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MOTORCYCLES

BMW's new range of 650 singles

By Mike Hanlon

07:00 September 12, 2006 PDT

Page: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

BMW's new range of 650 singles

BMW's new range of 650 singles

Image Gallery (28 images)

Apart from lower gyro-forces on the front wheel, the shorter camber also enhances the motorcycle’s handling and agility on the road.

The forward-leaning seating position also helps to make long and winding bends as well as serpentines a truly outstanding pleasure on two wheels, optimum directional stability on straight passages in between again leaving nothing to be desired.

One of the improvements made to optimise the motorcycle’s suspension geometry is the opening for the front axle moved further back, again in the interest of almost playful but nevertheless safe handling for significant benefits also in city traffic.

Both the springs and dampers are specifically tailored to the Street Moto with its particular requirements and riding qualities. While the upside-down telescopic fork offers 270 millimetres spring travel like on the Hard Enduro, the fork is even firmer and tauter all round in its inbound and rebound motion. Particularly the sporting rider will be happy to enjoy the sensitive, incremental adjustment of the damper in both directions, ensuring an individual, personalised set-up at all times. Rear-wheel suspension, in turn, is firmer and shorter, with spring travel at the rear of 245 millimetres.

The Street Moto boasts the most powerful brake system of all models in the G 650 X line-up: At the front a four-piston fixed calliper interacts with a 320-millimetre brake disc in floating arrangement, interacting with high-grip radial tyres for exceptional deceleration benefiting in particular from the very high torsional stability of the USD telescopic fork with its main tubes measuring 45 millimetres in diameter.

With its 240-millimetre brake disc and floating-calliper configuration, the rear-wheel brake is the same as on the other two models. Final drive on the G 650 X Moto conceived for road use comes with a ratio of 16 : 47 teeth, that is somewhat “longer” than on the Enduro version.

BMW G 650 Xcountry – a modern interpretation of the scrambler.

Back in the ’50s and ’60s of the last century, road-going motorcycles also suitable for offroad use after making a few technical modifications were called “scramblers”. And today the BMW G 650 Xcountry offers the same versatility, bringing together the best of two worlds: excellent road-going qualities combined with offroad assets typical of an Enduro.

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