I finally found and brought home my VFR. I rode to Global Motorsports in Houston, TX on Friday (October23) and traded my 500 for this:
The Bike
2007 Honda VFR800
Candy Glory Red
ABS
Honda OEM Panniers
4,400 miles
$6800
The bike is in excellent condition. The tires are great and the rear is almost new. There are a couple of items on the to-do list. The PO had added several stickers to the fairings and had wrapped the exhaust. I am currently working on undoing those additions to bring it back to looking stock. It is also clear that the bike was dropped from a stop (driveway/garage/light... not sure). It has a small bit of vertical scratches on the right pannier and front right corner of the fairing. I plan to touch these up. They don't show up in the only picture I have right now, but I will probably take a few close-up pictures as I touch these up.
And now for the picture. All I currently have is a cell-phone picture from the day I picked it up. I'll post up some more once it gets sunny and I have it cleaned up a bit.
http://www.vfrdiscussion.com/forum/uploads/1256740489/gallery_19044_5027_47504.jpg
The Last Ride of the EX500 (Trip to Houston)
The ride from Texarkana to Houston is about 315 miles (approximately 6 hours). I could have taken the interstate route that Google picked. It was 100 miles longer, but supposedly would take less time. However, it sounded more fun to have one last ride on the EX500 with some good 2-lane highways and I avoided the interstate route.
It was 50 °F that morning. I layered up, put on the Olympia 1-piece suit, and filled up the EX's tank. The ride was great fun. It was a bit cold riding that morning but it was so much fun as it started to warm up and the traffic thinned out. The EX500 handles long trips with no problem. In fact, it was more comfortable than it had any right to be. The last long distance I made had me stopping every hour or less with an extremely sore butt. Not sure what was different this time, but I was very nicely surprised. I was expecting the worst.
I got to Global Motorsports in Houston at about 3pm. It was a pretty toasty 80 °F when I got there. Wearing and being able to remove layers is a great thing.
Was This Trip Worth It? (Buying the Bike)
Global Motorsports is a small mom and pop shop in Houston, TX owned by a guy named Ed Smeets. In my experience, they were excellent. They are a relatively small repair and used bike sales shop. I called Ed the week before I bought the bike and he was very honest in describing the bike. He took multiple pictures and emailed them to me so that I could pore over them in making my decision. He was also willing to trust me on the condition of my EX500 and guaranteed the full blue book trade value on it. I called on Tuesday morning, put a deposit of $100 on the bike and he held it until Friday when I made it up there.
When I did arrive, everything was exactly as he had told me. The bike was very clean and in excellent mechanical condition. I got the trade-in value on my EX500 and he didn't even bother to start the thing up. "If you trusted it to get you to Houston then I know it is well taken care of." Anyway, the entire experience was positive and I would happily recommend them.
Goodbye EX500. I find that I was actually quite attached to the bike. I think I would have liked to have kept it, but when my wife says only one bike...
http://www.vfrdiscussion.com/forum/uploads/1256740489/gallery_19044_5027_156462.jpg
Taking the VFR Home (Baby, It's Cold Outside)
The new VFR is mine. Very exciting. And then I got to go out and enjoy an hour or two of crawling Houston traffic on my way out of town. Not fun. I did finally get back on the 2 lane highways with some daylight left and... wow is the VFR nice. I love it. Too soon for a good review. I'll have to work on that later.
Once the sun started to set, the temperature started to drop. I was expecting this and had worn layers. 50° F was the forecasted low, after all, and I was prepared. Except the temp continued to drop to 39 °F. I wasn't prepared for that. So here I am... dark, freezing, the middle of nowhere. And then I see a beacon of hope! A warm, inviting yellow glow from a middle-of-nowhere-hole-in-the-wall Dollar General. I stop, warm up and throw on my new sweatshirt. Hurray for another layer. I really am grateful for that Dollar General. There was nothing else for another 45 or so minutes and I'm not sure I would have made that.
The rest of the trip was pretty uneventful. I stop every once in a while to warm up and drink some coffee/hot chocolate and then would take off again. I really don't like riding at night and having to worry about deer every mile of the way. It did give me a chance to fall in love with the VFR lights. Power of the sun in the form of a street bike. Nice.
