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4 hours ago, Steven Knoetze (sk27) said:Depends on your needs but if you are looking at the T700 then also take a look at the Aprilia 660 Toureg.
My dream bike is an African Twin currently so that's where I would go without question, but I would be a 90/10 split between road/off-road.
Thanks - had a look at the Aprilia - looks good, only issue, according to the reviews that I read, is that the subframe is welded on, rather than bolted, which apparently can be a serious issue (probably showing my lack of knowledge here).
Popped into a dealer today that has Yamaha, Honda and BMW showrooms all within 100 metres of each other. The Tenere World Raid is beautiful but I like the traction control on the others. Unfortunately you can't test ride a bike here if you haven't had your licence for at least a year ,so having a think about how to get around that.
loving this thread. Been reading from afar for a while. Turned 50 in June and passed my motorbike licence test this week. Been riding bikes on and off my whole life but never got around to getting a licence as in SA you could ride for a year or two on learners licences back in the day. Haven't owned a road legal bike in many years, but am looking to fix that currently, so busy comparing adventure style bikes. Really like the T700 World Raid, but also looking at the BMW GS and the Honda Africa Twin. Don't know enough about the benefits of each yet to make a really informed choice so would appreciate any advice from those in the know.
26 minutes ago, TyronLab said:What you NEED as a farmer is a rugged, large-ish thing to put heavy/awkward/dirty **** in to take said **** somewhere on your farm, most likely over/through rough-ish paths.
What you WANT as a farmer is a Kalahari Ferrari because it's trés chic, and you don't want to be the only **** at the korporasie on Saturday morning not driving one.
An ex-colleague of mine (who previously was and has subsequently now returned to sugar cane farming) says that a Land Cruiser is a bakkie, and all other vehicles (including other bakkies) are "plat karre".
Disclaimer: I am not a farmer and have only been on a farm twice, so if you're about to hurl some logical arguments at me, you're barking up the wrong tree (trimming the wrong sheep/milking the wrong cow rather?).
Only advice I can give is to try and not live in your next increase. If you're relatively comfortable with your current lifestyle, try to keep your flexible budget (i.e. things you can control the cost of, not debit orders) the same when you get your next increase, and use the increase as the additional car repayment. Then, once that's done, use that money and the car repayment you're now not paying on the house.
My neighbour, who farms about 300 acres across a few different locations, with no labour other than himself (and neighbours when cutting and baling hay), drives a 2003ish Corsa with the back seats taken out. He reckons that anything that he can't shift in the Corsa, he'll use a tractor.
1 hour ago, eala said:Recently in Spain for two weeks ,the only Land cruiser i saw was the police vehicles and they were the basic TX type Prado. Major farming in France and Spain and the go to transport is a form of Van .I did not see even one double cab bakkie in France or Spain
Farmers have a very different attitude (or need, I'm not sure) to vehicles in Northern Europe to SA.
58 minutes ago, LazyTrailRider said:Sounds logical in principle, but over a 5 year period, it's not always that straightforward to beat financing costs with investment. I've tried both sides and have settled on buying cash...
Fair enough.
5 minutes ago, _David_ said:I have a mate who bought a brand new Defender just last week for his wife and he did not finance it. The rich are still rich and the poor are still poor. It's the middle class that's disappearing.
That I'll never understand. Why buy a car outright when finance is (comparatively) cheap. Surely that money would be better being invested somewhere?
48 minutes ago, ouzo said:Since I'm in the industry let me comment.
The banks will still only let you installment be 1/4 of your monthly income, but people are going with maximum RV values on their purchases or financing over 96 months. So your 400k polo is R6.5k per month, so they are only earning just over 300k per year.
They are however also pretty much maxed out with all other expenses so if any further outlay is required they are screwed.
But there is a big shift in spending patterns on vehicles. More people are going for the cheaper makes. Renault next door to us is pushing our Kwids and Kigers at an alarming rate. Yet everysingle person that walks across from them to us will comment on how crap the renault is, but they will still buy the renault over the honda because its cheap.
96 months - Holy Crap
I've no idea what the max is here as a percentage of income. Interest rates are pretty low though so paying a deposit on a car makes zero sense. As a comparison, in 2019, I financed a 2016 Polo for my son over 48 months with zero deposit and an interest rate of 4% APR. He has now taken on the payments (or is at least paying me the money every month) and, as a part time gymnastics instructor in a council leisure centre / gym, he is able to afford the monthly payment comfortably (about 13% of his take home if he works 35 hrs a week).
