I know I don’t post much but I figure I would share the news. She traded the 250 in for a Zero S 11.4.
The short story is that the only miles being put on the 250 were from me and it wasn’t as often as it needed. In a casual conversation I mentioned one of the dealers near me became a Zero Motorcycle dealer (thinking she wouldn’t care but I was going to tell someone and she was going to get the earful because she is obligated to).
I mentioned electric bike that does not require the typical maintenance from a combustion engine. I mean really for the most part it is tires and brakes. What really got her though was when I mentioned that there is no clutch. I saw it as a negative but she was really excited to see it at that point. The rest of my spiel (all positive) wasn’t necessary after that.
I told her the dealer had a demo model on the floor and I wanted to head over on the weekend to test it out. It was a DS model but aside from the ride height it was similar to the S model that she liked. The short version of this is that the ride was good enough where I could overlook the fact I didn’t need to shift.
The S and DS model have a toggle mode between “economy” and “sport”. The economy mode has a very similar power band of the Ninja 250 but smoother. The sport mode has a similar power band to the Ninja 650 I had. A cool feature about this though is that power band is adjustable by an app you can put on your smart phone.
Anyway, a few weeks later of tracking down a 2013 model, she traded in the Ninja 250. We went for a ride around the neighborhood so she could get used to it and the following day I followed her to work. Her confidence is through the roof on this bike. She loves it. I suspect next year (after winter) that we are going to be putting a lot of miles on it.
So on with the pics, right? Here is a picture of my garage and another of them in the driveway prepped for our first ride together with the new bike. Also, I left a lot out so that no one was staring at a wall of text, but if anyone has any questions feel free to ask.
On a side note, I went back to the dealer after the trade was done and saw the Ninja 250 sitting there.... It was my forth bike but it was also my first sport bike. Kind of heartbreaking to see it there.