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Vulcan 2000 Limited Review

The Vulcan 2000 Limited has been a very good companion and I have very few regrets about purchasing this bike.



The bike is very easy to handle, and has a nice low center of gravity making it as easy as pie to stabilize the bike if it needs to be stopped suddenly in an emergency.



The handlebars... are pretty dang wide and very low, and so low turn U-Turns can be iffy if your not careful. I happen to like a bike with ultra-wide bars, so I have no complaints at all. Your results may vary.

My main compliants would be the bike is set up to be very soft in the rear shock, with the added insult of very limited shock travel available when the going gets bumpy at speed. When the bike bottoms out the rear shock (constantly) it will rebound harshly without much warning, and can result in some hairy pogo-stick jacking up of the rear tire. If you happen to be in the midst of a hard turn when this takes place, the results can get way too entertaining for comfort. Other than the slammed profile on the groundclearance, there really is no excuse for such a low amout of travel in the rear suspension on this bike.

(BTW: the front forks seem to work just fine.)

I believe they should add a 6th gear as an overdrive to this bike for Highway usage. And while I have seen 135 MPH uphill as the top end of this bike, a lower overdrive in 6th would be nice to have when touring or just puttering on the freeway at a reasonable RPM.

The good stuff:
(1) Front Brake. This thing will pull you down from speed in no time flat. The huge front tire really helps get the brakes to slow the bike down quickly, and safely.
(2) Engine Torque. It's really quite awesome to have 120Ft Lbs of torque handy as a weapon at the stoplight drags or short-shifting through the twisties at lower RPM's. I am wearing out my rear tires every 4000 miles by drag-racing, and by using a little too much throttle through the twisties.
(3) Headlights. At night this bike will carve a frickin laserbeam into the darkest blackness on high beam. I LOVE THEM.

Other issues:
(1) The stock seat is not very comfortable or very thick. I will buy a Mustang brand seat replacement when I have the spare cash handy to toss away.
(2) While the exhaust sounds great- the stock exhaust is fricken fugly to look at, and if you grind the pegs turning to the right at any higher speeds you can (and will) wind up grinding up your nice chrome mufflers into the asphalt. HardChrome and others have some tempting replacements available.

I think I'll keep this bike forever, as I like the looks and the performance of this bike.

I think I would like to buy the Concours 14 as my next purchase to add to my bike stable, or perhaps try the KTM Supermoto 950 when it returns to the USA. Read Full Review