Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/127824
turns. Then the suspension stops bottoming out and cha ttering the front tire in slower bends (especially any with a dip in the apex which compresses the fork) without sacrificing high-speed damping. There's quite a lot of fork deflection under heavy braking, though, especially once you've wound off some of the excessive dive by upping the preload. The forks really cry out for compression adjustment, though - or better still make a set of upside-downies number three on the Storm trooper's hit list. You wouldn't want to swap the brakes for anything else, though - and especially not a set of supposedly more street-ered Brernbos, which now that the Italians have stopped making cast-iron discs on grounds of aesthetics (did people really object because they rusted up a little after riding in the rain?) don't have the bite in stainless-steel guise offered by the new-generation Japanese stoppers. The VTR's 296mm Nissins use CBR600 carriers fitted with a thicker version of the CBR900RR's discs, matched to a four-pot caliper based on the RC45 road bike's and a new master cylinder. Even without costly steel brake lines, the VTR brakes really, really well, with quite a lot of initial bite allied with sensitivity, and no fade even after repeated hard stops from three-figure speeds - even without the extra help of the engine braking delivered by the lusty V-twin motor. Good package. As is the whole bike but in spite of that, Honda has a problem here, and its marketing people around the world know it: How do they redress the preconceived idea that many potential customers for Japanese twins surely have surmised that the Honda isn't as good as the same-priced Suzuki, because it's not as powerful, isn't fuelinjected and doesn't have such a high level of spec? Hmmm. Like they say in greed-is-good country on Wall Street or in the City of London, that's an opportunity, not a problem. What Honda needs to do is to underline the true all-around nature of the VTR1000 by getting as many people to sample the bike as they possibly can, via ride days, dealer demos, track tryouts, whatever. That way, potential customers can appreciate that the VTR1000F really is a unique all-around package, perhaps better suited to everyday, real-world road use than its rivals, without their getting fazed by dyno figures. But in the meantime Honda isn't too worried. With only 10,000 VTRs slated for production for the 1997 model year (versus 8,000 TLlOOO Suzukis) and orders for 15,000 bikes already received from around the world, the F-version is already an assured success in its debut year. And looking ahead, Honda's R&D engineers and those nice folks at HRC have already moved development up a notch, aimed at.asserting Honda's sport twin supremacy with the introduction at the Paris Show next year of the eagerly awaited VTRlOOOR supersport version with power-up engine package and uprated chassis - matched by a steeper price tag. This will be a very different plate of spaghetti from the present all-rounder plate of Japanese noodles - but with the RR version of Suzuki's TLlooo debuting at Paris as well, and the all-new Ducati 90055 supposedly making its appearance a week beforehand at Milan, the twin-eylinder performance battle will truly be joined a year from now. This is just the opening skirmish. Enjoy. 01