Forum Foraging: 2018 Suzuki V-Strom 1000XT

Sometimes you don’t know what you want; you only know that you want something. If you’re in group A, keep reading MO and scanning the general marketplaces, of which there are now a bunch. On the other hand, if you know the motorcycle you want, don’t overlook shopping the online forums – of which MO‘s parent company, Verticalscope, happens to own a shedload; multiple forums is Fora, and chances are if it has wheels, wings, skis, sails or propellers, there’s an online forum full of fans.

There are good reasons for forum shopping. For one, the people on a given vehicle forum are collectively the best source of knowledge for that vehicle, be it motorcycle, automobile, boat, tractor or whatever. For that reason, you can comfortably sit back and watch the knowledgeable forum members ask the right questions anytime anything comes up for sale.

If the seller is an upstanding member of the forum (you can check their join date and history), chances are they’re also well-informed about the thing they’re selling. As a member of an enthusiast community, they’ve usually kept meticulous care of the thing they’re selling, and often have showered it in aftermarket upgrades. (It’ll be your job to break it to them gently that they’re asking way too much money for their baby.) Maybe most importantly, a member of a community has more incentive to be honest and trustworthy than a guy on Craigslist who wants to meet you in the Walmart parking lot, cash only.

Why not take this 2018 V-Strom 1000XT for an example, to kick things off, on Stromtroopers.com?

That Suzuki V-twin is an absolute classic motorcycle engine of all time, and at 16,500 miles it’s just broken-in. Sadly, this one’s the generation just before cruise control was introduced with the 2020 V-Strom 1050 XT, but aside from that, there’s a lot to love about the 2018, including a midrange chunk of power that got replaced in the newer bike with more top-end.

Besides, this one’s got an Atlas Throttle Lock. Also: Oxford Heated Grips, ROX Bar Risers, a Corbin Seat, GIVI Crash Bars, etcetera… also the stock (quiet) exhaust system, which is a plus for me personally: It reassures me that nobody’s been in there messing with “reflashing” the ECU or whatever. I always like to reserve the right to screw things up myself. But wait! What’s this? The seller sold, or at least listed, a Leo Vince slip-on for this bike last November.

I’m sure there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation.

Anyway, this looks like a well-kept example of an all-time fave modern Suzuki, for anybody who’s into comfortable, mostly roadgoing ADV riding. The seller, who’s in North Carolina, didn’t include lots of photos but you can tell a lot about a person from their nice white picket fence and that they have two sheds.

Frankly, I don’t know if $9,000 is a good deal or not, since I’m new to the V-Strom market this morning, but I think we all know that’s really only a jumping-off point to Haggletown. Whether you buy a thing from a forum or not, I hope everybody’s aware what a great resource forums are when it comes to fixing whatever goes wrong. Without Jaguarforums, for instance, I would not be able to keep my old beast on the road while remaining a financially going concern.

What do you think? What’s your favorite forum and why?

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