xinu
New member
I am the proud owner of a 2012 Can Am Red Sypder RS-S for the last couple of weeks. I have been riding motorbikes of all kinds for 45 years prior to the Spyder. The Spyder is a wonderful road machine that I love ryding. The SL forum is a great source of Spyder information and ryder experiences. So to add to the stack of threads, I thought I would share my newbie Spyder observations so far. Obviously the Spyder is not a motor bicycle but that's where I'm coming from.
Observations:
Stress free 2 up riding. No 2 up low speed foot paddling balancing issues for the short on inseam.
Thrilling acceleration but not crazy fast.
No need to continuously read road to avoid minor pot holes and cracks as I did on 2 wheels.
Noticeably more effort cornering with 2 up when compared to a motorbike and not as much fun for me in the
twisties. The power steering seems to have linear boost and road feedback is good at any speed.
Can get twitchy in hard corning when I get the feeling of potential oversteer and when I attempt to gently correct, the steering seems to over compensate and I head to the outside of the corner and need to pull back to the inside. It can oscillate quickly giving an unsettling twitchy feeling which is quickly recovered by backing off the throttle. This will hopefully go away with more time in the saddle.
Definitely not big V twin low RPM torque. Definitely not big V twin cruising RPM range. Definitely a Roadster.
Hard braking takes a surprising amount of foot pressure and seems to be biased towards the rear wheel rather than the fronts. When compared to my experiences with 2 wheels, the Spyder doesn't seem to stop as quickly during hard braking episodes on normal paved roads.
If I'm switching from a Spyder to ATV or to a motorbike my brain needs to be rebooted to avoid grabbing the nonexistent handlebar brake lever and use foot first and only. I can't help keep going for a front lever when venturing out on the Spyder after recently riding the ATV/bike and loose a few milli seconds of reaction time. Hopefully I can still train the hand or foot to know who goes first on what.
I'm just out of the break-in period and getting about 30mpg. I guess it's the nature of the beast. I don't expect it will get much better either.
The RS-S Can Am 'red' is not red. It's between red and orange. I didn't get to see in person before I purchased and was surprised how orange the red is. The color doesn't bother me but 'red' is slightly misleading.
Vibration (belt?) around 3.5K RPM.
Observations:
Stress free 2 up riding. No 2 up low speed foot paddling balancing issues for the short on inseam.
Thrilling acceleration but not crazy fast.
No need to continuously read road to avoid minor pot holes and cracks as I did on 2 wheels.
Noticeably more effort cornering with 2 up when compared to a motorbike and not as much fun for me in the
twisties. The power steering seems to have linear boost and road feedback is good at any speed.
Can get twitchy in hard corning when I get the feeling of potential oversteer and when I attempt to gently correct, the steering seems to over compensate and I head to the outside of the corner and need to pull back to the inside. It can oscillate quickly giving an unsettling twitchy feeling which is quickly recovered by backing off the throttle. This will hopefully go away with more time in the saddle.
Definitely not big V twin low RPM torque. Definitely not big V twin cruising RPM range. Definitely a Roadster.
Hard braking takes a surprising amount of foot pressure and seems to be biased towards the rear wheel rather than the fronts. When compared to my experiences with 2 wheels, the Spyder doesn't seem to stop as quickly during hard braking episodes on normal paved roads.
If I'm switching from a Spyder to ATV or to a motorbike my brain needs to be rebooted to avoid grabbing the nonexistent handlebar brake lever and use foot first and only. I can't help keep going for a front lever when venturing out on the Spyder after recently riding the ATV/bike and loose a few milli seconds of reaction time. Hopefully I can still train the hand or foot to know who goes first on what.
I'm just out of the break-in period and getting about 30mpg. I guess it's the nature of the beast. I don't expect it will get much better either.
The RS-S Can Am 'red' is not red. It's between red and orange. I didn't get to see in person before I purchased and was surprised how orange the red is. The color doesn't bother me but 'red' is slightly misleading.
Vibration (belt?) around 3.5K RPM.
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