It’s all fun and games riding around in your Chuck Taylors or work boots, until Old Granddad turns left across your bow or you come up short on a double. Sometimes, even the most talented among us wind up layin’ `er down – and if you lay her, or him, down on top of your ankle, well, then you might suddenly and painfully appreciate what a wondrous and complex organism the human body is; things like ankles and wrists and knees, once mangled, take a lot to put back together again. Good boots aren’t always going to save your underpinnings, but motorcyclists who’ve been around the block a few times like our chances much, much better with some serious soles and ankle protection – and a little (or a lot) of protection over the easily-injured tibia is never a bad idea either.

Have there been any great motorcycle movies lately? Maybe some cameos and probably some documentaries that I can’t think of at the moment. What is certain, is there have been many great (and not so great) motorcycle movies over the past seven decades or more. Movies depicting the Hell’s Angels in the late sixties, documentaries following travelers around the world and riders racing at the ragged edge, and even some light-hearted comedy make up our 17 movie list. So grab your Rolos, Junior Mints, popcorn, or whatever it is you like to enjoy with a movie. Sit back, relax, and enjoy the show.

Okay, maybe it’s not the last dirtbike tire you’ll ever need, but they last a heck of a long time and perform great as they wear. The Bridgestone Battlecross X40 caps off the hard end of the Battlecross lineup and is meant for drier rocky terrain like we see in much of the western United States. 

Any lock is better than no lock – including your bike’s built-in steering lock, which might prevent the average drunk from rolling it down the alley. At the same time, not even the burliest, most expensive lock is invincible if it’s up against an angle grinder in a forest where there’s no one to hear it scream, or a tree fall. Some locks, however, are way better than others. There’s an entire continuum of convenience and security, price and peace of mind.

Motorcycles seem to attract dirt. Even sitting still in the garage for a couple of days, they attract dust, but out on the road, bikes ride plow right into all kinds of sticky substances (mostly a wide variety of bugs). Also, they’re not immune to the dreaded water spots of the afternoon shower. So, naturally, since motorcyclists have a great affiliation to their machines, a cottage industry of motorcycle cleaning products has grown to a remarkable size. Here, we’ve listed a selection of the top cleaning products that we have personally used over the years. While there are many great motorcycle cleaners out there, you can also stumble onto some snake oil. With these cleaners, you’ll know you’re getting the good stuff.

I’m a gear nerd. Have been, and hope to always be. I nerd out on unique materials, armor, and the latest and greatest of motorcycle gear. That makes me a sucker for KLIM’s heavily researched and developed garments. Toward the end of 2019, I had the chance to join the folks at KLIM for a 2020 product launch and an inside look at some of the materials technology that was being developed and tested at the Gore Labs in Maryland. It was akin to touring Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory. 

What makes for the best motorcycle gloves? That’s a loaded question, we know. How could we at MO possibly know what the best motorcycle gloves are for you and your situation at any given moment? Well, to be honest, it’s because we’re moto-wizards. Ageless beings that hold the secrets of the universe among our homes offices. We know all, what has been and what will be. Including what’s best for you, same as your parents.

The first wave of motorcycle airbag systems largely involved built-in components within a suit or ones that required that they be installed in airbag-specific gear. Although there were some outliers, most notably the Helite Turtle Airbag Vest that requires being worn over the jacket with a tether to the bike, the airbag era is entering the phase where the safety system is garment-agnostic. These systems from Alpinestars, Dainese, and Klim take the form of vests that can be worn inside or outside a rider’s regular gear. While we’ve had the opportunity to wear the first wave of airbags in their specific jackets/suits from multiple vendors, the Dainese Smart Jacket is our first shot at a second wave airbag system. Although I’ve been lucky enough not to crash in it during my time testing the Smart Jacket, it has very quickly become part of my regular riding kit. 

A long-term tire test is hard to do these days. With the internet’s insatiable devouring of content, it’s hard to be away from the desk while still managing to deliver enough fodder to appease an entire world wide web of curious readers.

