The idea of that is if the back slides out leaving it locked will stop highside (I imagine this is the case from all the rear brakes slides I did on my push bike as a child.) from videos I've seen as soon as your rear tyre grips that's where your bike goes and thus it chucks you over the top. Does that sound right baltimore?

Quote from: slipperymongoose on May 04, 2012, 03:55:55 AM
The idea of that is if the back slides out leaving it locked will stop highside (I imagine this is the case from all the rear brakes slides I did on my push bike as a child.) from videos I've seen as soon as your rear tyre grips that's where your bike goes and thus it chucks you over the top. Does that sound right baltimore?

Sounds logical to me 

-Jessie

yaaaaaay 

Quote from: Phil B on May 03, 2012, 10:41:36 AM
It's a 250; why would it even NEED ABS? lol...

Size of the bike doesn't matter  . When the road is wet or covered in dirt/gravel and you have to brake in heart beat ABS could be a life saver no matter if your bike is a 250cc or 1300 busa, period.

Anyone against ABS is blatantly ignorant, I've riden the SV650 both with and without ABS. When riding the ABS version, I did not feel ANY inconvenient what so ever. The only difference was that I could not block the front wheel no matter how hard I would brake even under the worst circumstance. That's it, otherwise the brake would feel and perform exactly the same.

Imagine you are riding your bike, and then suddenly coming out of a corner you have to pull an emergency braking because there is a big fat truck stalled across the road. Now you might not realize it immediately, but the road is covered with grits... Now without the ABS you are in serious trouble 


To put it another way, the only time when the ABS get into action is when you would have crashed without it.

And to answer OP, if you are not a big boy (220lbs+), and you don't like riding fast the CBR/ninja 250 will do just fine 

However if you want a 500 with ABS you can try the CBF 500 ABS, very good bike and similar to the GS500 but more reliable and quite more expensive.

I have a 250 (granted, a very slow old-tech one) and there is no way you could compare the two in terms of power and torque. IMO you would get bored and dissapointed.  Having said that, I have found the GS very quick to lock up the back wheel, its not a deal breaker you just have to watch out for it.

im not an experienced rider or a physics phd, but i also noticed that its easy to lock up my rear wheel... could just be the old tire (bought new ones!) or is it possible that the notoriously soft front suspension makes the rear wheel abnormally light under hard braking thus making a rear skid more likely?

I think if you lived at one end of Deal's Gap and worked at the other end a 250 would be all you ever need. For the rest of us, there's a reason why people 'graduate' to larger bikes.

Outside of the more developed world, the roads are often so bad that being able to go fast is not that much of a benefit and the average income is a lot lower, which explains why smaller displacement bikes are popular there.

For the same price as a new CBR250 w/ABS couldn't you find a VFR800, SV650 or Bandit650 w/ABS ?

Quote from: cashmoves on May 04, 2012, 09:00:09 AM
im not an experienced rider or a physics phd, but i also noticed that its easy to lock up my rear wheel...

The GS500 probably has a fairly poorly designed rear brake system from the old Suzuki parts bin which gives poor feedback to begin with so you can't tell how hard you are pressing on the brake pedal vs. the amount you are actually slowing down.

Having said that, after watching students do braking exercises for 15 years I noted that almost all of them who had problems with locking up the rear tire did so because they were not using a technique appropriate for a motorcycle.

I've said this elsewhere, but in a car/truck you use your whole leg to push the brake pedal. On a motorcycle that is too much force. If you brake on your motorcycle like you brake in your car/truck you will always have trouble locking the rear tire in a quick stop.

To correct this, try using JUST YOUR FOOT to apply the rear brake. Push down with your toes only. If you are moving your leg, you are trying to push with a set of muscles designed for gross motor movement, and you will apply too much pressure and not be able to moderate it. It may help to have a friend/instructor watch to see if you are moving your heel off the footpeg as well ~ this is the most common indicator of incorrect technique I observed over thousands of hours of instructional time.

Quote from: SAFE-T on May 04, 2012, 09:04:26 AM
For the same price as a new CBR250 w/ABS couldn't you find a VFR800, SV650 or Bandit650 w/ABS ?

Didn't know some sv650s came with abs.  That sounds like an appropriate upgrade and I've always like the looks of em.

Forget the 250 for abs reasons.

