The Gel Seat

The factory seat on the Bandit is a bit ordinary.  It feels nice initially to sit on, but the foam is too soft, compresses and on a trip starts to cause a deep seated (literally) ache.

The options were things like an aftermarket seat (too expensive as all sourced ex USA), getting the seat re-covered and new foam in NZ (at least $500) or a Suzuki gel seat.  Rather optimistically I priced the gel set through Suzuki NZ, and almost fell over when quoted $1000 (yes, one thousand dollars) ex Japan with a 10 week delivery time.  No sale for Suzuki there!!

The answer?  Ebay.  Ex USA, as new gel seat off a wrecked bike, $187USD.  The sellers didn't realise it was the gel seat, but fortunately I was going through the pictures and recognised it for what it was.  New they are $286 on Ebay.

Took less than 2 weeks to arrive, bolted straight on and perfect condition.  It's wider, heavier and has far more robust vinyl with a heavy basket weave on the rider's part.  It is much firmer and I don't think this seat has been used much at all.  Initial impressions are that it is much higher quality than the OEM seat.  I haven't had a chance yet for a longer ride, but it's unlikely to cause the same issues with the foam compressing.

Always worth shopping around.  I just wish Suzuki NZ didn't charge so much, as all it does is drive my shopping off shore.

UPDATE: The longest ride to date has been over 4 hours and 400 km.  Much better than stock and I don't get the pain I got in the past.  A good buy. (And it's adjustable and I have it on "high")

Foray into Youtube

I finally had a crack at posting to Youtube.  Works well, although my video quality could be better.  I'll get a better camera and do something with a commentary.  This video should give you an idea about the time I spend working on this bike.  Given it gets used daily in all sorts of weather, it looks really good.  Paint protection film in key areas and regular coating with polymer protectant wax and general elbow grease, silicone spray and keeping things clean seems to work.  Suzuki make a good product, and it's easier to keep a waxed bike clean than leaving it for ages.

Some cleaning

The rain cleared for a while, and after a ride, I thought I'd give the bike a clean.  Scrubs up quite well.  The NZ K8 touring models have the "Touring" decal on the fairing.  The K9s didn't.  The decal looks good, but is somewhat fragile.  I haven't seen these on any images of bikes from Europe, UK, Canada or the US.

A couple more

Demotivators

Some personal favourites needing no introduction:

Bandit side cases

I thought I'd turn the Givi V35 side bags into Suzuki ones.  The only difference is a sticker, which is amazingly hard to track down.  Here's the part number: 990D0-V35SC-LOG.

Original:

to:

Same size and a self-adhesive fit.

I also got the red inserts for the bags, and the part number is: 990D0-V35SC-YHL

An easy fit and I also put some reflective tape behind the red lenses on the bags as it makes them light up with headlights on them

F800 abuse

Wow

Check this link.  This guy can really ride a fully set up F800.  It's a plug for Twisted Throttle, but I don't mind.  They have sold me a lot of stuff as it's cheaper to buy from dealers in the States than the locals.  It's ironic - I'd rather support local retailers, but the Suzuki markup in NZ  is obscene.  A Gel seat in the US is around $260US and less than $500NZ landed.  Through Suzuki NZ, it's $1000.  I can understand a hundred bucks here and there, but there's no reason for such a disparity.

Anyway, check this out: