Wow, nice thing. But I just would like to be driver and for sure never ever on “the 2nd place” besides I want my backside “well done”. 
Any price for that one standing in the stars? Not that I want to get one, but interested, you know. 
kamiwaza says: fuck yes!
(dunno about single cylinder for such a large displacement though… hang on what’s the deal with the twin pipes?)
[quote=“kamiwaza”]kamiwaza says: fuck yes!
(dunno about single cylinder for such a large displacement though… hang on what’s the deal with the twin pipes?)
[/quote]
Yeah, how come it has twin pipes?
I used to have a Yamaha 500 single. One of the most fun bikes I ever had.
Found the motherload of info for the MT-03: yamaha-motor-europe.com/prod … /MT-03.jsp
Just don’t any of you cretins buy it before me…I don’t want sloppy seconds.
Interesting bike…
I see it online with both chain and belt final drive…Interesting.
I’m still in the market for a bike, and these singles are looking more and more interesting. Power at any RPM, agile and perfect for our narrow high-mountain passes.
I also don’t want a 2nd bike. Whatever hits MJB’s stable will be a daily commuter, not something that is usurped by a scooter when I need to run to the grocery store or pick up my kid from school.
Be cool to see on in the flesh…Are they available in Taiwan yet?
The confusion is because we’re talking about at least 2 different bikes here…
The story starts in 1999 with Yamaha releasing what was for the time a ludicrously modern looking urban assault concept bike at the Tokyo Show, the MT-01…It’s purpose was to replace the Bulldog BT1100 which was a good-ish looking bike, but just bombed on the showroom floor… The 1600cc twin concept MT-01 did the round at all the shows for 4 years generating a lot of interest until last year when Yamaha eventually released the production version of the MT-01…
MT-01 Concept-----------------------------------------------------------------------------MT-01 Production
Fast forward to 2003 and I was standing at the Yamaha booth at the Milan Motorcycle show looking at what was then the brand spanking new R1, when I was practically crushed by a mob of Italian journalists swarming over to where a conspicuosly cool looking sheet on the main display stand had just been whisked away by the head of Yamaha Europe… Underneath it was the MT-03 concept, the middle weight follow up to the MT-01… an implausibly urban chic looking work of art on wheels, there was little doubt that the big Y has roped in the talents of some of the local Italian lads in the design department, and decided that even though a lot of the original MT-01 features wouldn’t work in the real world on a 1600cc 250kg beast, they were just too cool to give up on… Being a concept bike it was suitably decked out in outlandish but impractical coolth like LED lights front and rear, single piece CNC swing arms, Ohlins suspension, super kinky CNC wheels and disc rotors that would have even the most devout buddhist take a second look at his lotus flower…
The MT-03 concept circa 2003
Again the hype generated was off the scale and Yamaha were quite pleased in the knowledge that even though the Bulldog has missed the mark, the concept that there was a market for slick design funky urban naked bikes was spot on… Again fast forward a couple of years and fresh for next year we have the production version of the MT-03… unfortunately but inevitably most of the bespoke trick bits have been binned in favour of price point pleasing ho-hum versions, leaving the MT-03 at rather a no frills spec level, which it has to be to compete against the other entry level budget 600 nakeds, but the overall feel of the bike made it through amazingly unscathed for the tough transition between concept and production bike…
The MT-03 Production bike available early 2006
The production MT-03 has arrived with the same 660cc 4valve, single cyclinder thumper as sported by Yamaha’s budget supermoto the XT660… the suspension, brakes and wheels have all been replaced by standard issue budget items, the ultra light and trick CNC wing arm is replaced by a cast version, the LED lights are gone and the belt drive of the concept model has given way to the cost effective chain drive… It’s still a very cool looking bike, but at 175kg dry and a rather meek 45 horsepower the socks of all but the most timid of riders will remain firmly in place… for that reason Yamaha is toting it heavily as a first timer’s bike and dare I quote it, “a great bike for your girlfriend”… so sales probably not looking so great amongst the burley macho biker market then… but they just might be onto something as the modern metrosexual’s city runabout of choice…
[quote=“plasmatron”]The production MT-03 has arrived with the same 660cc single cyclinder thumper as sported by Yamaha’s budget supermoto the XT660… the suspension, brakes and wheels have all been replaced by standard issue budget items, the ultra light and trick CNC wing arm is replaced by a cast version, the LED lights are gone and the belt drive of the concept model has given way to the cost effective chain drive… It’s still a very cool looking bike, but at 175kg dry and a rather meek 45 horsepower the socks of all but the most timid of riders will remain firmly in place… [/quote]The XT660X itself is about the same weight. But it does look like a nice piece of kit.
