Question for motorcyclists.

SeanW

I've never owned any kind of motor vehicle before, and I'm thinking of buying a motorcycle, second hand. Now, given the dominance of the car, I've heard it all on TV and from family, friends etc, about the cost of buying and using a car.

But I know very little about motorcylcles. except that they probably use less fuel, cost less to buy and maintain etc. and tend to be unsafe if the motorcyclist does not excercise caution.

Can a motorbike owner or enthusiast here give me a general run down of motorbike costs, and a few other questions I have, like

how much a second, lower end motorbike should cost, generally speaking?
Could I haggle in negotiations? If so, how?
Are motorbikes subject to the NCT?
Are they expensive to tax/insure (provisional license)?
How fuel efficient is an average motorbike vis-a-vis a car?
How much/often maintenance are required?
What's involved in parking a motorbike? Is it difficult to find approproate parking for motorbikes in town/city centres? also in securing them?

Kinetic^

SeanW wrote:

how much a second, lower end motorbike should cost, generally speaking?

Are you looking for something that you can use around the city or to commute??

SeanW wrote:

Could I haggle in negotiations? If so, how?

Get the bike checked out in a garage, they might do it for free if you use them to service it.

SeanW wrote:

Are motorbikes subject to the NCT?

Not as of yet.

SeanW wrote:

Are they expensive to tax/insure (provisional license)?

Tax is about €50 a year. Insurance will depend on age and location etc.

SeanW wrote:

How fuel efficient is an average motorbike vis-a-vis a car?

I've a Suzuki Burgman 125cc and i get about 15 miles per litre.

SeanW wrote:

How much/often maintenance are required?

They service every 6-8 months, once before summer and winter.

SeanW wrote:

What's involved in parking a motorbike?

Not much TBH, there's space everywhere.

SeanW wrote:

Is it difficult to find approproate parking for motorbikes in town/city centres? also in securing them?

As above, lock it to any road sign on the street.

murphaph

This thread will get more responses in the motorbike forum.

LegacyUser

Hi,
If you do choose to get a motorbike, then please add protective clothing (leathers, gloves etc) to your budget.

They are notoriously dangerous, and this protective gear could save you a LOT of pain if in an accident.

B

Victor

Moved from Commuting / Transport to Rec > Motors > Motorbikes

Eye

Lots of questions there, dunno where to start....

Price of a bike will vary widely depending on the type of bike your looking at and how old it is and milage, if you want to keep your insurance down then your best bet would be to go with something along the lines of a cruiser. You will find most 125 and 250cc crusiers are in and around group 2-3 insurance so pretty cheap even for younger people. Flip that over to a 125 sports bike and you could instantly be going towards group 4-5 all depending on the bike.

With regards to tax it's cheap at the moment, the most you will pay for taxing any bike would be €67 if i recall correctly, think some of the smaller bikes are €45 or so and i think there is even a category below that too for the likes of scooters and such, can't remember what they were.

Fuel ecconomy will vary from bike to bike but i think in general (once your not thinking of getting a 1800cc monster) it should be lower than your average car, trying to think how much petrol i use..... used to get about 120 miles for €10 but the price of petrol lately would throw that off, think it would be about 12 miles or so per litre for me on my 650cc Yamaha Dragstar (which is probably not the most fuel efficient bike in the world )

Maintenance will vary quiet a bit from bike to bike in terms of price anyway and parts too. For example, your average sports bike would not get as good milage from tires, slightly more expensive for a bog standard service and you'll go through a few chain's and sprockets which can be costly for a good chain/sprocket.
Now being slightly biast here i know but, take for example my bike, a mid range cruiser, a standard service is about €100, but because my bike is shaft driven and not chain/sprocket i've never had to do anything to that yet just recently started on my second set of avon venom tyres, the last set i got about 17k miles out of and there was still loads of thread left on them.

Personally speaking i tend to service my bike more often than is needed, but as i drive all year round i would rather spend a little more money servicing it every 3000miles than every 4000miles as the manual suggests, but that's really for my own peace of mind more than anything else.

Last thing i'll mention, for now anyway, is something bubby said about protective gear. Most important thing to remember when getting a bike is to get some good gear and take care of it and it will take care of you. Nearly had a heart attack the other day when i realised how much i've spent on leather gear, wet gear, boots gloves and a good helmet, but they are good and i know they will last so it's not too bad.

Idleater

SeanW wrote:

how much a second, lower end motorbike should cost, generally speaking?
Could I haggle in negotiations? If so, how?
Are motorbikes subject to the NCT?
Are they expensive to tax/insure (provisional license)?
How fuel efficient is an average motorbike vis-a-vis a car?
How much/often maintenance are required?
What's involved in parking a motorbike? Is it difficult to find approproate parking for motorbikes in town/city centres? also in securing them?

Learner legal starter bikes (generally 33bhp or less) second hand can range widely in value. Depending on where you stand in the style/practicality/desirability trade off they can range from €1000 to probably €7000 (or whatever that zx6 restricted costs :eek: ). See MAG Ireland for further information.
Personally I would recommend something like a Suzuki GN125 or for a slight bit more the Honda CG125. Both bikes are pretty much bulletproof. Actually as a guide, any of the bikes that couriers use are pretty much bullet proof. These include the bikes mentioned above and the Honda BROS.
Of course all bikes need to be maintained. Costs can be reduced by servicing them yourself. I have 2 bikes myself, a BROS and a nice Royal Enfield. Both are in < 33hp and are 400 and 500cc respectively so they are no slouch to go when they need. I (constantly) service the enfield myself but recently had the BROS serviced by a garage (€150). Parts are more expensive on the BROS so I got a mild heart attack! I would guess though that that 2 services a year from a garage would run at about €200 - €250 depending on milage. And if you did things yourself like adjust the chain, change sparkplugs, the oil etc im sure it would be quite managable.

Fuel efficiency is much better than with a car, I get 4 - 4.4 l/100k (~80mpg out of the enfield and 5-6l/100k (~60 mpg) out of the BROS. A 50cc moped if you were heading in that direction can be even more efficient but their downside is that they seem to have a more limited lifespan when driven hard, for sustained periods of time, and you cant go on the motorway with them. However you also can factor in time, because you will in general reduce your commute/journey time also. This means that you can get up that nice half hour later in the morning. The downside (for me anyway) is that I get home half an hour earlier than my better half so I get to "put the dinner on"!

Tax and NCT have already been answered in other posts, but for bigger bikes motor tax (above 250 or is it even above 125???) is €67 per anum.

Parking, you can pretty much park them where you like, but, I would emphasise that you should respect local residents, pedestrians and wheelchair users etc. No one minds a bike parked on the path when everyone can get by unimpeeded but if it is parked where other people have to eg walk on the road around it, it will cause annoyance and bring down the good reputation that bikes have when they are parked on the path if you get me.

If you have any other questions I would be happy to help you out.

L.

saobh_ie

"bring down the good reputation that bikes have"

We don't have a good reputation, but inconsideratly parked bikes would be another barrier to getting some sort of social acceptance of our machines and all thier benefits over every other form of transport (except for boats and airplanes).

davmigil

Yep, budget for protective clothing. Helmet, gloves, armoured clothing that doesn't shred on impact. Your most important/first line protective instrument is your brain, so budget €600 or so for basic training. Recognised training will qualify you for a discount with AON (insurance) also.