BIKETEST KAWASAKI ER-6f:I DIDN'T WIN the lottery on Saturday. For the 400th week in a row. What are the chances of such a run of bad luck? writes GEOFF HILL
Still, in the meantime, I’ve given up on my alternative idea of making a fortune by pinching my bum as I bend over the filing cabinet, suing myself for sexual harassment, then settling out of court at the last minute and splitting the difference.
No, instead I’ve come up with an alternative alternative: I’m going to sue the BBC’s weather forecasting website for trauma, post-traumatic trauma and emotional whiplash to boot.
The idea came to me the other day as I was standing in a motorcycle dealership looking out at the rain hammering down and bouncing off the lime-green Kawasaki I was supposed to be taking out for a test ride.
The Kawasaki with zero miles on the clock. And shiny new tyres. On a wet road. In pouring rain.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” asked Andy the salesman, who was passing by, with a grin of benign Schadenfreude.
“Ah, it’s only a shower. It’ll pass over,” said my mouth, with an optimism my brain didn’t share. For once my mouth was right. Half an hour later, the huge black cloud overhead had gone, leaving me to splash across the steaming tarmac and get a look at the ER-6f.
Available in the naked n version since last year, and now out in the faired f model, this angular beast is a far cry from when it was introduced in 2005, after years of sliding sales because the company’s middleweight bikes were dull and dated.
Their response was to poach design chief Shunji Tanaka from Mazda, and the ER-6 was his baby, a radically styled bike with a brand new 650cc parallel twin engine.
Even better, at €4,500 it was a cheap, fun way to get on two wheels, and, to Kawasaki’s delight, it sold far more than they expected, in spite of niggles about lumpiness at low revs, vibration, and slightly heavy handling for such a light bike.
They went away and revised the frame, swingarm and suspension to transmit less engine vibration and give the bike lighter handling, and tweaked the engine for more consistent power delivery at low and medium revs.
They gave the looks a makeover as well, and the latest incarnation has a sleek, angular look that to me looks best in the faired version, which gives you more protection from wind and weather in any case.
The neatest touch of all, though, is in a wholly digital Ducati-style dash, which tells you everything you need to know in an elegantly ergonomic package, including a fuel gauge, which you don’t always get on bargain-basement bikes.
The backroom boys have done a pretty thorough job of ironing out that vibration problem, with only a faint buzziness at certain revs that is no worse than you’d get from any mid-range bike.
Like anything around the 600cc mark, you also need to wind it up to get the best out of it, and although I kept the revs down because of the zero mileage, it was obviously fairly brisk once you got past 5,000rpm, although not brisk enough to frighten the novice riders who, I suspect, will be the bike’s biggest market.
The gears are slightly clunky, which may have just been early bedding-in, and the brakes slow the bike down in the brisk but not fierce equivalent of the acceleration.
Handling is a bit light at the front end on slow cornering, but out on the road is stable and vice-free. In a way it was appropriate that I was taking it fairly easy through corners on the brand new tyres, since that’s exactly the way most owners will ride it, at least at first.
With a low seat and centre of gravity, it’ll appeal to gals and shorter bikers generally, although anyone over six feet will find their legs getting a bit cramped on longer journeys.
The mirrors show only a hint of elbow, which will again add to the confidence of tyros.
All in all, a pretty good package at a very good price.
Factfile Kawasaki ER 6f
- Engine:649cc liquid-cooled, fuel-injected four-stroke parallel twin, DOHC, eight valves, 53 kW/72.1bhp @ 8,500rpm, 66 Nm/48ftlb @ 7,000rpm
- Top speed:203km/h
- Transmission:six-speed, chain final drive
- Suspension:front 41mm telescopic fork, rear offset laydown single-shock with adjustable preload
- Seat height:790mm
- Fuel capacity:15.5 litres
- Dry weight:178kg
- Price:€7,950 (non-ABS version). Kawasaki Distributors, tel: 01-456 7234. UK price £5,075.
(Test bike, Phillip McCallen, tel: 028-92 622 886, philipmccallen.com)