Every time it comes time to write one of those “Great Motorcycle Developments of the Future” deals, some form of cooling tech always makes it to the top of the list. Usually it’s an air-conditioned helmet. Indian decided to attack the heat problem from the other direction with its ClimaCommand Classic Seat, retro-fittable onto all Thunderstroke models back to 2016.

The new FLY Formula helmet sits atop the company’s helmet line up in terms of safety, materials, and price ($649.96). FLY’s Conehead EPS technology, Impact Energy Cells from Rheon Labs, and the helmet’s 12k carbon fiber shell all come together to make a substantial lid that FLY claims is its safest yet. 

As it does every year, Father’s Day is coming up fast (it’s June 21 in case you didn’t know), and if you’ve got a moto-loving pops you care about, a moto-themed gift will undoubtedly put a smile on his face. Let us help with this collection of gifts for all the moto dads out there. With prices running on the gamut on the affordability chart, there’s bound to be something here for any budget. So, without further ado, let’s get started:

The Coronavirus pandemic and the subsequent lockdowns have given us a lot of time to wrench on our motorcycles – good thing riding motorcycles on the open road is about as socially distant as you can get. Still, the fact remains that turning a wrench on your bike, whether to perform basic maintenance or even a complete teardown, is a part of the ownership experience many of us enjoy (or at least tolerate). While a good set of basic hand tools is an essential part of anybody’s garage, when you’re ready to step up your game then it’s time to get some power tools.

One of the essential ingredients of any home mechanic’s toolbox is a set of combination wrenches in all the common sizes for your bike. After a while, many motorcycle mechanics find they need a stubby set of combination wrenches to get into a tight spot. With that first step down the rabbit hole of wrench variations, they begin a long and interesting journey toward adjusting fasteners that previously were unreachable. Here are some of our favorite styles of combination wrenches for your perusal. And remember, if you happen to buy any of these wrenches MO gets a small infusion of cash to keep the doors open and the motorcycle articles coming. 

Many, many moons ago, I club raced for five years, and one of my favorite stories from that era involves a high-speed crash in Turn 7 of the big track at Willow Springs. Every Saturday, at the end of the day, expert riders had the chance to sign up for practice starts. Novice racers had these required as part of their school day. So, on the first of the practice starts, during the warmup lap, where we’re trying to get heat in the tires, a novice racer commits the cardinal sin of abruptly chopping his throttle on the back straight where everyone is WFO heading for the ultra-fast Turn 8. He went from motoring away from me on his much larger displacement bike to essentially dropping a high-compression anchor. The result was that I barely had time to cut my throttle before I plowed into him.

As you no doubt know, Motorcycle.com also produces videos to go along with nearly every motorcycle review we publish. So, when the opportunity came along to get our hands on a 360 camera for the first time, we couldn’t say no. Chances are you’ve already seen some footage with the camera in prior reviews, too. Normally, our video guy Sean Matic doesn’t involve himself with the written word, instead focusing his attention on moving pictures of the questionable MO team. But considering how he’s the one with the most “seat time” with the Insta360 OneX camera, we couldn’t think of anyone better to tell you how it works. Here are his impressions. -TS

The thing I love most about the change of seasons is getting reacquainted with different pieces of riding gear. Case-in-point, the recent late spring weather made me pull out my vented gear, and I’ve discovered, again, how much I like the Alpinestars SP X Air Carbon V2 Gloves. How much is that? Well, I wear them with riding gear that doesn’t begin with the letter A, which the PR representatives of the other gear manufacturers will say is not an appropriate thing for a moto-journalist to do. Let’s take a look at what goes into a glove that I have gotten quite fond of, shall we?

For almost a quarter-century, I’ve been wearing earplugs while riding, and I’ve tried just about every kind of earplug out there. For about the past decade, I’ve used musician’s earplugs because they fit my funny-shaped left ear canal, and they don’t muffle sound – just lower its intensity. However, I’ve had to put up with some idiosyncrasies, like the slight protrusion from my ear. Imagine my interest when the folks from EarPeace approached me to review their product. On the surface, it appears to address my issues with musician’s earplugs while still playing to their strengths.

