camera56
Well-known member
Friends . . .
First, a happy and hearty new year. For those of you in the Seattle area, I just returned from an excellent ride along the south bank of the Skagit and Sauk rivers. Zero traffic, though some black ice and dodgy road surfaces. A lovely 200 mile loop.
Riding said loop got me to thinking about gear. I thought I would pass along some random reviews. YMMV.
Boots
I have two pairs of spidis. I've put a lot of miles under the tall sympatex touring boots. Highly recommend.
Gloves
I have more pairs of gloves than I care to think about including a bunch of Revit's, Held, Gerbings, Lee Parks and probably some others. For general riding, I am loving two pairs of Lee Parks golves https://www.leeparksdesign.com/. I wear the Deer Tours in the summer, and his new Deer Sports until it gets really cold. There are a lot of things to recommend his gloves including . . .
For butt cold riding, it's hard to argue with the Gerbings gauntlets. Today it was in the low 30s and I was completely comfortable with these on.
Helmet
I've been trying out the much acclaimed Z1 helmet (vs. my Shoei RF-1000). It's a nice piece for the price. Some observations . . .
I've bought and worn all the ear plugs sold by Aerostich. If there are more that these, I can't imagine how they'd differ. My preference by a long, long way is the soft foam kind. I buy 30 and 33 db plugs.
I've worn every conceivable ear bud from the standard apple variety, to full custom, to every model Shure makes. FWIW, I now leave my Bose headphones at home when I travel in favor of the ER-6s, and yes I like them much better than the full custom kind. Having said that, I hate them all in a helmet. I bought a pair of helmet speakers from aerostich for $20 or whatever they cost so I can hear the V1 chirp and leave the ipod at home.
Neck Gaitor
I must have twenty of these things including the turtle fur kind, everything that Aerostich sells (the bandana triangle things), several balclavas from various manufacturers, and god knows what else. No question, hands-down, the best set up is made by Buff https://www.buff.es/newen.htm. I have one of each version: with and without polartec, one with polartec and windbarrier. If you look at the website you'll see that there are a zillion ways of twisting and turning these things into gaitors, masks, hats, balclavas, beenies, and who knows what else. I buy them at the motorcycle show that comes through Seattle every year. I buy a lot of them becuase my riding buddies keep stealing them.
Riding Suit
I've written about this on other posts. I have been riding in a full set of kevlar mesh from https://www.motoport.com/. This is very high quality gear. I feel like I'm going on a moon shot when I get into this stuff . . . it literally stands up by itself in the closet . . . but once I'm on the bike, it feels incredibly supportive and I confess to some added confidence knowing that the suit can deflect Nato rounds and polonium in case I should run into either. One particular detail I really appreciate is a neck closure that a) works, and B) closes snugly if I'm wearing a turtle neck and gerbings. I've worn and looked at a lot of suits, and it's astonishing how few manufcaturers get this right.
Underneath
I wear REI poly pro top, bottom, and socks (lightest weight) for the kind of riding I did today: low 30s to about 50 with an emphasis on the low 30s part. On top I wear an extra layer of heavy weight poly pro. Then full gerbings. Then the motoport stuff. I was very comfortable top to bottom at 31 degrees with plenty of mobility to be able to shift in the saddle, hang off, etc. As long as I kept moving, I was fine at 50 degrees as well with the gerbings shut off. If I opened up the vents on the jacket, I am fine up to about 60. So that's a lot of range without having to get off the bike and start taking things off.
I wear a padded back brace by a company called bio skin If i'm going longer than 50 miles or so. Makes a huge difference.
Radar Detector
A different category and I know I risk getting banished to the pointless box . . . I recently replaced my Escort Solo with the V1. There is so much written about radar detectors that I will only add these thoughts (I did not use them together as the Escort got stoled)
Somewhere along the way I recall reading that you should work on your bike with the tools you take on the road. I'm not a big wrencher so that means a relatively small number of things I'm willing to fiddle with. Still, I find that I'm able to do it all with two items from Cruz. This is high quality gear and I don't ride further than about 30 miles with out . . .
First, a happy and hearty new year. For those of you in the Seattle area, I just returned from an excellent ride along the south bank of the Skagit and Sauk rivers. Zero traffic, though some black ice and dodgy road surfaces. A lovely 200 mile loop.
Riding said loop got me to thinking about gear. I thought I would pass along some random reviews. YMMV.
Boots
I have two pairs of spidis. I've put a lot of miles under the tall sympatex touring boots. Highly recommend.