On dirty, use your rear brake only unless you know what you are doing. Same for slow speed braking and cornering - rear brake only unless you know what you are doing.

When rear locks the back of the bike slides out. If you then release it you will highside. Only options are, release right away before side slide has started (but this requires feel which you don't have cause you locked on the first place), or keep it locked until the bike gets straight again.

Locking the rear is easy to do since the weight of the bike and rider shifts forward to the front tire. If you ease off the foot pedal before the slide gets you too far sideways the bike will recover just fine and there won't be a highside just a little sort of wiggle. I find my 09 has plenty of feedback and have locked the rear several times with no problems. As soon as I feel any lockup I ease up on the pedal to allow the tire to rotate again while continuing to use the front brake as needed. If you've encountered sand, dirt, gravel, in the road well you're probably going too fast and good luck, do the best you can to ride it out. The worst thing you can do is PANIC. If you don't have faith in your bike or your riding skills then slow down and take it easy out there but get out and ride. Confidence comes with practice. Ride safe y'all

+1

Practice makes perfect they say, use it or loose it and don't wait till you really need it to use it.  I had 4 old Hondas with drum rears that I put a quarter million miles on before my 1st GS and I hardly ever touched the rear brake except to hold the bike on hills, thought that was what the rears were for.    Discovered the GS rear and have used all three brakes all the time since, front, rear, and engine.

Used Dunlop touring tires on those old Hondas getting terrific tire milage and thought they were great until I tried them on the GS, the GS wanted to go around the corners faster than those touring tires did and I quickly learned to catch a rear end breaking loose in the corners. Never took the MSF course and never heard of keeping rear brake locked until stopped, just quickly released and kept on going.

The GS rear disc brake is a bit touchy though.  During my 1st month on the GS a car started to jump out in front of me and I hit the brakes hard and locked it up and low sided.  A couple years later @ 15-20k miles a year I was riding into town on 2 lane Shaker Blvd where homes are set way back and hedge rows run out to the road and as I passed an oncoming small truck a deer suddenly appeared directly in front of me.  My covered rear brake applied instantly and I slowed and missed that deer by a couple feet.  I can attribute 3 deer near misses to that almost always covered rear brake.  I keep front and rear covered in heavy traffic.

I personally wouldn't downgrade to a 250. I have locked up my rear a few times on the GS and I don't stomp on the rear breaks, it's just touchy sometimes. I have also grabbed a fist full of front brakes and had the rear end lift completely off the ground (it was an emergency breaking situation going down a hill) Sometimes things just happen. I would rather practice more with my older bike than go shell out a bunch of money for a newer one hoping it will fix all my mistakes.

Quote from: codajastal on May 04, 2012, 12:25:57 AM

Quote from: dougdoberman on May 03, 2012, 06:42:48 PM

Quote from: slipperymongoose on May 03, 2012, 01:38:38 PM
If you were buying it purely for a commuter and runabout possibly, but if you head up into the twistes you will immediately regret it. Long term ideally I would love to have a 250 for the commute, and my weekend fun bike.

If you think that a 250 CBR wouldn't be as fun as a GS500 in the twisties, you've either never ridden a 250 CBR (or Ninja) or you've never ridden anything that really qualifies as "twisties." 

I grew up riding 250s and can tell you that YOU are joking if you think a 250 would be as much fun as the 500? There is no comaparison between the 2?
What you can do with the 500 in the twisties is not achieveable on the 250. Speed out of corners on the 500 is sweet for example. Same cannot be said for the 250? Just too slow for my liking.

Did you grow up riding 250's that can handle?  When you can go through the corner several miles an hour faster on a 250, coming out as fast isn't an issue.

Quote from: dougdoberman on May 06, 2012, 06:46:41 PM


Did you grow up riding 250's that can handle?  When you can go through the corner several miles an hour faster on a 250, coming out as fast isn't an issue.

Well considering I have been riding bikes for the last 30 years and owned around 2 x 50cc, 1 x 80cc, 1 x 100cc, 3 x 110cc, 2 x 140cc, 1 x 200cc, 6 x 250cc, 2 x 500cc, 1 x 550cc, 2 x 750cc, 1 x 800cc, and ridden as big as a 1400cc I am pretty sure that qualifies as riding some real bikes. as for 250cc bikes that can handle how about YZ250, RZ250, CB250T Superhawk Those 3 alone can handle anything you want to throw at them and STILL do not compare to the 500cc
So stop talking out of your A$$ until you know what you are talking about.

