High Or Low Mileage Used Bikes?

Full service history over mileage is in my mind a better indicator of the bikes reliability

 

I bought mine in 2017, a used 2013 865. It had 1500 miles on it. I am the 3rd owner. Still baffles my mind. Near perfect new really. I am a huge fan of buying used. The search is half the fun. I look for documentation of care. Service records, receipts of any major part or work replacements, either professional or home DIY as long as it validates any owner claims. Low mile bikes older than 5 years I assume are suspect of "neglect investments" that will have to be made on my part such as tires, fork oil, brake line fluids, coolant if any, shaft drive oil if any, plugs, etc. This is more so with carb bikes that lay dormant (sync-balance or rebuild). All points of negotiation to take the price down.

I also look for close as stock as possible. Never want to buy into someones previous modding hacks that didn't quite work out.

Miles are merely a point of interest, not a decisive factor.

 

My 2018 speedy was 2 in May. It had 3 owners and 1800 miles on it. Alarm bells did ring a bit, but I’ve been lucky over 2000 trouble free miles and counting.

 

1995 Trident 900 with around 55,000 miles on the clock. Regular oil changes (max every 2 years even if mileage doesn't warrant it) and service every 6,000 miles. Got a wad of relevant paperwork. Hardly uses any oil and pulls like train. Beautiful!

 

I think there are a lot of things that can lead to a bike having low mileage that are based on the human factor as much or more than the machine. Case in point. I have a good friend who bought a 2014 Street Glide with every intention of riding with us. He loved that bike and took immaculate care of it but rode it very little--only 5K miles over the course of six years. But he has been developing some serious health issues that made him, frankly, very anxious and afraid to ride the bike. He kept thinking he'd start feeling better and start riding again. He never did--in fact he's a lot worse--and just sold his bike about a month ago. His main love is golf and he can't even do that anymore neurologically-related tremors and balance issues.

I've heard a lot of other reasons that are human more than bike-related that have led me to suspend judgment about a bike's "health" or reliability without having as much maintenance info and history as I can dig up. I'm with you on the first part of your post, @MyEvilTwin, about documentation of care being very important. But I don't necessarily assume as I once did that relatively new bikes with low miles are "neglect investments". Having that documentation of care can help to shed light on that.

The saddest little bike I ever knew that was definitely neglected was a 2015 Suzuki Savage that a friend of mine bought with the intention of taking the MSF class (which she did and passed with much difficulty) and riding off into the sunset. In three years she owned it, I kid you not, nine miles (yes, 9). When I connected her with another friend looking to buy a bike like that, she did step up and have it trailered to a shop in town for a thorough going-over and paid for anything that needed to be attended to prior to the sale.

 

Interesting one that; in my case had just suffered a near death, ruptured aneurysm which had forced me to cease trading as a self employed contractor and retire. Had wished to get back into biking for many years but having family, safety concerns etc had put me off. After recovering, you naturally start to review what you have done with your life and what you are going to do in the future - get busy living or get busy dying (Shawshank). So, sod it, I thought, looked online and found a dealer that had the bike that I wanted with 600 or so miles on it. All of this was fortuitous as Triumph were due to bring the Tiger 900 out and so the dealers were keen to get rid of the 800's and I reckon I got a very good deal for a (virtually) brand new bike (albeit white). I love the bike and the freedom it has given but also thank my wife who planted the kernel of an idea in my mind (think she was worried about me endlessly watching videos of the Japanese Tsunami on Youtube after the op - strange things happen due to the drugs used) and has always allowed me the slack (I say that as I here a lot of blokes saying 'I'll have to ask the missus') to go off biking.

Other major considerations were safety, comfort and engine off manoeuvreability (not too heavy to shunt about) - had read a lot of guff about the bike I wanted and the Tiger 800 seemed to fit the bill. And so here we are. Other than that, I guess we all need people to buy the new items, otherwise there wouldn't be the used items?

 

Ha,,,,,who are you trying to kid HT.

I’d say you’ve been round the clock at least once

 

It all depends on the bike. A few years ago I bought an eighteen year old cbr600f with 50,000 miles on the clock for £950. It had obviously been well looked after. No rattles, no smoke, ran sweet as a nut. I'd say it was good for another 50,000 miles if looked after. On the other hand if you see a £6,000 bike with 5,000 miles on the clock, always been left outside, never serviced/oil changed, thrashed, scored discs, rusty chain etc, you'd leave it be.

