Silverwing v Burgman

Hi all,
I currently ride a Forza 300,....my daily commute is 20 miles each way, this is soon to change to around 60 miles each way...obviously I need to upgrade, question is Silverwing or Burgman or do I go all out and look at my the BMW?
Regards
Richard

Ricardo, why don't you Introduce yourself properly like it says at the top of the page before diving in with questions.

And search for topics on this subject first.

hi Diverdick,

I would recommend the Silverwing for the low cost of purchase and the low cost and ease of maintenance. The other two have more power and gimmicks, but the SW is also the lightest of them. I am 100% convinced that the cost of ownership of the Honda is by far the lowest and the reliability the highest. You can do nearly everything on the SW yourself if you are mechanically minded. Of course, if money is not an issue, the extra performance and equipment of the other two maxi scooters will better the SW and their manufacturers are also known for quality products.

Diverdick,

Welcome to the site and hope you find your answers. Do you want a powerful scooter that is lighter weight and cheap to operate? The BMW is 60 hp, Burgman 650 is 55 hp and Silver Wing is 50 hp, but the SWing is the lightest of the bunch. All 3 will handle the 60 miles you need to go in comfort and plenty of power. All 3 will carry 2 people as well so just ask away and also use the search function and you will find your answers. Tell us what you decide.

Diverdick wrote:

Hi all,
I currently ride a Forza 300,....my daily commute is 20 miles each way, this is soon to change to  around 60 miles each way...obviously I need to upgrade, question is Silverwing or Burgman or do I go all out and look at my the BMW? Regards Richard

Welcome aboard the board Richard. I'll be the contrarian here. We rode the older Honda Elite 250's and our former Reflex 250 for a number of years ... on long journeys as well as daily commutes. Never a problem with keeping up with traffic etc. except for steep hills where they all simply ran out of breath.

I understand the Forza 300 is quite a capable maxi-scoot in its own right. Why do you say "obviously I need to upgrade"? It's not so obvious to me at least. ~ BugJr ~

Good point about sticking with the Forza, a 60 mile commute can get quite expensive on gas. The sw, burger and bmw are all nice bikes but not particulary economical... but they are faster and therefore much more fun :-)

Thanks for the replies....I will start with rectifying my poor forum etiquette.
My name is Richard, I currently live in Hornchurch, Essex, but am looking to move out a little.
Other than that I am a middle aged fat balding git.....first mistake sorted.

I did search the forums prior to my post, but thought I would ask the question in order to hear people's opinions specific to my needs.....second mistake hopefully sorted.

I will probably stick with the Forza to start with, but I will be traveling the A12/M25 & M25 into central London and feel something a bit larger would cope better with maintaining 60 mph + , instead of being near to the top speed of the Forza for extended periods. I may be proved wrong on this once I have done the journey a few times.

Regards
Richard

Hi Richard and welcome to the forum.

I'm assuming that your commute will be during the morning and evening 'peaks'.
All the roads you mentioned are pretty overcrowded at that time (at most times really) so I doubt the ability to maintain high average speed will turn out to be particularly important.

The ability to be lightish and manoeuvrable is probably just as important, especially for the bit from the A12/M25 into Central London. The Silverwing might seem a bit long and cumbersome once you get into London.
On the odd occasion that I go into London I have used both my Silverwing and my PCX125. Once in London the 125 is the tool for the job.

It might be worth your while doing a couple of test runs from where you will be moving too into town.
You might find that the Forza is actually more suited to the journey as a whole.

Of course, you may just fancy a larger scoot in which case why not.
The Silverwing is very capable and reliable. If you like to do your own maintenance then it is easy to work on too. I haven't tried working on the big Burger or the BMW but from what I've read they are more difficult. If you're going to be doing 120 miles per day then maintenance will become a bigger issue.

The Silverwing would be great for the journey you've got in mind but I suspect that the Forza would be just as suitable - they would each just be better at different bits of it.

Whatever you decide, enjoy your riding.
Oh, and good luck with the house move when the time comes.

Hi Richard. I recently bought a Silverwing and joined this forum. I have two other bikes and wanted to replace one of them with a comfortable machine. I'm 6' 3", 18 stone with a bad knee and a skinny wallet (major consideration).

A Burgervan 650 is more complex than most scooters and had troubles with earlier models. My knees wouldn't clear the "dashboard".

A BMW was too pricey for me, but felt comfy.

A Burgman 400 was a serious contender for a while. I tested a K8 model and felt it was comfortable and rode well. Handlebars a bit close to knees but bar raisers would've sorted that. Motorway speeds were no problem and it was quick enough at the traffic light drag race.