I’m very particular about the fit of my gloves. That in itself can make it difficult to find a pair that I’m truly happy with. When it comes to finding a pair that fits well with a one-piece suit, I hadn’t had much luck until the REV’IT! Jerez 3 gloves came down the pipeline. I was able to use the Jerez 3 with the REV’IT! Quantum one-piece suit, which ended up being one of my favorite suit/glove combos to date. 

Back in the era of my misspent youth, things used to be so much simpler. You’d take your new motorcycle home, bolt-on a “Closed Course Only” aftermarket exhaust, and (if you were smart) install a jet kit in the carburetors. The result was significant power gains and weight loss. Today, things are a little more complicated. Carburetor jet kits are illegal in some states, and the OEMs are making it tougher for EFI piggyback systems to alter what the EPA dictates your air/fuel tuning should be. Additionally, it is much more difficult to get aftermarket exhausts in some places.

The AGV X3000, if you hadn’t noticed, is AGV’s heritage-inspired line of full-face helmets. What sets the X3000 apart from others cashing in on the retro resurgence is the fact that this helmet is designed to replicate AGV’s first full-face helmet that donned the head of none other than the legendary motorcycle racer, Giacomo Agostini in 1969. The fact that Ago himself helped design the original helmet that the X3000 is based off gives this nostalgic lid a bit more street cred than your run of the mill vintage brain bucket.

It had been a minute since I’d used any Fly Racing gear off-road when the Kinetic Shield gear set arrived in the mail. Pulling the jersey, pants, and gloves out of their packaging, I really liked the black on black graphics, but if you’re not into it, there are also a handful of other color options in this model. Price-wise, the Kinetic Shield gear comes in around mid-level for the Fly Racing lineup and on the budget-friendly end of the spectrum when considering all of the other gear sets on the market. Obviously, everything integrates and looks great together. As B. Jaswinski used to say, “Look good, feel good, ride good”.

Listen to sport riders talk about a corner on the track, or maybe their favorite road, and you’ll hear things like “I come in hard on the brakes, bang a couple of downshifts, and then bend it into the corner.” Let’s just focus on the word “bang” here. Riders are broken into a couple of different categories when it comes to downshifting technique. On opposite ends of the spectrum, you’ll find the ones who flex their ankle, precisely snicking each shift with the toe of their boot, and then there are the stompers who use their whole leg. Most of us are somewhere in between, neither babying nor beating our motorcycle’s transmission. No matter how strong modern transmissions are, they still contain parts that you can bend or break if you abuse them. That’s what Rottweiler Perfomance’s Transaver is supposed to prevent. 

The first pair of off-road boots I bought when I started riding dirtbikes were some entry-level Alpinestars Tech 3s. The low price and the relative flexibility compared to others on the market made them a great choice for a newbie. I remember how little I could feel in those when I started using them and how foreign the experience felt to me entirely.

Recently, while practicing my government-mandated social distancing in the middle of nowhere on dirtbikes, I noticed a friend of mine had a new 6D ATR-2, 6D’s latest dirtbike lid. I asked him what he thought of it, “Well, I haven’t worn it too much yet, but I thought I’d get the safest lid I could.” It would seem, for those in the know, that 6D has made a name for itself – within a relatively short time, with the company being founded in 2011 – with it’s Omni-Directional Suspension (ODS) technology making for a “safer” helmet. In what is becoming a sea of great offerings, 6D helmets started a revolution in terms of solutions to injuries from rotational impacts with its original ATR-1 off-road helmet. 

From the world introduction of the KTM 790 Duke in 2018, detractors have commented on two characteristics of the bike’s front brakes. The first, the soft initial bite from the pads, I easily remedied with the EBC Double-H pads. (KTM PowerParts discs improved the braking even more.) The other characteristic that performance-minded riders expressed their disdain for was the amount of free-play in the lever before the brake was activated. I’m not going to call this a design flaw because I believe it was a deliberate decision on the part of KTM’s engineers. The 790 Duke was designed to be a street bike, and that little bit of free play can help less experienced riders avoid initial abruptness with their brake application – which is a good thing, particularly in a panic stop situation.

