I have never been able to understand this …

Mine's already modded for me (bar the front suspension).
Already has the fairing lowers, single seat cowl, and nice loud end can.
I'd never call it a waste of money.
If I'd started with a standard SV, then I'd mod it the same way, but then I enjoy doing that sort of thing.

You buy a bike though, and even if it's mint, standard, and exceptionally low mileage, you'll never get your money back on it - they always depreciate.

Originally Posted by timwilky

...TBH I would rather spend the little money I have to run the bike on decent tyres, an oil change every 1500 miles and fuel to ride it......

Yep prefer to spend my money on trackdays, bike holidays and petrol.

But I also enjoy fiddling in the garage, luckily I'm so inept that anything simple keeps me occupied for a month or so...and costs very little apart from valuable riding time.

I think it's also down to the love of the bike itself. You fall in love with the particular bike and want to make it as shiny as possible and improve its eprformance as much as possible.

I love my 125 so much, if I had the cash I'd definitely keep it, get it resprayed, new exhaust, braided lines, bored engine, new shock etc etc because I love riding it and would love to improve it in any way possible.

It's totally illogical but then again as someone said, buying a bike instead of a car is illogical. Biking is a passion and totally worth every penny it costs.

^^^he's right you know^^^

I've stayed away from this for a while, but as for not understanding, my take on it is:

Horses for courses.

HTH.

Originally Posted by TheDangerousQuietOne

... buying a bike instead of a car is illogical. Biking is a passion and totally worth every penny it costs.

Not always so ... I use my Blue one to commute on, and to me a bike is the only practical day to day transport for where I live (traffic is stupid).

If we are talking practicality alone and I was forced to chop one in, I would sell my car way sooner than my bike ....

Originally Posted by Blue_SV650S

If we are talking practicality alone and I was forced to chop one in, I would sell my car way sooner than my bike ....

Same here. I can insure, tax, and put petrol in the bike with less money than just putting petrol in the car to get to work!!

Originally Posted by Baph

Same here. I can insure, tax, and put petrol in the bike with less money than just putting petrol in the car to get to work!!

Indeed, I guess for people that have bikes for pleasure alone would see it different to people that use them as a commuter!

Originally Posted by Jelster

For that money you'd get an '02/03 'Blade. Why would you want anything else ??

Because it's a Honda...nuff said.

Originally Posted by SV650Racer

Race powerbikes..ok take one GSXR1000 and spend equally as much on it..then go and race it in Powerbikes.

Why?

Danny Imberg's doing quite well on a pretty much standard 2004 ZX10R. he certainly hasn't spent thousands on tuning and other performance bits. So far the list runs to:

MHP full exhaust system
Power Commander
Quckshifter plugged into PC3
Rearsets (cheapies)
Uprated bellmouths inside stock airbox
WP shock
WP fork springs
Pretech calipers (not needed, but they were donated by sponsor)
Race tyres (slicks or wets depending on conditions)
F/glass bodywork

He's still using standard wheels, fork externals and dampers, seat subframe, fairing bracket and clocks, clip-ons, seat, all electrics are still in and we could turn it back into a roadbike in about 2 hours. When you compare what he's spent against what Rob Ellsmere, Neil Faulkener or Steve Mercer have spent it's a pittance, and he's always up with them and beating them.

He kinda proves you don't need to spend thousands on tuning bits to win races at that level.