I'd tested two used S'Wings but they were poor examples - one vibrated and rattled like mad, and the other had steering alignment problems. I wanted ABS and a later model with the Lambda sensor is better on fuel. No other S'Wings were up for sale and I was about to buy the B'man 400 when a wing turned up. A quick ride showed it to be a good 'un. Unfortunately it didn't have the Lambda sensor but had only done 7k miles. The thing that convinced me to forget the B'man 400 was the acceleration. It was so much better on the Honda.

I looked at other makes but those were the machines on my shortlist.

My advice... if the new job pays well, get a late model Honda with better fuel economy (I only get 52mpg Imperial on my A7 model). A Burgman 400 might be more economical but a tad slower to motorway speeds. New BMW's have quite a few improvements over earlier models, but very pricey still. A Burgman 650's complexity would worry me to distraction although many say they are reliable.

I really like the simplicity of the Honda. Reliability is important to me and, with my new backrest, comfort is good. However, I do find the ride a bit harsh on country B roads - something I'm going to look into.

Unless you have deep pockets , stay away from the 650 burgman. At 100500 kl on my swing 3 belt change at $ 160.00 each ,and easy to install. My friend's 650 gurgman blew his drive belt at 72 k kl at a cost of $1605.00 left 300 miles from dealer only to brake down 50 miles from home .Now the drive line bearings fail and looking at total replacement . He is still waiting on back order parts. his burgy is in the shop since the last week of June and still waiting for a final cost of repairs.IMO the 650 Burgmans are trow  away scooters.

For every shock horror story about 650 Burgman's transmission failures, there'll be scores more that run for thousands of miles without problems. You can't really compare the Burgman's over complicated set up with the simple rubber belt that the Silver Wing has.

For commuting the big Burgman is great on fast motorways, but a big heavy lump to thread through stop-go city traffic and congestion, it's hard work solo and harder still with a passenger.

I really have sympathy with anyone that has to commute into London, courtesy from other road users is virtually non-existent. A big lardass scooter will be harder to park too, in places where you can park nose in to the kerb there's a lot more sticking out towards the road, especially with a large top box fitted.

The king of commuting scooters isn't the Burgman, Silver Wing, or BMW, it's the 3 wheeled Piaggio MP3, Paris is full of them.

Flyingpanman wrote:

[EDIT] The thing that convinced me to forget the B'man 400 was the acceleration.

A Burgman 400 might be more economical but a tad slower to motorway speeds.

A Burgman 400 uses a basic belt & pulley CVT transmission similar to the Silverwing. Upgrading the variator with Dr Pulley Sliders would improve low and mid range acceleration at minimal cost.

Tim

All this tinkering with perfectly capable basic maxi scooters for a modicum of extra poke. What's next, the usual upgrade to HyperPro fork springs and fit a cup holder posts?

Cosmic_Jumper wrote:

A Burgman 400 uses a basic belt & pulley CVT transmission similar to the Silverwing. Upgrading the variator with Dr Pulley Sliders would improve low and mid range acceleration at minimal cost.

Tim

But then I could do the same to the Honda for even more performance

Meldrew wrote:

What's next, the usual upgrade to HyperPro fork springs and fit a cup holder posts?

Of course Meldrew. I did say I found the ride harsh, (particularly on 'B' roads in N. Yorkshire). Hyperpro may be the answer.

Last Tuesday I fitted a cup holder from Lidl filled with cordial and saved myself £3 in brew money while we toured cafes around Teesdale. Others scoffed but I remained cool and refreshed.

I tour around Yorkshire and Shropshire, as well as Cheshire and Lancashire I never found the Silverwing ride "Harsh". Sounds like you should have stuck to your Goldwing or Pan European Flyingpanman. I average 64mpg on my 2014 A7 Silverwing, maybe you should slow down a bit to get the economy.

Old Limey wrote:

I tour around Yorkshire and Shropshire, as well as Cheshire and Lancashire I never found the Silverwing ride "Harsh". Sounds like you should have stuck to your Goldwing or Pan European Flyingpanman. I average 64mpg on my 2014 A7 Silverwing, maybe you should slow down a bit to get the economy.

The Pan European is the one I want to sell. It's too cramped on my bad knee.

I *think* mine is an A7 model (2006 registered) I know it doesn't have the later fuelling system with the Lambda sensor on the exhaust, so 52 mpg. isn't too bad. A thorough service and throttle balancing is on my to do list.