Gloves
I have more pairs of gloves than I care to think about including a bunch of Revit's, Held, Gerbings, Lee Parks and probably some others. For general riding, I am loving two pairs of Lee Parks golves https://www.leeparksdesign.com/. I wear the Deer Tours in the summer, and his new Deer Sports until it gets really cold. There are a lot of things to recommend his gloves including . . .
- American made if that sort of thing appeals to you.
- Fabulously comfortable
- Excellent craftsmanship
- Lee is an all around great guy and complete motorhead
For butt cold riding, it's hard to argue with the Gerbings gauntlets. Today it was in the low 30s and I was completely comfortable with these on.
Helmet
I've been trying out the much acclaimed Z1 helmet (vs. my Shoei RF-1000). It's a nice piece for the price. Some observations . . .
- A lot of room between chin and chin bar if that matters to you. More like a Shoei than an Arai in this way.
- Considerably noisier than the RF. You MUST ear earplugs with this one.
- Decent but not great ventilation.
- If you have a Shoei head, it fits similarly in a Large. My wife has one of each and finds the Z1 loosey in a small in comparison to her RF-1000.
I've bought and worn all the ear plugs sold by Aerostich. If there are more that these, I can't imagine how they'd differ. My preference by a long, long way is the soft foam kind. I buy 30 and 33 db plugs.
I've worn every conceivable ear bud from the standard apple variety, to full custom, to every model Shure makes. FWIW, I now leave my Bose headphones at home when I travel in favor of the ER-6s, and yes I like them much better than the full custom kind. Having said that, I hate them all in a helmet. I bought a pair of helmet speakers from aerostich for $20 or whatever they cost so I can hear the V1 chirp and leave the ipod at home.
Neck Gaitor
I must have twenty of these things including the turtle fur kind, everything that Aerostich sells (the bandana triangle things), several balclavas from various manufacturers, and god knows what else. No question, hands-down, the best set up is made by Buff https://www.buff.es/newen.htm. I have one of each version: with and without polartec, one with polartec and windbarrier. If you look at the website you'll see that there are a zillion ways of twisting and turning these things into gaitors, masks, hats, balclavas, beenies, and who knows what else. I buy them at the motorcycle show that comes through Seattle every year. I buy a lot of them becuase my riding buddies keep stealing them.
Riding Suit
I've written about this on other posts. I have been riding in a full set of kevlar mesh from https://www.motoport.com/. This is very high quality gear. I feel like I'm going on a moon shot when I get into this stuff . . . it literally stands up by itself in the closet . . . but once I'm on the bike, it feels incredibly supportive and I confess to some added confidence knowing that the suit can deflect Nato rounds and polonium in case I should run into either. One particular detail I really appreciate is a neck closure that a) works, and B) closes snugly if I'm wearing a turtle neck and gerbings. I've worn and looked at a lot of suits, and it's astonishing how few manufcaturers get this right.
Underneath
I wear REI poly pro top, bottom, and socks (lightest weight) for the kind of riding I did today: low 30s to about 50 with an emphasis on the low 30s part. On top I wear an extra layer of heavy weight poly pro. Then full gerbings. Then the motoport stuff. I was very comfortable top to bottom at 31 degrees with plenty of mobility to be able to shift in the saddle, hang off, etc. As long as I kept moving, I was fine at 50 degrees as well with the gerbings shut off. If I opened up the vents on the jacket, I am fine up to about 60. So that's a lot of range without having to get off the bike and start taking things off.
I wear a padded back brace by a company called bio skin If i'm going longer than 50 miles or so. Makes a huge difference.
Radar Detector
A different category and I know I risk getting banished to the pointless box . . . I recently replaced my Escort Solo with the V1. There is so much written about radar detectors that I will only add these thoughts (I did not use them together as the Escort got stoled)
- Nice piece of gear. The accessories and crap that comes in the box is too clever by half. I don't know for sure but it appears you can configure it to cook your dinner, converse with aliens, rig electronic voting machines, and several other things with what's in there. For reasons that simply defy explanation, you can't just plug your ear buds or headphones into the V1. You need to buy a special doodad for another $40 to accomplish that little feat. I'm sure there's some geeky reason why this is so, but I think it's BS.
- From what I can tell, it falses less than the escort and warns sooner.
Somewhere along the way I recall reading that you should work on your bike with the tools you take on the road. I'm not a big wrencher so that means a relatively small number of things I'm willing to fiddle with. Still, I find that I'm able to do it all with two items from Cruz. This is high quality gear and I don't ride further than about 30 miles with out . . .
- Cruz metrix https://cruztools.com/toolkits%202007.html
- Miniset https://cruztools.com/toolkits%202007.html
- T-driver with socket https://cruztools.com/t-handles.html