Quote from: codajastal on May 06, 2012, 10:55:17 PM

Quote from: dougdoberman on May 06, 2012, 06:46:41 PM


Did you grow up riding 250's that can handle?  When you can go through the corner several miles an hour faster on a 250, coming out as fast isn't an issue.

Well considering I have been riding bikes for the last 30 years and owned around 2 x 50cc, 1 x 80cc, 1 x 100cc, 3 x 110cc, 2 x 140cc, 1 x 200cc, 6 x 250cc, 2 x 500cc, 1 x 550cc, 2 x 750cc, 1 x 800cc, and ridden as big as a 1400cc I am pretty sure that qualifies as riding some real bikes. as for 250cc bikes that can handle how about YZ250, RZ250, CB250T Superhawk Those 3 alone can handle anything you want to throw at them and STILL do not compare to the 500cc
So stop talking out of your A$$ until you know what you are talking about.

Yeah I think thats a fair qualification for riding bikes. The 30 years bit gets a bonus point though lol.

Quote from: codajastal on May 06, 2012, 10:55:17 PM

Quote from: dougdoberman on May 06, 2012, 06:46:41 PM


Did you grow up riding 250's that can handle?  When you can go through the corner several miles an hour faster on a 250, coming out as fast isn't an issue.

Well considering I have been riding bikes for the last 30 years and owned around 2 x 50cc, 1 x 80cc, 1 x 100cc, 3 x 110cc, 2 x 140cc, 1 x 200cc, 6 x 250cc, 2 x 500cc, 1 x 550cc, 2 x 750cc, 1 x 800cc, and ridden as big as a 1400cc I am pretty sure that qualifies as riding some real bikes. as for 250cc bikes that can handle how about YZ250, RZ250, CB250T Superhawk Those 3 alone can handle anything you want to throw at them and STILL do not compare to the 500cc
So stop talking out of your A$$ until you know what you are talking about.

Hmmm.  You're pretty close to my 32 years on bikes (including several years spent racing).  I got my first dirt bike when I was 10 in 1970.  And I guess if we want to count my neighbor's mini-bike, I was actually riding a couple years before that.  Unfortunately, you're unlikely to ever catch up.  While I haven't owned as many bikes as you, I can just about guarantee that I've ridden many more, including pretty much everything released in the US between 1988 and about 2002.   I've also ridden the new CBR 250 that's being discussed here.  Have you?

You're coming at me with dirt bikes and 70's standards as your examples of 250's that you've ridden?  Talk to me when you've ridden a Ninja 250, or the VTR250 (THAT'S what Honda should have reintroduced instead of the CBR250), or the almighty TZ250. 


A 250 will not pull as hard off of a corner as a GS500.  (Though some of them are close.)  What they will do is brake later, transition quicker and hold more corner speed.  Given a sufficiently twisty stretch of road, this will allow the smaller bike to make it through faster.  The higher corner speed is the big thing.  Now, if you get the most fun from blasting out of a corner and accelerating hard to the next one, then a 250 is not the bike for that.  If you wanna go fast on a 250, you simply can't slow down. 


That said, personally I'd never own a 250 as my only street bike.  The unfortunate reality is that the roads I drive on regularly have too many loooong straight stretches and I hate having to wring the neck of a bike in order to drone along at highway speeds for an hour.  If I lived somewhere with easy access to real Sunday morning twisties though, a sporting 250 is an absolute blast.

I think the consensus is that 250's need a fairly specific set of circumstances to be worth owning. I knew someone on vfrdiscussion.com that had owned multiple bikes that had a 250Ninja he rode regularly at Deals Gap (Tail of the Dragon). On the other hand, he also no longer has it, if that tells you anything.

from my little bit of experience there are mainly two kinds of riders who own 250s like the ninja and cbr - 1) beginners of all ages 2) very experienced, seasoned older riders, but mostly they don't own them though, they just say how much fun they would have on one if they did indeed own them, but then go on to make excuses for why they do not, in fact, own one, the excuses are rarely a fault of the bike, at least explicitly, but excuses just the same.

really there is just one group of people that own these 250s, and they are beginners... i think there are very good reasons for that.