It definitely doesn't smooth out the rough roads like my other bikes, but it is after all, a scooter with small wheels. I know the tyres are past their use by date (hardened rubber?) so they're up for changing along with the wheels being repainted. I've made a back rest and I'll be padding out the seat for a little more height. I'm not giving up on it but I'm going to take it to a suspension specialist for his advice.

I daren't slow down - I'm worried that hearse may catch me

@Flyingpanman: see the "Too Bouncy" thread and the shocks being developed

With you, though, on the SW ride. Had a PCX already and was a little disappointed the SW didn't have much improvement over the smaller scooter's ride.

It's all that unsprung mass on the back wheel compared to a motorbike. Having said that a little more damping wouldn't go amiss.

steve_h80 wrote:

It's all that unsprung mass on the back wheel compared to a motorbike. Having said that a little more damping wouldn't go amiss.

I know, I know. Try as I might, it's difficult losing weight when you simply can't go without a locally produced home-made ice-cream for more than a day, or one of my local baker's delicious pies.

Fuel consumption might improve also.

Diverdick, if your planning on year round riding you might want to have access to a hose for a daily wash in winter as they are not very corosion proof as I am finding out to my cost, 2 filters corroded through before the 12 month change date and a front caliper that is corroding away at the join

I'm with Old Limey, I've never found the Silver Wing's suspension harsh on any road surfaces, riding solo with or without a load of touring kit, and occasionally Mrs M. That includes temporary road surfaces, and frost damaged tarmac. In fact I've never had a problem with the suspension front or rear an any of the maxi scooters I've owned. Smaller wheels like on the Helix meant cheaper replacement tyres, I've no idea what unsprung mass is, "top boxes ruin handling" is a myth, and the stock seat is all day comfortable for me.

Meldrew wrote:

I'm with Old Limey, I've never found the Silver Wing's suspension harsh on any road surfaces...

...I've no idea what unsprung mass is, "top boxes ruin handling" is a myth, and the stock seat is all day comfortable for me.

Maybe it's just me being a big, fat bar steward and cosseted by my KLV1000 and Pan European. Maybe it's my particular machine, or the prev. owner did something with the suspension, I don't yet know but I'm going to investigate the possibilities. I am sensitive to ride quality due to an operation for a prolapsed disc many years ago that has left me with a slightly weakened back.

Basically, unsprung mass means the weight of anything not suspended by the springs and shock absorbers. The weight of the wheels, the tyres, brake calipers and discs are all supported only by the road surface. Keeping this weight down improves the chances of the suspension controlling  the action of the wheel and tyre to improve grip and handling.

The seat and rider are supported by the springs, so technically I wasn't quite correct when I referred to my weight being a problem for the unsprung mass.

"Top boxes ruin handling"....  It would if I sat in your top box.

Edit: I feel I must apologise to the original poster as we have hi-jacked his topic somewhat.

Diverdick,

You may want to try Dr Pulley sliders, a lighter weight, on your Forza to get a bit more acceleration. But I hear the Forza doesn't have trouble getting up to almost 80 mph so it may be more than enough for what you need. If you get a SWing you should look at a 2008 or later since they get better mpg's due to the O2 sensor. I didn't find the rear shocks bad at all but I did install the Hyperpro shocks and it gave my SWing much better handling. I am able to ride in the twisties and mountains and found it gave it a more motorcycle feeling in the front.

I know some don't like to add anything whatsoever, but I like to play with things and did mod my SWing some.

Many thanks for all the replies....definitely things to think about.
The Forza does accelerate well....like I said I just feel I will be riding it for extended periods near to the top end of its operating range, hopefully from comments this should not be a problem.
The points on rear suspension are interesting, as I feel the rear suspension on the Forza is poor, bordering on agricultural, have been considering upgrading rear shocks for a while.

Regards
Richard

The only difference between a 20 miles each way commute and and a 60 miles one is the longer time you're riding. As for spendinng extended periods at the top end of it's operating range, how is cruising at a constant 70mph detrimental a 300cc scooter, they're perfectly capable of holding that speed from full tank to empty. It's steep uphill sections, headwinds, crosswinds, and pushing through the turbulent bow wave overtaking one or more HGV's that larger maxi scooters have the clear advantage on motorways, smaller than 400cc they make it harder work.

Meldrew,
From what you say I should be fine on the Forza...as long as I am the only one on the road!.

Unsprung weight on the maxi scooters is proportionally less than on smaller scooters where the engine is part of the swing arm. The lower unsprung weight the better the ride because the wheels and suspension don't have as much mass. That allows them to react to a bump faster which prevents the larger mass of the machine from reacting as much.