47 minutes ago, Paul Ruinaard said:I keep reading about all this stuff and like everything that goes up it has to come down as the demand drops off for whatever reason. Hindsight and experience is a great teacher of the long game in all things, bikes included. Even the chip shortages are easing and in fact there is predicted to be a glut. Watch and wait until oil hits $ 30 per barrel again. Cycles happen. Anyway theres going to be a lot of very expensive bikes that are going to have a very large depreciation when the owners realize they have paid top dollar for something which is essentially the same as the cheap option functionally. Bike ate the high end are laughable in terms of the justification for the prices. Time to reap the whirlwind.
What luxury products have dropped in price after a rise before? Other than houses and fuel of course?
1 hour ago, Shebeen said:so many people talk about buying a house during this 24% repo rate period. Must have been like a train station at the deeds office July 98.
Debt is not all bad.
Borrowing money is one thing, what you do with it is another sport entirely.
*buy a house, install pv on the roof, start a business with long term profits - generally good.
*take out a personal loan to go on holiday, have a huge wedding, a car that is fancier than your budget - debatable
*invest in stocks - risky as hell
If you're scared of debt at all costs, you're less likely to be either poor or rich.
Lol - I didn't buy a house, but I bought a BMW 320 just before the rate went through the roof. Was paying prime + 2% if I remember correctly and the payments went through the roof. Cured my 25 year old self of any desire for fancy cars after that.
Over here, the bike shops are saying that they cannot fulfil the demand at the higher end. I was chatting to a shop owner the other day who says that custom builds are most affected, often because of not being able to get one or two components. A mate of mine took delivery of his new bike on the weekend from Ribble. It was supposed to be delivered in March, but was delayed because they couldn't get some of the Ultegra parts to build the bike. At the same time, it seems that the biggest growing industry in the UK is Charity Food banks
2
Presumably, if stock is still constrained and demand is still high, the bike boom is not over.
On 7/21/2022 at 6:36 PM, BrentCGP said:This is Cost push (Supply) inflation, not demand/price inflation, Demand is the same, or lower, but the supply is not there. That's what we are suffering from here in SA. The way to solve it is NOT Monetary policy, ala interest rate hikes. There are three ways to fix cost push inflation, and its all on the Fiscal side, simplified of course.
1. Government spending needs to come down drastically. (ANC? laughable)
2. Tax more ( Not going to happen).
3. FIX the supply chain! (KZN Looters? the recent floods, Transnet, the ports? Its a total F up everywhere.
Most of us will be okay. I have been unemployed for over a year, came back from the middle east when Covid ate us alive out there. Been the hardest few years of my life. Using my time to study my masters and I will be on the first plane out of SA at the end of this year to join Mrs again. I hope to return many years down the line. But sadly I think my time to live here is done for good.
But the knock on effect down the line for this is unimaginable. So many caveats to this and is much more complex that I could dare to post here. and the people making the decisions are politicians who cant run a bath let alone a country. Its going to be a brutal few years. Hold on tight.
Ride your bikes. There is light at the end, its just very far away at the moment.
Supply issues are going to continue for a long time still.
That said, let me tell you a story.
We building Mrs a new bike. Ordered her the GX AXS upgrade from Germany, paid the shipping, the duty and VAT landing in Dubai. (yes there is tax there now for a few years) and the total cost, converted from $ to ZAR was R6400 for the AXS Upgrade Kit... Now Cape Cycle Systems and CoolHeat are not suffering from inflation or supply issues. They are purely taking the piss out of us in SA. I refuse to believe any other story.
Anyway, the order was almost R20k less than our local favourite online store for the same order.
Including 2 XX Eagle Chains, GX AXS upgrade, GX Cassette, 2 Ti King Cages, 2 SS King Cages, a set of Magura brakes, and whole bunch of Wolf Tooth Goodies for your truly. Make of that what you wish.
That's brutal
34 minutes ago, DieselnDust said:Yip employers don’t give a shot either. Come back to work even if you have to walk or stay home unemployed.
it’s in times like these when he value and sincerity of the “we value our employees “ jargon show it’s true worth ….0000
So true - We've just been through an enhanced salary review that was brought forward three months from the usual time. It is humbling to work for a company that has stepped up, increased salaries early and by a far higher margin than in a normal year. First company that I've ever worked for that doesn't just talk about valuing employees,, but lives it at every turn.
Loving this thread and learning a lot from it. I just had a quote last week for a PV setup. We're in a different position to a lot of you folks in that we don't have load shedding to worry about, but electricity is very expensive and traditional energy generation doesn't help global warming, so we've decided to go the PV route.
We have an electric shower, so don't need hot water going into it, and our water pressure is so poor that a bath will take 45 minutes to run to about 8 inches deep, so only really need hot water for washing hands, dishes that don't fit in the dishwasher etc. At the moment, our house and hot water is heated by an oil boiler, with a 1200l heating oil tank outside. I have a TADO system to automatically manage the house, so run the boiler for an hour a day to heat up the hot water tank/geyser and that gives us enough hot water for our daily needs. That may change in winter, but the boiler will be running the central heating at that stage so hot water will be no issue.