 

If you got a T100 with 15000 miles, I wouldn't be too concerned. But a liter sport bike with 10,000 miles would be a hard pass for me. I don't want to inherit someone's red line ripping trackday messes. It's not mileage, it's RPMs that govern engine life. So to me, they command a premium because of how bikes are treated. You can see the videos.

I once bought a sporty car with a turbo. Nothing but headaches. I will never again buy a used sporty car with a supercharger or turbo (though modern engines put them on for different reasons than 20 years ago.) You inherit someones heavy foot and youtube helmet cam messes. But I would buy a used Toyota Camry with a lot of miles because I know you can't really do much fun with that car.

So long and short, it all depends, but I don't want to inherit messes.

 

I was chatting with a colleague about a Harley, some gigantic thing he rides. Was telling me how hard it was to get parts out on the road because the bike was a 2000 and HD dealers only keep 10 years of parts on hand. I said, how many miles on that tank? He said, it's over 100,000 miles. I said you got to be kidding me, you got 100,000 on of all things, a Harley? So even some monster Harley well maintained, can pack on the mileage.

 

Bought my Street Twin in March 17 and insured it for 4,000 miles a year, had to ring for more miles after 4 months! Now at 36,000 miles and probably worthless compared to the low mileage ones for sale. Has been maintained religiously by an ex-triumph race mechanic and wanted for nothing. I did buy it to ride after all. (Unfortunately my classic CB750 and R75/6 hardly turn a wheel these days.)

 

I recently read about a guy with his 800 xrt that he was hoping to get to 200,000 miles. He has owned it from new since 2013 (I think) but sadly it broke down on the A30 in Cornwall showing 187,00 miles, bottom end gone so expensive repair. Sadly, he has now moved onto a Tracer the silly so and so! Don't think I'll be doing that on my Tiger 1200 as it is getting very heavy for me to push it around. Would like to see a 600cc style adventure bike from the factory with shaft drive (I ride all through winter and cannot be bothered with chain clean/lube/maintenance) which I would gladly part ex in a heartbeat.

 

Well low milage means I can better work out how many people may have owned it because apart from regular oil changes, I try to ascertain if the bike has been regularly redlined, which I would try and avoid.

 

I tried very hard to buy a Harley Wide Glide a few years back - 3 years old with delivery mileage. Apparently a chap had bought 2 new Harleys, ridden one and not the other and after 3 years traded both of them in at a Suzuki dealer for a Gixxer thou.

Only problem was that the Suzuki dealer wanted pretty much new money for it, despite me pointing out that it would be second hand by the time I got it home, and, as it was outside the HD warranty period, any teething problems wouldn't have been picked up.

He stuck to his guns and I walked away.

 

I searched for 3 months for Tiger 800XRT dealers -private and found one in august 2016 17230 miles -1 owner full history and in July he changed chain and sprockets -new brake pads -new tires and full service when i viewed it knew i was buying it -it was so clean better then any i had seen in triumph dealers -its now on 19500 --next year Austria and Norway + Scotland and wales. should wack up the mileage .
+ heated seats are great that what wife likes

 

Nice one I hope my tiger gives as good service over the years.....

 

I'd definitely go for condition over mileage. After passing my test and moving to bigger bikes with bigger price tags I used to worry about clocking up the miles and it's affect on resale value but soon fell out with that idea after a salesman at a local dealer, looking my 1000RX over for a part-ex, was unconcerned with the mileage as he was so impressed with the condition. I put 2400m on the 1198SP in three months back in 2011 and the guy who bought it thought it was high mileage. He reckoned around 800-1000m was to be expected but he still bought it 'cos it was cleaner than when it came out of the dealers!
The Z is just over 36k and just as fast and sweet as the day I bought it. I've never owned an old (60's/70's) British bike but a friend of mine, now passed away, had several back in the day and regarded rebores/rebuilds as normal maintenance, until he bought one of the first CB750F1's in 1970. Jump on, press a button and ride. Just relatively minor routine maintenance, no blow ups, no oil leaks, no drama. The rest is history.

 

I'm of the view that machines like regular use. I've bought cars with 180k and took them past 1/4 million (not a bloody diesel, either). On a regularly used and well maintained engine mileage isn't much of an issue. depends what those miles are tho, I never knowingly buy 'urban' cars that have short run/start stop journeys. I never see small prior usage as a guarantee of a good buy.