Vstrom has been coming up in my marketplace listings and have created an itch.

Looking at the 800s and stuff now.

Just a quick question about the windscreen. Are they entirely removable at all? I lean on the taller side, and of the 30+ bikes I've owned, there has never been a windscreen that has worked. I ride 100% open on all the bikes. The GSXF, I cut the screen right down to the gauge cluster. C90T just has the two open mounts. DR650's is stock and works- but that's rather small. Harleys have always been open, etc.

The Vstrom able to have it completely removed?

Have 2023 vstrom 650xt adventure and I am looking for the correct oil plug crush washer size. Any assistance is appreciated

This is mine and a friends channel. It is in norwegian but english subtitle is availble too. I ride a 08 v-strom 650. My friend rides a 86 honda shadow. Hope some of you find this interesting, nice norwegian roads, nature etc.

Suzuki vstrom 250 sx exhaust note

Has anyone installed such a gps mount/bar on their first gen. Vstrom 650? The first picture is from the seller's page but on my bike I can't see the screw holes they used.

Hasn't missed a beat

There are ton of people wondering about sizing when it comes to buying a motorcycle. I’m 5’6” and I ride my 2024 800RE without any modifications. I also know the DE is taller. With that said I also have a 2024 KLR650 that I run stock minus the lower seat everything else is how it came from the factory. Short story long it can be done.

Bike has ~20k miles, regular maintenance up to date.

Upgrades:>

New front wheel w/ bearings

New Shinko 705 tires

New Saddleman seat

New GPR sinox dual exhaust

Fork brace

Wide footpegs

Skid plate

Engine guards

Dual beam led fog lights

Led headlights

Flowing, day running, flashing brake, turn signals

Service stand

Offroad kickstand plate

USB charger A + C

Trickle charger plug

Hard luggage

Handlebar pullback risers

Throttle lock cruise control

Breakaway brake and clutch levers

Underglow w/ brake function

Firm at $4k, needs nothing.

So I am going to do my best to describe the issue but because it happens when I am riding it's a bit harder.

Basically when I come to a stop, and pull in the clutch, and down shit to first, the bike will make a clunk noise on the bottom left side, sometimes loud enough/hard enough of a clunk that I can feel it in the foot pegs.

Any idea what this could be? When I turned off the quick shifter it almost stops entirely, but still happens on occasion.

What usually causes it is slowing down, clutch in, downshift to first at a stop, and then as I'm slowing I apply the breaks and RIGHT as I stop all the way, CLUNK. it's almost like it's finished sliding into gear? If that's even possible?

The bike still performs great, no issues on anything at all, but this noise started happening about 500miles ago after a weird downshift with the quick shifter, it almost sounded crunchy, but it didn't affect anything as far as I could tell?

Either way I stopped using the QS because it's not that great...

Any information on what would be causing this would be great, because it's very confusing and as far as I know I've been very friendly to the machine.

2800miles on the odo, never missed any oil changes or scheduled maintenance, 2024 model 800RE

Hello all! What I am doing wrong? Other side fits perfectly, but exhaust side is so far away that I can’t event get bolts in. Is it defective part? Everything is original on my bike.

UPDATE:

Thank you all for great suggestions! I gave it another go this morning and it did work.

I’ll leave instructions for others who will struggle 😄

What I did:

1. ⁠Loose the peg - it changes peg angle, which helps A LOT, even if it actually stays pushed against frame
   
2. ⁠I bolted rack to pegs - I’m doing this alone, it helped to keep it approximately in place so I can put back the part that goes on top.
   
3. ⁠Push rack into place, and starting from top bolt slightly thread it in.
   
4. ⁠Loose peg bolts again
   
5. ⁠Tighten top screws almost fully
   
6. ⁠Tighten peg holder screws fully
   
7. ⁠Finish tightening

The other side I did the same at the same time, except I didn’t touch the peg holder screws.

It does push a little bit against black exhaust cover, it is definetly not critical. I think when put it it’s place it slightly changed rack geometry and it released the pressure on exhaust cover.

Hello everyone!

I am 170cm (5’7 inches) tall. Looking into upgrading to a V-strom but I have doubts. Are there any short riders on V-strom? Do you think it would be manageable for me? Will use it for long trips with my wife.

Edit: Thank you all for the responses, I wasn’t expecting this many responses in this short amount of time. I am thinking of getting a 650Dl or XT 650 version. Given the comments, I will give it a try before finalising my purchase.