The plan is to install a system now, without batteries but battery ready, and to set washing machine, dishwasher etc etc to run during daylight hours to maximise use of generated electricity. The excess then gets sold back to the grid for 25% of what we buy it for. Installation cost is about £6,800, which will hurt.
Next step, after we properly insulate the house (new windows, thicker insulation in the ceiling etc), is to install a battery system and a heat pump setup to control temperature in the house, which should be largely run by the PV system, especially in Summer. This will allow us to get rid of the oil boiler altogether and save the £1,200 per year (based on last years prices, twice that now) that we spend on heating oil.
We investigated a small windmill at the top of our property as the wind never seems to stop at our place, but decided, for all of the reasons listed on this thread, to stay away from that at the moment.
Anyway, the point wasn't to bore you all with my plans, but wondering if anyone has any thoughts on whether this is the right plan or is there a better way to do it?
3 hours ago, Sid the Sloth said:Don’t worry. I agree. But I am also convinced a large number of riders would be happy on a gravel bike and switching road and gravel wheels than on a pure road bike. I would say at least a pair of training wheels with 32s would be lovely for a road bike around Cape Town. I’ve started hopping onto the new trail up the side of constantia nek on my road bike and it’s fantastic - but I wouldn’t recommend doing it on nice racing tyres, unless you like risking them 😅
So true - for so many of us, the benefit of skinny tyres, enhanced aero etc etc make little difference to our ride. I rode across the UK a few weeks back and only realised afterwards that I didn't use my drops once. Made my think about why I have them.
In for both. Thanks lads
19 hours ago, Abel Du Plessis said:Need some advice please. My Fuji TeamSL has the Shimano Ultegra shifters. The crankset has 2 rings: 36/50 teeth. The groupset is 10-speed, 11 - 23 teeth.
I am not as young and fit as when I brought it, and find that I am struggling with climbing. I would like to have some more, larger rings in the back, and a 3rd smaller ring in the front.
Is this possible with the same Ultegra shifters? What do you experts recommend I do?
Not sure about the front, but I converted my Ultegra back setup to 11-34 from 11-28 two weeks ago. Needed a longer cage derailleur (there was also a wolf-tooth adaptor available instead). This was because of a ride across England that I did last week. Genuinely made such a massive difference to my enjoyment of the ride. Front is 50/34 I think
2 hours ago, madmarc said:No - But i'm comparing what i would pay in Germany as to here in SA out of interest
German VAT is included @ 19% so in ZA this would be 4% cheaper
I stand to be corrected but GPS devices fall under 8517.62 tariff heading which is 0%
My ROE is a bit heavy as i could today buy Euro for 16.41 making it even a bit cheaper.
I would rather pay a bit more and have a local supplier to go back to in case of issues or for accessories etc.
7 minutes ago, madmarc said:R 12 750 online in Germany incl 19% VAT @ ROE 17:1 - Can you compare ?
Is that landed in SA, VAT and duties paid?
2 hours ago, mazambaan said:My comments were based on Giant bikes and the battery compartment is not sealed well, if at all. Water can easily penetrate where the pins make contact at the base of the battery near the motor. Just washing the bike will have some moisture there. Drop that thing running in a pool (submerge it) and it is going to get saturated. The incidents I quoted I saw myself, although not the Sani drowning.
Be careful out there.
Makes sense. Why phone makers generally won't say that their products are waterproof, even if they are.
My good mate has a Ghost bike and I swear he spends more time fixing it than riding it. TBF he rides hectic trails.
32 minutes ago, rorydewet said:Is this based on fact.
E-bikes dont like water.
I though the water level is an issue for e-bikes and normal bikes.
Have yet to read that normal bikes can go where e-bikes cant.
Thought it was the same for both.
I would assume that, where there is an electric motor / battery etc involved, there is more opportunity for failure when coming into contact with water, should water ingress anywhere into sealed units and they would be harder to dry out completely.
Lots of folks here ride with cameras and submit footage of close passes, phone use by drivers etc to the various authorities. I have never ridden on the road with a camera as I can hardly get organised with charging my lights, radar, garmin, phone, watch etc and I know that I wouldn’t ever take the time to download and edit footage.
this might change that as I already have a varia so no extra charging, and if it keeps overwriting itself, so no downloading needed, it might be useful in the event of a small incident. Will have to wait and see what folks think once more have them
Is motorcycling allowed?
in Chit chat
Posted
Nope - 2 yrs to rent a bike lol