Quote from: dougdoberman on May 07, 2012, 08:17:35 AM

Quote from: codajastal on May 06, 2012, 10:55:17 PM

Quote from: dougdoberman on May 06, 2012, 06:46:41 PM


Did you grow up riding 250's that can handle?  When you can go through the corner several miles an hour faster on a 250, coming out as fast isn't an issue.

Well considering I have been riding bikes for the last 30 years and owned around 2 x 50cc, 1 x 80cc, 1 x 100cc, 3 x 110cc, 2 x 140cc, 1 x 200cc, 6 x 250cc, 2 x 500cc, 1 x 550cc, 2 x 750cc, 1 x 800cc, and ridden as big as a 1400cc I am pretty sure that qualifies as riding some real bikes. as for 250cc bikes that can handle how about YZ250, RZ250, CB250T Superhawk Those 3 alone can handle anything you want to throw at them and STILL do not compare to the 500cc
So stop talking out of your A$$ until you know what you are talking about.

Hmmm.  You're pretty close to my 32 years on bikes (including several years spent racing).  I got my first dirt bike when I was 10 in 1970.  And I guess if we want to count my neighbor's mini-bike, I was actually riding a couple years before that.  Unfortunately, you're unlikely to ever catch up.  While I haven't owned as many bikes as you, I can just about guarantee that I've ridden many more, including pretty much everything released in the US between 1988 and about 2002.   I've also ridden the new CBR 250 that's being discussed here.  Have you?

You're coming at me with dirt bikes and 70's standards as your examples of 250's that you've ridden?  Talk to me when you've ridden a Ninja 250, or the VTR250 (THAT'S what Honda should have reintroduced instead of the CBR250), or the almighty TZ250. 


A 250 will not pull as hard off of a corner as a GS500.  (Though some of them are close.)  What they will do is brake later, transition quicker and hold more corner speed.  Given a sufficiently twisty stretch of road, this will allow the smaller bike to make it through faster.  The higher corner speed is the big thing.  Now, if you get the most fun from blasting out of a corner and accelerating hard to the next one, then a 250 is not the bike for that.  If you wanna go fast on a 250, you simply can't slow down. 


That said, personally I'd never own a 250 as my only street bike.  The unfortunate reality is that the roads I drive on regularly have too many loooong straight stretches and I hate having to wring the neck of a bike in order to drone along at highway speeds for an hour.  If I lived somewhere with easy access to real Sunday morning twisties though, a sporting 250 is an absolute blast.

*I* have ridden the new CBR250. I have been riding since Moses played Fullback for Jerusalem. I have ridden every bike ever made (by Suzuki called a GS500) and can categorically say.... a 250cc bike will NOT go through a set of twisties faster than say an r6 or Striple or even GS500 in the hands of the same rider.

Cornering is not just about carrying speed in and then out. It is also a factor of suspension and sprung/unsprung weight. Center of gravity, ground clearances, overall weight vs suspension, cornering technique and rider ability.

In comparing the CBR250 to an R6, you'll see the R6 weighs 50lbs more. That's 50lbs of extra inertia the suspension would need to overcome to effect the stability of the bike mid corner. Together with better suspension the r6 is more likely to take the same corner more stable than a more bouncy CBR250. It is also thus more likely to carry its speed through the corner and be less effected by any uphill gradient changes than the 250. The heavier bike will have more momentum, in other words.

And while the r6's larger tires might not make it dive into corners as readily as the 250, the greater size contact patch will provide more grip through the corner.

Add the rider's weight of say 180lbs to 200lbs and the 100+hp stronger engine of the R6 will again be less effected and the bike will be less likely to lose speed/momentum due to up gradient changes than the 250cc CBR with its measly 21hp.

Now, the CBR250 might beat the r6 in a gymkhana where time is started at entry into the first obstacle and the course has Zero straight bits, is all entirely twisty and tight as a fish's ass. But certainly not ever going to happen in the really real world.

As has been stated, no experienced rider will forego their 600cc and up bike for a 250cc, thus the 250 will only live in the realm of the learning and inexperienced. And the argument over what a 250cc could or could not do is a moot one. And those who think the 250cc will eat up other things will not change their mind - the ego needs to protect its thought.

NOW, if you want to discuss the mid size bikes vs the liter bikes through a set of twists....

Just remember, in all likelihood, this bloke on his Goldwing would still whip your ass doing Deals Gap http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nrMQ3QwyPo

Michael