Tiger Hunting

[Bogus Jim]

I've been hunting tigers... no, not this kind:



This kind: 



Finally found one in my price range so I'm flying to Arizona and riding home via Moab and a few other places. 

[Lonesome Dave]

Congrates.  When you leaving?

[Fletch]

Sounds fun!

[Hank]

Very cool!    Riding Tigers home is fun.   Hope you can take your time and enjoy the trip!

[Wacked]

Ooooooooooh.......  SO jealous it makes me hurt! 

That is a fine ride.  I think I'll be adding to the DDSR Tiger litter in the next year.

Wacked

[greatbuffalo]

Me too. Very jealous.

Love me some Tiger

[tannerc]

I've been hunting tigers...
Finally found one in my price range so I'm flying to Arizona and riding home via Moab and a few other places. 

Nice.. good time to go south for a ride!

[Fletch]

so maybe a few weekend trips to the Bighorns this summer Jim?  I've been wanting to do some exploring over there.

[Bogus Jim]

When you leaving?

Wanted to fly out today but something came up at work so probably next weekend?

so maybe a few weekend trips to the Bighorns this summer Jim?  I've been wanting to do some exploring over there.

Sounds good. I know you also want to do some exploring on the Morrison Jeep Trail.    Not sure I'd take the Tiger up that but it's tempting to ride the WRR over there and get some video of the 1190 in action. There is something funny about taking big bikes where people say you can't go.

[Fletch]

When you leaving?

Wanted to fly out today but something came up at work so probably next weekend?

so maybe a few weekend trips to the Bighorns this summer Jim?  I've been wanting to do some exploring over there.

Sounds good. I know you also want to do some exploring on the Morrison Jeep Trail.    Not sure I'd take the Tiger up that but it's tempting to ride the WRR over there and get some video of the 1190 in action. There is something funny about taking big bikes where people say you can't go.

as always I'm prepared to fail, or chicken out before that point.

[Osnabrock]

Nice bike Jim.
I've never done a fly and ride.  It seems like a fun thing to do.  Let us know how it goes.

[greatbuffalo]

I see a bit of humor in the picture, a Triumph parked very conspicuously in front of a Victory sign.

I think a big bike gettaway ride in in order at some time. That would be fun.

[Bogus Jim]

I think a big bike gettaway ride in in order at some time. That would be fun.

I wouldn't mind riding the TSDAT again, hopefully when it is not pouring rain. Seems like we could start from Mitchell and squeeze it into a 3 or 4-day weekend.

[greatbuffalo]

It would be pretty cool if we could get a few more players to ride the Adventure trail before the rally this spring. Tom, Hipster, and I are gonna make plans to do that before the rally. I think we will leave Rapid/Hill City area on Monday so we can be done on Thursday at Fish N Fry.

Is anyone else interested in doing this?

[Bogus Jim]

Well the Tiger is in my garage now. I don't think WRR is very happy about it, she's leaning towards the KTM, trying to avoid the Tiger.



I picked up the bike from the Victory dealer in Mesa AZ. They took it in on a trade; the bike was immaculate and judging by the non-blemished skid plate, I'm not sure it had ever been off road or even on gravel. My brother met me at the dealer on his KLR, and we headed northeast via some backroads. Soon the bike was completely covered in Arizona dust and the washboarded roads tested the suspension a bit. The suspension did OK I thought, but the Shinko 705's would easily washout in sand and loose gravel so I didn't push it too hard.

We stopped in Young AZ at the Antler Cafe and Bar to eat supper. Really exceptional food, probably the best food I've ever had at the end of a dirt road. The ADV crowd in Arizona raves about this place and it's well deserved. The chef there knows what he's doing and has put together an excellent menu.

Next morning, the Tiger had trouble starting... we figured out pretty quickly that the bike was running OK, it just wouldn't idle. Died immediately if you let the throttle close. We'd been riding in pretty dusty conditions and my brother thought this sounded like the stepper motor issue that's been discussed on the ADV Tiger threads, so we sprayed some WD-40 on the motor shaft and linkage (stepper motor controls the idle on this bike), cycled the key a couple times and that solved the issue (for now).

Little brother looking for WD-40 in his top case.



My brother had to be back at work so we parted ways at this point; he headed home and I headed to Moab. I had planned a dirt route to Moab, but he advised me it probably wasn't possible or advisable to ride across the reservation so I took highway 191. Moab was quite crowded, understandable for a Saturday in May I guess. There was an hour wait at the Moab Brewery so I ate at a place called Blue Pig or Blue Hog, something like that. Had the pulled pork and have to say, it was not as good as the pulled pork that gerry1eye serves at the DDSR rallies.

My camera battery died and I forgot to bring the charger so unfortunately, no pictures after AZ.

I hit a couple big bike trails in Moab... the stepper motor issue was surfacing again on dusty trails so that took some of the fun out of it. Would've like to stay longer in Moab but had to be home in a couple of days. So, headed to Grand Junction and then up the west side of Colorado on 139, over Douglas pass. Excellent motorcycle road. Wasted about 2 hours and 100 miles, trying to find a road from Dinosaur National Monument to Flaming Gorge, but eventually found something that worked. Meandered around the south end of Flaming Gorge (beautiful) and then up the west side... that section of the road got a little boring. 

I hadn't been to Jackson in years so decided to stay there for the night. 700 miles, about 100 of that was gravel... I was tired. Went out and had a $40 steak at one of the many restaurants in Jackson. The steak was good but I'm not sure if it was twice as good as a $20 steak? Plus the receptionist looked at me like I was lower class... maybe it was my grungy riding clothes.

Wanted to leave early next morning... it was 36 degrees in Jackson (6,200 ft) and I was headed over a pass that crossed the Continental Divide at 9,500 feet. Probably my dumbest decision of the trip. Holy frozen lizards, IT WAS COLD going over the pass. 6-7 feet of snow in the ditches, the road was plowed or never would've made it. Stopped to warm up in Riverton for an hour, drinking coffee. Was planning to ride home via Bighorns but decided I'd had enough of mountain passes so detoured down to Casper and then home via Lusk and Edgemont. Finished with about 2,100 miles in 3 1/2 days.

So... my impressions on the Tiger 800. It doesn't have the acceleration to hang with a liter bike. That shouldn't surprise anyone. But it has a boatload of torque throughout the entire rev range... usable torque even at idle, and starts pulling really hard at 2,500 rpm. No vibration from idle to redline. The flat torque curve means you can dispense with shifting gears if you're lazy... just leave it in 6th for the two lane and leave it in 2nd / 3rd for easy trails. A really nice powerplant I think, for a middle-weight adventure bike.

The stock suspension is probably going to be good enough for 85% of my riding... the other 15%, I'm not sure about yet, but I need to get better tires on before pushing it much harder in the dirt. Suspension is better than I expected, happy with that.

The transmission shifts really smooth... much like my WRR. Triumph could've done a better job on the gear ratios... first is a bit tall (even for big bike) and 6th could've been taller. 70 mph shows about 5,000 rpm but this motor could easily pull that speed at 4,500 or 4,000 rpm. And first gear shows 15 mph @ 2,000 rpm... you can slow it down to 9-10 mph but at that speed, any obstacle will stall the bike so you've got to slip the clutch.

I really enjoyed the ride home. The Tiger doesn't seem to have any bad handling characteristics, on bumpy twisty pavement, or on trails. Not sure if this will be a long-term relationship but I know for the next year at least, I will enjoy riding the Tiger 800 XC.