The REV’IT! Quantum One-Piece Suit is a looker for sure. Whether you can handle the splattery graphics and snakeskin-esque embossing is entirely on you, but if you can, you’ll be awarded with a suit that functions just as well as it looks, and all the ladies (and/or men) will notice. Let’s delve deeper into the Quantum’s mechanics.

We’ve now sung the praises of the modular helmet enough that all regular readers probably have the chorus down: It’s excellent to be able to flip up the whole front of your helmet when you want to talk to people or quaff a refreshing drink while you’re stopped for gas, etc., without having to take the whole thing off your head.

Since its introduction in 2015, the Sportec M7 RR tire has been a popular seller for Metzeler and continues to sell well to this day. So, why fix it? Well, while we may think that the advent of motorcycle electronics has been growing quickly, the arena of tire performance has also been undergoing seemingly exponential change, and a five-year-old tire runs the risk of being left behind in the marketplace. Enter the Metzeler Sportec M9 RR, a tire designed to capitalize on all the M7 RR’s strengths and then exceed them. Does Metzeler, the only tire manufacturer to exclusively produce motorcycle tires, have another hit on its hands? Let’s take a look.

Updated March 2020:

If you’re making a tire in the sport-touring category, you probably have one of the most difficult jobs in the entire tire business. Where racers want the grippiest tire they can find, longevity be damned, and the touring set seek high-mileage with modest grip, the sport-touring crowd wants the best of both worlds. Oh, and it better have good wet weather performance, too. No easy feat.

Updated, February 2020

Motorcycle touring, traditionally, means we’re sticking pretty much to pavement. Though you can wear any of these for Adventure riding, we have a whole other list of  suits more suited to life off the beaten path, designed for the most part with even more freedom of motion and impact absorption. Every suit here, from the one-piece Aerostich to the jacket/pants combinations of the others, are a bit closer-fitting for reduced drag at highway speeds, with plenty of ventilation but not too much, and with enhanced abrasion resistance as well as armor. When you’re caught out in the rain after dark, you’ll be glad to find yourself inside any one of them.

Updated February 2020

Ride in a warm place. The end. But if you insist on living where it gets cold in the winter, there are plenty of strategies to continue riding way down below freezing. We don’t recommend doing that, only because single-track vehicles don’t handle well on ice, but the fact is, it’s not that hard to rig yourself and your motorcycle for cold-weather riding.

Let’s just address the elephant in the room right off the bat. The Del Rosario F-Light Coveralls aren’t for everybody. With its fighter-pilot-turned-racecar-driver-turned-plumber motif, it’s an interesting design, to be sure. Half of you probably think these are atrocious, while the other half thinks they’re weird. Still another half probably digs them (but that demographic skews young and may not read online reviews anyway). Odd math aside one thing’s for sure: you’re looking at them.

Ever since protective moto-specific jeans hit the market, I’ve been searching to find some that I liked. It’s been a challenge. I’m 5’8” with a 30-inch inseam and pretty muscular thighs – the watermelon-crushing kind. For a long time, it was the fit that bothered me. Euro jeans were too skinny, others were too baggy. Furthermore, jeans built with aramid fiber offer zero stretch to help with fit. Even now that there’s a plethora of jeans on offer from many different brands, I’ve yet to find any that I, personally, am 100% stoked about, be it fit, color, style, etc. At long last, the Pando Moto Steel Black jeans have been like finding the needle in the haystack for me.

Now that they’ve become a thing, I have a pretty decent stack of “riding jeans” on the shelf. But when these Trilobites flew in over the transom the other day, I seem to have forsaken all others. It was really easy to find photos of them on MO, since they’re the only pants I’ve worn in about the last six months of road tests. Just like with a good helmet, fit is key, and the stretchy-feely Trilobites hug my curves just right. Do not body shame me.