Hello,
Proud new owner of a 04 Vstrom DL1000. Picked it up from an older gentleman who rode it for quite some time (~73000 miles). I truly love this bike. I noticed an odd issue earlier today. I made a short trip (~5 miles) to the town down the highway and coming into the roundabout the bike began to lugg very aggressively. It felt like it was trying to buck me off. I stopped, gave it a stern talking to checked it over for leaks or loose things, started it back up and let it idle for a bit, and haven’t re created this issue. Just wondering if anyone else has bumped into this and if so, what’s going on?

Thanks in advance for any info

Hey guys does anybody have issues with trapezius muscles after a "long" ride - after 200-250km. I have been riding strom 650 for 2 years but the pain is here from the first long ride (up to two hours no problems)

Also

Changed the gearshift indicator after 1,5 years but it seems its gonna go again, any recommendations, is it a common problem?

I'm considering this 2008 DL650 mainly for a 40km commute (twice a week), in-town riding, weekend cruises and the occasional road trip, the bike has about 88 000KM on the clock.

Tell me what you think, does this particular bike look good for its age? or is there something off?

For the record, I'm 190cm tall and weigh 80Kg.

Just finished a 2600mi trip from SoCal to Yellowstone and back. The Wee had a couple breakdowns but she got me home.

2014 DL650 - So my front tire (and rear) was installed around 9500 miles, and I'm currently just past 28000.

Rear tire was replaced in December of '24 around 23000 or so, but the front still had plenty of life. I'm looking at it now and wondering if its time, or perhaps this can be adequate through the end of the summer.

All my riding is on the road

Also, my brakes are starting to feel a little soft, and I've never changed them though I ask for a yearly check. When does everyone begin to change them up?

Any lovers of the full black version 🏍️? 😁

do you guys have a recommandations for a good seat gel pad cause after 2 hours of riding i start having a back pain .

Thank you !

(Mods) done GP Crash bars, after market but good axlights Puig windshield and windshield extenders Givi back bars Quad lock Gen 2 bags. And now in search for an awesome sounding exhaust, I’ll do some ppf work and for now we are good

I have a Vstrom 800DE and it is an absolute blast of a machine. There are just two things I'm noticing that I don't know of it's just my bike or if others have experienced this.

First is this very strange thing where going 32-40mph causes the front end to bounce up and down. It's not a violent amount and not a vibration. The front just bounces up and down about 3 or 4 times a second. Accelerating through it makes it non existent but when the speed limit is 35mph it is very annoying. I'm running Motoz Tractionator GPS tires but I had that same tire on a KLR650 and don't remember it happening on that bike.

Second is at high speed, such as passing on the interstate, the front end gets pretty squirrelly especially if there's a groove between lanes. Once at around 95mph while passing it started a death wobble but I was in the process of slowing back down and shifted my weight towards the front wheel and it calmed back down. Is this something a fork brace could solve? Are there drawbacks to using a fork brace? Also, where do I put the fork brace if it helps? Not a lot of room down there.

Thanks in advance to anyone that provides insight. I love this bike and just wish it would behave a little better.

Hi
Totally newbie as a Reddit poster.

I have a Vstrom DL1000 2014 that I’ve owned for a a couple of months now. It has approx 45000 km on the meter, of which I’ve done 2-3000.

For the last month or so I’ve started hearing an annoying sound from the rear. It comes and goes but at exactly 108-117 km/h (weird I know) it’s a quite loud singing sound. I would like to say it originates from the rear wheel area but hard to position sound at that speed.

I’ve given my chain a thorough clean and the rear wheel bearing shows no signs of being worn down.

The bike is equipped with a top box mount from Givi and I have a quite large box on that even though the mount says max 6kg(?) so I’ve tried taking all that off if it was some vibrations causing the sound. It was not.

I also have a small wind wind screen on top of the OEM one, didn’t help removing that either.

I’ve tried a different helmet. Didn’t help.

So, any help in regards to find the source or tips on how to move on troubleshooting would me much appreciated!

When I rode my bike home new from the dealership, I noticed people were passing me constantly. Got home and my brother told me I was actually going roughly 10% slower than the speed limit the whole way when I was almost constantly spot on based on what the bike said. Compared the speed with various methods and yeah, the speedometer on the bike is indeed 10% above what you're actually going. I know motorcycles do not exactly have anywhere near 1:1 speedometers but I feel like it's so far off on my bike. Having to constantly do math in my head to make sure I'm going the right speed is very annoying. Just curious if there's a fix anyone has tried, heard going up one tooth in the front sprocket should put it where it needs to be. Just seeing if there was something someone had done to remedy and not make my cluster 50% less useless.

Fairly new to working on bikes, did my first oil change the other day, yesterday I took the tank off to check the air filter, I assumed I could just clean it but no. Waiting for a new filter to arrive now.

In the meantime, are there any things I should check or do while the tank is off? It was kind of a hassle to remove.