Made it home. The Givi luggage key broke in the lock (what kind of luck is that?). But I was home! And warm! And it could wait.
A Work in Progress
So the one and only luggage key (why is it that most used vehicles only have one key left?) broke in the lock. It snapped clean in two with no effort. It had worked the entire trip until it finally decided not to. So, I guess that I am grateful it waited until I got home.
I finally made it to the locksmith on Tuesday. Closed on weekends; raining cats and dogs on Monday. It took them about 1.5 hours to fish the broken piece out of the lock. Very deep cuts on the key. They had trouble getting the tumblers out of the way as they pulled it out. Anyway, they got the key out and opened the case, so I have my paperwork. I can actually title the thing now!
We tried several attempts to make a new key using the the two halves, but none of them worked. The key broke pretty cleanly, but I think it was missing just enough between the two halves that copying was not successful. Honda can't actually get new keys or locks despite it being a Honda accessory. Finally found that TwistedThrottle.com sells Givi lock unification kits. So I have new locks and keys on the way. I think it should be pretty easy to swap them (of course, now I need to get the other case picked open).
Anyway, this all reinforces my belief that it is important to have spare keys. It was a shame that it happened before I had a chance to get them made. Sad
I'm currently working on sticker removal. It is a slow process when you have no free time. Then it is on to exhaust wrap removal and then scratch touch-up. It is taking some work to get it ready, but overall I am very pleased with the bike and the price has been worth it to me. I'll get some more pictures up when I get a chance.
Final Thoughts
It was really fun to get the VFR. It is my dream bike and it has ABS and the OEM panniers. Exactly what I wanted.
I enjoyed the chance to take a day off from work and just ride. Except for the cold it was very fun. The EX500 did well and the VFR is just so smooth.
At the end of the day, I put in about 12 hours (not counting stops) and 630 miles. If I had taken the interstate route, I would have been a bit over 800 miles in less time. That makes me think that an Iron Butt 1000 miles in 24 hours would be pretty easy in the right weather. I don't think I have any desire to go for it. It just had me thinking.
The Bike
2007 Honda VFR800
Candy Glory Red
ABS
Honda OEM Panniers
4,400 miles
$6800
The bike is in excellent condition. The tires are great and the rear is almost new. There are a couple of items on the to-do list. The PO had added several stickers to the fairings and had wrapped the exhaust. I am currently working on undoing those additions to bring it back to looking stock. It is also clear that the bike was dropped from a stop (driveway/garage/light... not sure). It has a small bit of vertical scratches on the right pannier and front right corner of the fairing. I plan to touch these up. They don't show up in the only picture I have right now, but I will probably take a few close-up pictures as I touch these up.
And now for the picture. All I currently have is a cell-phone picture from the day I picked it up. I'll post up some more once it gets sunny and I have it cleaned up a bit.
http://www.vfrdiscussion.com/forum/uploads/1256740489/gallery_19044_5027_47504.jpg
The Last Ride of the EX500 (Trip to Houston)
The ride from Texarkana to Houston is about 315 miles (approximately 6 hours). I could have taken the interstate route that Google picked. It was 100 miles longer, but supposedly would take less time. However, it sounded more fun to have one last ride on the EX500 with some good 2-lane highways and I avoided the interstate route.
It was 50 °F that morning. I layered up, put on the Olympia 1-piece suit, and filled up the EX's tank. The ride was great fun. It was a bit cold riding that morning but it was so much fun as it started to warm up and the traffic thinned out. The EX500 handles long trips with no problem. In fact, it was more comfortable than it had any right to be. The last long distance I made had me stopping every hour or less with an extremely sore butt. Not sure what was different this time, but I was very nicely surprised. I was expecting the worst.
I got to Global Motorsports in Houston at about 3pm. It was a pretty toasty 80 °F when I got there. Wearing and being able to remove layers is a great thing.