motorbikestoday.com/reviews/ … xt660x.htm
So plasmatron… so nice of you to come into a thread where quite a few people are admiring a bike and say that it’s for girls. Would you care to provide a link to that quote? I enjoy reading about this new style of bike. Thanks in advance.
WTF! Why is that guy in the pic. riding it like it was a supermoto bike?
Doesn’t look like a supermoto.
yamaha-motor-europe.com/prod … ew=gallery
Uh, he ain’t riding it. That pic was taken doing zero kilometres an hour. That’s why.
kamiwaza
I started looking at some 0-60mph speeds for different bikes…since that’s the “legal” max most of us can do…and I noticed something interesting. See if you spot it too. Of course 0-60 times vary, but I’m just going by what’s printed on the net.
The CBR600RR sportsbike is usually said to do it in 3.55 secs.
The Honda hornet naked bike comes in at 3.60 secs.
The 1200cc V-Max which is known as the ultimate drag bike or muscle bike does it in 3.55 sec…hmm, starting to see a patern here?
The 2300cc Triumph Rocket does it in…yeah, you guessed it… 3 and a half secs…or 3.54 to be exact.
So from 0 to any legal speed…all these bikes (and many others) are pretty much the same. Just depends on the rider I guess. Heck, I used to beat sportsbikes in the city on my old Virago 1100 cruiser. That was funny.
Not much point to all of this…I just thought it was interesting.
I was going to start a new thread with this…but I felt the mods wouldn’t like me cluttering up Zoom Zoom with all this “big bike” stuff.
sure, the quote is from the November issue of BIKE magazine, and was based on their interview with the Director of Sales for Yamaha UK… I don’t have it with me but I can get you the page number if you like…
I also said it was a slickly designed, great looking city bike ( just my personal opinion)… but 0.25hp per Kg (before you add oil, coolant and gas) and that from a single cylinder thumper, any way you look at it, hardly an untamed beast of bike… don’t shoot the messenger… 
Fair enough. Just seemed like walking into a discussion between a few guys about a bike they like and saying “That’s for girls.” wasn’t the most tactful thing to do…but who am I to talk? I’m one of the rudest people on here…
Anyway, did some other calculations. Your BMW GS has .44hp per Kg. And a Honda Hornet has .53hp per kg. Incase anyone wants to compare that to the MT-03’s.
This kind of belongs more in the other GS bashing thread since nobody’s talking about GS’s or Hornets here…
BUT…
you got the maths wrong mate… it’s 98Hp divided by 199kg = 0.49hp/Kg
http://www.bmw-motorrad.co.uk/gb/en/index.html
really doesn’t make much difference to me, but you’ve mentioned before how you’re a stickler for getting the facts right and can’t stand people distorting the figures for the sake of argument… 
This kind of belongs more in the other GS bashing thread since nobody’s talking about GS’s or Hornets here…
BUT…
you got the maths wrong mate… it’s 98Hp divided by 199kg = 0.49hp/Kg
http://www.bmw-motorrad.co.uk/gb/en/index.html
really doesn’t make much difference to me, but you’ve mentioned before how you’re a stickler for getting the facts right and can’t stand people distorting the figures for the sake of argument… [/quote]
There you go with your paranoid GS bashing statements. I merely mentioned a statisic with regards to your own bike so you can relate…since I am mainly talking with you…and you take offense. Didn’t know you were so ashamed of your bikes performance figures…sorry…didn’t mean to mention them in public friend.
