See alot posted about Nightsters , Irons etc how many 1200r owners out there ?

 

Me...

 

Heres Mine !

 

My 04. This was my first H-D, bought it used in 2006. (Well, I had a 2003 Buell XB9S). I'll always have a soft-spot in my heart for this bike and I still enjoy riding it.

 

06 1200r here. Love it and has alot of tweaks. Hopefully soon it will become my fiance's bike when I get my vrod.

Only thing I don't prefer the r over a C is the tank size.

MH

 

'07 1200R for me. Fell in love with the looks when it came out in '04 and knew that sooner or later I'd own one. When they changed the tank in '08 I knew I was going to have to go used since it just didn't look right without the peanut tank. In January of '09 I found my perfect bike sitting in the used showroom at the local dealer; SE intake, SE II exhaust, and even the silly security thingy. It's amazing the deals you can get when there are piles of snow in the dealer's parking lot and they have more used bikes than they know what to do with.

 

My 08 r1200 is my 5th sporty and i love it . The suspension is alot better than my 883c and i like the way it rides . I'm just the opposite i wanted the larger tank instead of the peanut tank .

 

"08 1200R here. Love the 4.5 gallon fuel tank. Some of the areas I ride in South Texas don't have gas every ten or twenty miles.

Never understood why the MoCo did away with the Roadster. Dual front discs, tachometer, blacked out engine and tasteful amount of chrome. Plus better ground clearance and shock travel for those country roads. What else could you ask for?

 

I can't argue that the 4.5 gallon tank isn't more practical. I'd love more capacity, but I still think the 3.3 gallon tank looks better. Stupid reason, I'll admit, but there it is. Every now and then we've all got to allow ourselves an irrational decision here and there.

I can sort of understand why the Roadster was dropped; it never did sell particularly well as I understand and no matter how many parts it shared with other Sporties it really did present itself differently than the models with forward controls and more "cruiser" styling. The Roadster was more of a "Standard" motorcycle, a UAM, if you will (and if I can be forgiven for the comparison to a UJM) and because of that it occupied an odd sort of middle ground. It wasn't styled like a cruiser in the manner that the traditional Harley buyer looks for but it wasn't different enough to pull in people looking for something obviously different (like the XR1200 or the VRSC models).

As good as standards are in terms of practicality, they just don't sell well in the US anymore. Seems everyone wants either a full-blown cruiser or a race bike in street clothing. It's the same thing that killed great bikes like the Honda Nighthawk 750 in the US; people just don't buy them.

It's probably the same reason that I'll run into other bikers all the time when I take the Sportie to the pub, but almost never when I throw the backrest bag on and use the Sportie to fetch groceries or run errands. We tend to look at bikes for reasons other than practical things like dual front discs or a tach or even ground clearance and shock travel. It's not a bad thing, but it makes the cancellation of the Roadster more understandable.

 

That is exactly what I wanted, a standard well working motorcycle.
The kind that can go around corners, stop well, comfortable, good suspension, is fun 2 up or solo, slap on some stuff on the back and go on a trip, etc.
I had a lot of Triumphs, loved the flat flip up seat you could move around on and stash stuff under.
I like a bigger gas tank and/or good economy.
I ended up with a 1200L that I made into the bike I wanted (somewhat) with better handle bars, shocks, seat.

Brett