it faster than I am at changing gears, but it does so consistently better and more economically with absolutely no effort required making it fantastic for my commute to the office in bumper to bumper traffic.
But on a motorcycle I don’t have bumper to bumper traffic, it’s simply not applicable to me and therefore I find myself asking why would I want this on a motorcycle.
Now sure enough I can understand the notion of beginners to lean towards it, especially in North America where manual cars are the exception to the norm. It reduces a significant learning curve if the concept of gears and clutches isn’t ingrained in your behaviour like it is down here at the bottom of Africa, but at the same time I also feel that it removes so much of the interaction between man and machine that makes motorcycling so much more special than driving a car.
A car has four wheels and keeps itself upright. Whether you get a gear change right or wrong doesn’t really make a difference to the overall experience and usually just amounts to some discomfort to your passengers. On a bike though it changes the entire equation and therefore offers a certain satisfaction when getting it perfect combined with so many other things not applicable to cars.
Now before the car people jump up and down telling me how satisfying it is to use a manual gearbox in a car, let me just say that I fully agree. It’s like loading a sniper rifle and pulling off the perfect headshot when you get it right…but as I mentioned earlier this happens maybe ten percent of the time and the rest of it is being stuck in bumper to bumper traffic where it’s like operating a gatling gun for hours on end and never hitting anything.
So once I accepted the fact that I was on an automatic bike and that there was no other way to get back to the shop I got to spend a little bit of time with it.
There is a parking brake which isn’t unlike a choke on older carburetor bikes fitted to the left handlebar. Somewhat worrying though is the lack of clutch, I guess I didn’t think this through and expected something to be there like the rear brake on scooters. Of course there is no shifter either, something I guess I expected to be there when operating in manual mode, but is of course replaced by buttons on the handlebars.
This lead to some confusion which I still think is a bit daft and I was only corrected after the ride. Much like paddles on a modern automatic car there are identical buttons on the left and right handlebar, much like the overtake flasher button on most bikes but larger. Where I assumed the left is shift down and the right is shift up, it turns out the left is shift up and the right is to switch between manual and automatic modes, with the down shift actually being hidden on the bottom of the left handlebar where you expect the horn to normally be.
Bizarrely while riding it I got the impression that the buttons were just wrong way round and that left was gear up and right was gear down and this made no sense to me…obviously I was the one being the retard.
Another thing one doesn’t think about (while constantly searching for the clutch) is that when you buddy revs at your while standing at the lights you can’t simply return the same by opening the throttle because as I very quickly learnt that of course makes the bike go forwards (and potentially over backwards) into the car in front of you.
No idea how one would go about doing burnouts of if they are even possible but I assume if one were to hold the front brake down and open the throttle that it would still spin up the rear wheel.
Overall the “Drive” mode is a terrible experience in town as it tends to keep the revs low and holds onto higher gears very obnoxiously like a naughty child who won’t listen to what their parents tell them. It should be a better option on the open road I would imagine.
Sports mode is what I would use by default, as the bike holds onto gears and remains very responsive and quick to change down should you need it. Ultimately I don’t see myself ever really using the fully manual option as it defeats the purpose somewhat.
There is a minor audible clunk when it changes gears but it’s generally imperceptible through the drive train and it never did anything really odd that seemed potentially dangerous or threw me off mid corner or any of those things I expected from a non-CVT automatic.
However, when pulling away from a stop and turning at the same time one really needs to baby the throttle and wait for the clutch before committing making things a bit slow at such low speeds and something I easily compensate for by feathering the clutch on a manual bike. That being said this is much the same for my car which is actually much more uncomfortable when pulling away in first and disengaging the clutch.
Apart from the weirdness of the gearbox though I found the VFR to probably be one of the most terrible bikes I have ever ridden in town. It is heavy and I don’t mean that so much in weight as in slow steering and it’s urge to pick up when braking a little into corners.
The brakes are superbike deadly and don’t seem to fit in with the general sports tourer appeal of the motorcycle. You hardly touch them and it wants to stop dead and pick itself up at the same time, meaning that it’s extremely hard work to ride it at pace and keeping up with the NC700 was quite a challenge for its lack of nimbleness.
Sure it’s a completely unfair comparison as the two bikes aren’t even remotely the same and I would imagine on the open road at higher speed touring pace it will be in its element compared to the 700X, but I would never ever want to commute on one and lane splitting would require some serious viking bravery.
More astonishing though is that for more than double the price of the NC700X it certainly doesn’t feel like anything special. For that kind of money I would definitely be looking elsewhere. I’m inclined to go ride a BMW K1300S now, just to see if it’s a general Sport Tourer problem or just this particular VFR being a bit of a fatty.
Overall it was a fun ride with a couple of surprises, some very pleasant and some not so much.
South African Motorcyclist 