PIMP MY RIDE(ING GEAR)

WORDS: Ollie S PIC: Geoff Osborne
Seriously. When Darbi Accessories’ Graham Irvine rolled out the Sidi and Acerbis riding gear he had earmarked for me I was half expecting cult American rapper Xzibit to saunter through the door and tell me ‘you’ve officially been pimped.’ After all it’s not every day a quick phone call nets a glossy set of pristine, snow white Sidi Crossfire SRS boots and the absolute fly-est looking shirt, pair of pants and set of matching gloves currently available from Acerbis.
Message to self. Make more quick phone calls!
BOOT IT!
The boots need no introduction. Sidi Crossfire MX boots, and in this case the SRS edition, are at the pinnacle of safety and design. Made from genuine leather and constructed to endure years of punishment, the Sidi Crossfire boot incorporates, without a doubt, some of the best ankle, shin and foot protection available on the market. SRS spec, in case you are wondering, means that the standard synthetic blend sole is replaced with a specifically prepared plastic foot print that is designed for cross use between MotoX and Supermoto. I prefer the SRS over the standard synthetic sole for reasons of extra rigidity in the boot and the ability use the boots when Supermotarding.
GOLD STANDARD
In conjunction with the boots Darbi’s also hooked us up with a new set of limited edition gold and black JDP Acerbis off-road gear to use in photo shoots. Alongside its eye catching design is the top quality construction you expect from Acerbis. The gloves fit very snugly and the shirt is relatively loose around the forearms with little restriction at the cuff. The pants are neatly rough at first but after one wash and a chance to break in, they conform snugly around the knee braces and provide the perfect amount of room around the thigh. The Velcro tabs on the hips and the plastic clasp waist buckle on the front can be individually adjusted for a finely tuned fit. Sidi Crossfire MX Boots are available in black or white and with standard or SRS replaceable sole from $799. The Acerbis JDP shirt has an RRP of $99, the pants $299, and gloves $89.

BD: KIT FIELD TESTED

I was just going over the disc with the images from the '10 Harley Launch in Aus and noting how well my gear worked.

The weather forecast for Geelong and the Great Ocean Road was '4 seasons in one day' so I took the wet suit.

I reckon my new helmet is simply fabulous. Arai Chaser Phil Read Replica. Most of the other Journos on the ride asked or commented on it. Comfortable and a real pleasure to wear. A beautiful thing.

The Rev-it jacket did the business through a few heavy showers too. Warm and comfortable throughout the ride. Motomail has a range of them and they appear to be pretty good value for money. There is a review here.

The Harley FXR Boots worked really well too - They proved waterproof and feet stayed nice and dry and with good comfort on and off the bikes. Sturdy rubber soles. Get them from AMPS at $230ish retail not bad value either. Harley do have an excellent range of boots.

I wore a $25 (from motomail) pair of lightweight plastic pants over Rev-it leather 'Canyon' jeans. They (jeans) have been really good too, over 4 years and a pretty decent crash and the linings are still intact. My black leather suit that I use in KR a lot is 4 years old now. It's still in good order apart from a few battle scars.

I did tear the daylights out of the Overpants on a XR1200X hero peg as we were getting ready for the last leg of the ride so had no option but go for the gaffer tape look.

We calls it 'Star quality'. But for $25 I got 2 seasons out of them and will have no hesitation going with them again. They roll up small enough to go under the seat and are a good option over the top of leather.

Lou Martin pics.

JIM WALSH: CONTIMOTION TYRES

"Can you pass a Motion at this price?"

What the?

It's funny what catches your eye when you're staggering around aimlessly in one of your favourite bike shops and that piece of genius copy certainly managed to pierce the cloud of confused indecision when confronted by a wall or two of motorcycle related gear.

What made it doubly surprising is that it came from Richard Lawrence, late of Darbi Accessories Ltd in Petone and now Parts Manager at TSS Motorcycles in Alicetown, Lower Hutt. He's quietly spoken, affable, incredibly helpful, and one of those "all round nice guys" except he's not because he's tall and thin.

A closer read revealed that Continental Tyres are in the midst of promoting their Sport Touring tyre, the aforementioned "Motion" (actually ContiMotion), and were selling sets at $380 a pair! Given that I had just chewed about 3 months worth of wear out of my previous set of tyres in one weekend on the South Island's barely used and quite coarse roads I had been checking out a variety of tyre reviews and asking the opinion of people I know who ride sort of like me.

There's a myriad of options available in the "standard biggish to large bike" tyre sizes of 120/70x17 front and 180/55x17 rear in the correct load and speed ratings for my '05 Kawasaki Z750S. Everything from semi-slick to mileage-plus-heavy-load oriented touring tyres. In fact there's so much choice that it's easy to forget to factor issues like wear characteristics, mileage, and price vs. performance into the decision . That can sometimes mean buying something not relevant for the majority of your riding, and putting up with less than optimum performance day to day, just so you can hang it all out on that few and far between perfect Sunday afternoon. To add to the confusion, it's pretty difficult to try before you buy.

Rather than confuse myself further, I decided to simply trust Richard and order a set. Once I discovered that a good mate who'd been using Continental Road Attacks for years had switched to ContiMotions I was quite content that I'd made the right choice.

It always rains when you get new tyres, right? Something I've found over time is that if a tyre can be persuaded to shed release agent on a cold wet road, we're going to get on fine. Tick that one off for the ContiMotions, especially gently slithering my way home successfully

Thankfully the weather cleared up rather quickly and my scrub in ride to Toppy's Cafe in Martinborough couldn't have been better. First impressions were of a quick but neutral steering front with a very precise "set" to a given angle of lean. Once in a turn, no effort is required to maintain the selected turn radius.

Motorway riding revealed a much improved quality of ride over the previous Sports oriented tyres I had fitted to the Z750, which were all about transmitting every last skerrick of feedback to the rider. Great if you're on your ear and giving it some welly. A little unnerving at times when droning along urban roads.

Hitting the Rimutaka Hill road revealed another delightful feature of the ContiMotion tyre. The carcass of the front tyre acts in concert with the rather basic front suspension of the Z750 rather than forcing it to react to every bump and gouge in the road surface like a stiff-walled sports oriented tyre can. Braking on rippled corner entries can provoke an "out of sync" feeling from the front end, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that the less stiff construction of the ContiMotion front allowed the suspension and tyre to track the road surface rather than jarring and "hanging in air" sensation I used to experience from the front end. Bear in mind that we're talking about changing from a sports tyre designed to be tortured to a sports touring tyre designed to cover a range of compromises and change in feel makes sense.

From talking to other riders using the ContiMotion tyre I knew that I wouldn't see the "furring" or "balling" on the edge of the tread after a spirited ride that you can expect from nominally "stickier" rubber, but I was surprised at how well the Motions did stick on the way home, after they'd been scrubbed in. I aimed at potholes and surface irregularities, braked late and hard, got on the gas earlier than normal, anything to see if I could find inconsistent responses or a propensity to break loose under provocation.

They may not be a track tyre, but for a Sports Tourer owner, especially in the budget end of the spectrum, you'd be hard pressed to find a tyre with such an inherent blend of stability, precision, light steering and an almost "buttery" ride. All that and supreme value too. To be honest I was nervous about moving away from brands that I've trusted and travelling deeper into the sports touring tyre range, but a few hundred kilometers over mixed road conditions and I can stop justifying my choice on price alone.

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