Was This Trip Worth It? (Buying the Bike)
Global Motorsports is a small mom and pop shop in Houston, TX owned by a guy named Ed Smeets. In my experience, they were excellent. They are a relatively small repair and used bike sales shop. I called Ed the week before I bought the bike and he was very honest in describing the bike. He took multiple pictures and emailed them to me so that I could pore over them in making my decision. He was also willing to trust me on the condition of my EX500 and guaranteed the full blue book trade value on it. I called on Tuesday morning, put a deposit of $100 on the bike and he held it until Friday when I made it up there.
When I did arrive, everything was exactly as he had told me. The bike was very clean and in excellent mechanical condition. I got the trade-in value on my EX500 and he didn't even bother to start the thing up. "If you trusted it to get you to Houston then I know it is well taken care of." Anyway, the entire experience was positive and I would happily recommend them.
Goodbye EX500. I find that I was actually quite attached to the bike. I think I would have liked to have kept it, but when my wife says only one bike...
http://www.vfrdiscussion.com/forum/uploads/1256740489/gallery_19044_5027_156462.jpg
Taking the VFR Home (Baby, It's Cold Outside)
The new VFR is mine. Very exciting. And then I got to go out and enjoy an hour or two of crawling Houston traffic on my way out of town. Not fun. I did finally get back on the 2 lane highways with some daylight left and... wow is the VFR nice. I love it. Too soon for a good review. I'll have to work on that later.
Once the sun started to set, the temperature started to drop. I was expecting this and had worn layers. 50° F was the forecasted low, after all, and I was prepared. Except the temp continued to drop to 39 °F. I wasn't prepared for that. So here I am... dark, freezing, the middle of nowhere. And then I see a beacon of hope! A warm, inviting yellow glow from a middle-of-nowhere-hole-in-the-wall Dollar General. I stop, warm up and throw on my new sweatshirt. Hurray for another layer. I really am grateful for that Dollar General. There was nothing else for another 45 or so minutes and I'm not sure I would have made that.
The rest of the trip was pretty uneventful. I stop every once in a while to warm up and drink some coffee/hot chocolate and then would take off again. I really don't like riding at night and having to worry about deer every mile of the way. It did give me a chance to fall in love with the VFR lights. Power of the sun in the form of a street bike. Nice.
Made it home. The Givi luggage key broke in the lock (what kind of luck is that?). But I was home! And warm! And it could wait.
A Work in Progress
So the one and only luggage key (why is it that most used vehicles only have one key left?) broke in the lock. It snapped clean in two with no effort. It had worked the entire trip until it finally decided not to. So, I guess that I am grateful it waited until I got home.
I finally made it to the locksmith on Tuesday. Closed on weekends; raining cats and dogs on Monday. It took them about 1.5 hours to fish the broken piece out of the lock. Very deep cuts on the key. They had trouble getting the tumblers out of the way as they pulled it out. Anyway, they got the key out and opened the case, so I have my paperwork. I can actually title the thing now!
We tried several attempts to make a new key using the the two halves, but none of them worked. The key broke pretty cleanly, but I think it was missing just enough between the two halves that copying was not successful. Honda can't actually get new keys or locks despite it being a Honda accessory. Finally found that TwistedThrottle.com sells Givi lock unification kits. So I have new locks and keys on the way. I think it should be pretty easy to swap them (of course, now I need to get the other case picked open).
Anyway, this all reinforces my belief that it is important to have spare keys. It was a shame that it happened before I had a chance to get them made. Sad
I'm currently working on sticker removal. It is a slow process when you have no free time. Then it is on to exhaust wrap removal and then scratch touch-up. It is taking some work to get it ready, but overall I am very pleased with the bike and the price has been worth it to me. I'll get some more pictures up when I get a chance.
Final Thoughts
It was really fun to get the VFR. It is my dream bike and it has ABS and the OEM panniers. Exactly what I wanted.
I enjoyed the chance to take a day off from work and just ride. Except for the cold it was very fun. The EX500 did well and the VFR is just so smooth.
At the end of the day, I put in about 12 hours (not counting stops) and 630 miles. If I had taken the interstate route, I would have been a bit over 800 miles in less time. That makes me think that an Iron Butt 1000 miles in 24 hours would be pretty easy in the right weather. I don't think I have any desire to go for it. It just had me thinking.