Quote from: pantablo
Honestly, the gs is a crap bike for anything except commuting or learning.

game on.

I agree.  Today I took a short ride on my new to me Honda CBR F1 (although I've owned one before) and was surprised at how powerful it was in comparison to the GS.  All I had to do was grab the throttle hard and I'd lift the front tire.  Without even knowing it I found myself at 75mph on Foothill Boulevard.  

And this bike is older than my GS.  Of course it doesn't handle as well as my track GS, but that could be fixed if I wanted to throw some money at it.  

Adam

I'm not even talking power! handling too. Yeah, its flickable. So's a gsxr600, at about the same weight. The ducati 900ss weighs about 420-450 dry but was amazingly stable in the corners at Crest. Drop it in and it felt planted...completely planted. You could feel the superiority of the suspension, the tires. Same for the speed four I rode.

The gs belongs in a class of bikes with the ex500/250 and a few other learner bikes. Yeah, you can make them go fast enough to make you giggle...but seems like you'd be trying to make the gs something its not. At least thats what I felt I was doing when I had the gsxr wheel ready to go on the back, just to get a 150 tire on.

I'm past the point of no return now, having tasted the torque of the liter twin. Now the gs just feels buzzy everywhere in the powerband.

Don't get me wrong Pablo, the GS is what it is.  I've ridden some wickedly fast bikes, and the GS is not even close to a 600 repli-racer....... even with massive mods, but for around $3000.00 and $300 a year in insurance there is nothing in the same ball park.  Throw some springs in the forks, a rear shock, a set of tires (no GSXR rim needed), and a re-jet and you have a hell of a cheap and fun weekend ride.  No bling-bling, just grins.

Aside from the fact that Srinath is suffering from dyspepsia, he is right.
I would take too much change from the Golden Arches (if I actually went there) but not from the corner deli.
Oh, wait , that makes me socially responsible.
OK, I buy small stuff from the Kawasaki dealer, (because he's a better shop than the Suzuki dealer,) but buy the big ticket stuff from EBay. Yeah, that's more than frugal, that's almost Scottish.
Lastly, I originally bought a thirdhand  helmet for my wife, but my conscience wouldn't let me alone. So I bought her a secondhand one instead and sleep like a baby. Yup, that's cheap. :lol:

Cheap eh...?

Ya the GS is cheap (inexpensive to buy, insure and maintain). And you won't see it blowing buy the mondo rice burners out there.  But i have a pleasant memory during the blackout last summer when myself and my 4 biker friends from work all tried to get home during that traffic nitemare on that fateful day.  My buddy's Ninja 900 overheated in midtown traffic, my other friends Honda 600 RR had killed his battery in the stop and go heat.  And my last friend on his Buell XB blah blah blah had to stop a few times to cool off his bike as it was running hot.
My cheap little GS carried me through the heat and traffic and throngs of envious people who occasionally thumbed me for a ride.  Took me all the way home.  And the next day....with gas pumps inoperational i still had enough juice to ride back into the city to my girlfriends apt. to bring her lunch.

And not to mention the number of times i had to help give a boost to "superior" bikes with their multiple gadgets and juice sucking cycle computers.

Anyhow.....i'm no road racer.....i commute and once in a while go for a "ride".  I have no intentions of setting a speed record or picking up a beautiful lady with a sexy fairing on my bike (i already have the beautiful lady anyhow)

So am i cheap...  I thought i was being practical and frugal.

I know quite a few people with bikes that turn heads and empty wallets.  But i can't help but snicker every time i hear how much they need to dish out to repair or modify those bikes.

My ride is a cheap ride.  But the smile i get when i'm on it is just about the same as my friend when he's on his Ducati.   Except my smile costs about a third less.  :mrgreen:    :nana:

Quotefor some stupid reason consumers think that they are being raped by the dealer if the price they pay is one penny more than MSRP.

Now lets look at sets or post the MSRP prices that you see for item on the web or in magazines and if you a little bit brite then you will realize that it is the manufacturer of the product who just happens to pull a majic number out of the air that will allow for their product to sell against other brands. The manufacture has already figured out what profit they needed to make to sell the item and that is what they sell it to the dealer for but when checking the market place to see what they will MSRP the item for they really do not that the dealer into play and the Manufacturer just pulls a number out of their ass and lists it as an MSRP.

Personally, I would learn how to spell and how to form a sentence before I started calling people stupid!

Anyway, just to clarify, not that it matters, there are dealers around here who try to charge $500 over MSRP, PLUS shipping and set-up charges. If people are willing to pay that, so be it. I'm not. I still think it is a rip-off, especially when there are small shops within an hour and a half away who list their bikes at MSRP (plus set up and shipping charges). I'm all for supporting local businesses, but sorry, if the only way they can stay in business is to charge SIGNIFICANTLY more for the same product, I'm not shopping there. $500 is quite a bit of money to me, especially on a lower end bike. I wouldn't call it pennies. I guess I'm a cheap ass!

Laura

Lets see.....

I am a poor college student.
I am getting married in June.
I am a pilot paying for flight fees.
I would rather pay 75% online vs 110% local.
I have a 96 Ranger to go along with my 2002 GS500.
My current part-time job is 60 miles away.
Why pay gas for a truck with extra room,
when a GS500 will get you there.
  (FYI, the difference is like a 1 buck raise)
There is rarely a day that goes by,
that someone doesn't say nice bike.
I could never go back to dial-up,
after my broadband was connected.

You have to save somewhere,
in order to enjoy the things you love!

Quote from: tkm433

Also if you check the small print usually listed with the term "MSRP" you will notice it does not include freight charges, assembly, or other cost depending on the item that you buy.

I've checked the small print. Aparrently you havent. MSRP includes freight, setup, etc. Dealers use these "extras" to pad their profit. They're all bullshit additional costs.

There's a couple dealers near me that operate on volume sales...every bike they sell is MSRP price OUT THE DOOR-that includes all freight, setup, TAXES, REGISTRATION, etc...everything. $6495 MSRP on speed four? $6495 gets you out the door-not a penny more. They sell Aprilia's, Triumphs, Suzuki's, Victory's, Honda's, Yamaha's...Funny thing is, I've been able to BEAT those prices for the triumph speed four, honda superhawk and for the aprilia falco's that I've been looking at.

I can't imagine a dealer trying to get over MSRP on a gs500. I thougth only Harley dealers did that. I dont think the demand for the gs500 is that strong to support price gouging(sp?).

look, the gs500 is the honda civic of motorcycles.  cheap, reliable, good for beginners, and no matter how much money you spend on mods, you would have been better off just buying something else if you wanted real performance.  

and the reason we cringe at paying $350 for a full exhaust is because it hardly makes any sense to pay for a $350 exhaust when you bought the whole damn bike for $1350.

Shopping around for best prices is the duty of consumers in order to maintain a properly functioning capitalist market...