And I did mention the Honda Hornet in the OP…so it’s not off topic.
And with regards to me doing my maths incorrectly. I didn’t. Not according to this other site: motorbikes.be/en/BMW/2005/R%201200%20GS/
Kamiwaza take a closer look at the tires. They exhibit motion blur. That pic was taken while he was doing a turn, while riding. And I was commenting on the riding style, not whether he was riding or not.
yikes… If I were you I’d avoid that site like the plague in the future, their facts and figures are laughably incorrect… maybe it’s only the GS they screwed up on though… but who knows, you could be getting incorrect information about all the bikes you’re looking up there… better to check the manufacturer’s websites, at the very least the info is straight from the horses mouth…
like I said I don’t much care about the performance figures of the GS I’m not a “drag performance uber alles” kind of rider… and like I already wrote in the other thread I whole heartedly admit to it being a big, heavy-ish and slow machine in comparison to a crotchrocket sportsbike… So no paranoia here… Still can’t help thinking it’s weird that you were the one who was bringing up the 12GS in a negative light all over the place even though no-one else was talking about it, but you’ve already covered the fact that you’ve got issues… 'nuff said… 
I’ll accept that you were bringing it up to fill me in, of course I already knew, as you know you tend to read up a lot about a bike you own, but thanks for the sentiment…
To add to this…I have borrowed the above mentioned November issue of BIKE magazine from Plasmatron. I just read the article about the MT-03…and the statement about it being a “beginner’s/ladies bike” is true. And the magazine quotes thw Director of sales for Yamaha in Europe…
I don’t have a scanner but i’ll return the issue to Plasmatron and he can scan it on here.
As for all the GS talk…who gives a shit!..it’s just childish and stupid to compare apples and oranges…I ride what I like and that’s that!..one thing worth mentioning is that the GS has heaps of torque…more than a K5 GSX-R…this torque proves very useful in the twisties and is guaranteed to leave any sportbike in it’s dust very quickly on most Taiwanese twsity bits of road…and for me, cornering is why I ride bikes…not for blinding speed!..
I used to ride #3 as fast as I could when I owned the CBR…it was fun as hell because it was a fast and flowing road with wide corners and had a half decent surface…it was CBR territory!
…now…a few years has passed and the road that once let me rip it up is now dmaged by typhoons and huge ass overloaded trucks…holes, ditches, bumps(mid corner), ruts, surface changes, jumps, patch jobs now litter then #3…it’s not what it used to be and i’m sure happy that I don’t have a sportbike to ride it anymore or else i’d be in a permanent tanks slapper all the way up and down!..
so the high speed runs that offered a rider the chance to ride fast and take nice corners are not as fun as they used to be…or should I say not as safe as they used to be…you can go on the highway and ride as fast as you can…if that’s your thing…but that seems to be the kind of riding that most people don’t care for!..
that’s my .02 cents worth!
[quote=“skylarkpuma”]
As for all the GS talk…who gives a shit!..
it’s just childish and stupid to compare apples and oranges…
I ride what I like and that’s that!..one thing worth mentioning is that
the GS has heaps of torque…more than a K5 GSX-R…
this torque proves very useful in the twisties and is guaranteed to leave any sportbike in it’s dust very quickly on most Taiwanese twsity bits of road…and for me, cornering is why I ride bikes…not for blinding speed!.. [/quote]
Fine, fine…I believe you about the girl comment. No need to scan it. I just thought it wasn’t the most tactful way of bringing up the subject. I myself had read that it was a great “first bike”. Along the same lines…I’m sure.
I noticed that the number 3 was in bad shape closer to Taichung…it’s still pretty much perfect up here in Taoyuan, Hsinchu.
This says it has less torque…
A childish comparison