All of the Racer gloves I’ve tested have easily stood by the claim of the best fitting gloves you can buy, and the Racer Multitop 2 is no different. Much like Cinderella and her glass slipper, I slipped the medium-sized gauntlets on and whaddya know, a perfect fit. I typically wear a large in most European brands and MX gloves, but mediums have always fit me spot on for Racer gloves. As someone who’s easily bothered by ill-fitting gloves, Racer’s consistency is a welcome surprise in a market where different styles of gloves can fit in vastly different ways even interbrand.

Stop and think about helmets for a minute. Undoubtedly the most important piece of safety equipment motorcyclists wear, have you thought about what goes into testing a helmet? Basically, a helmet is dropped straight down onto a surface and the results of the impact are measured. That’s all well and good, but there’s more to a crash than the impact itself. And besides, how many accidents involve the rider falling straight down, as if dropped from a building?

Klim makes some of the most technical gear on the market. From the companies Klim partners with, to the level of thought, research, and testing that goes into new products, it’s always exciting to hear what the brand has coming down the pipeline. Recently, I had the opportunity to take a trip with the folks from the Klim HQ in Rigby, ID, to the Gore facility in Maryland (think Gore-Tex). We had the opportunity to tour the Gore labs – an eye-opening and mind-blowing experience – and later got to check out some of Klim’s 2020 product line, which includes some new stuff that I think will be a hit for the company. In addition to new gear of its own, Klim has teamed up with In&Motion, a company that makes motorcycle airbag vests, to bring the Klim Ai-1 airbag vest to America’s motorcycling contingent.

’Tis the season to do some frantic last-minute holiday shopping for the loved ones in your life! If you’re lucky, those loved ones include women who ride. I’m usually horrible at finding the perfect gift, and I’m sure you can relate, considering the fact that you’re consulting a cheesy article for gifting tips. All teasing aside, you’ve come to the right place. As a woman who loves motorcycles, I can think of a few gifts that I would be overjoyed to receive. So, I offer this gift guide to help you shop for the female riders in your life.

Big manufacturers rarely open up their factory doors to the inquisitive eyes of journalists, and when they do, it is typically to show off the state-of-the-art nature of their manufacturing process. Recently, Arai opened its factories for a host of international journalists to show how their premium helmets, which are seen around the world on the grids of the pinnacle classes of each respective motorsport category, are as much the product of hands-on craftsmanship as they are technological advancements. The reasoning behind this openness was the desire to show why Arai believes they make the best motorcycle helmets in the world. The tour was enlightening for all who attended because Arai had the opportunity to show how its long-held core philosophy about head protection affects almost every step of the helmet construction process. 

As motorcyclists, we’ve all heard that using high-powered pressure washers on our bikes is a big no-no. The pressure can force water past O-rings and seals, introducing the potential for corrosion and premature wear. Some of us have ignored that warning by using pressure washers anyway and, aware that intensity is an inverse square of the distance, tried not to get too close to the bike’s sensitive parts with the wand. Well, now Muc-Off has created a motorcycle- and bicycle-specific power washer that addresses the excessive pressure issue. 

News flash: OEM suspensions are designed to a price point. So, unless you’re riding a flagship literbike, those suspenders are full of compromises. The stock suspension on the vast majority of bikes out there is designed for an average rider, going an average pace, over an average road. Get outside of those parameters, and the suspension’s performance is compromised.

Updated November 2019

Updated: November 2019

The REV’IT! Offtrack jacket and pants have actually been in the company’s lineup for some time, albeit with a brief hiatus. Now, the combo is back, ready for adventure, and available in three colorways to make sure you look good whilst doing so. The first chance I had to test the Offtrack gear was 1,600-plus miles through England in August. It had been scorching hot the week prior to my arrival and though the temperatures had begun to drop, I still experienced vast temperature swings and plenty of moisture. As it would turn out, the Offtrack jacket and pants were the perfect kit for the trip. How so? Read on.

I don’t even know whose idea it was to put an Akrapovič pipe on a perfectly good Honda Monkey, but it fell to yours truly to do the deed. And in fact I was happy to do it – to get out of the office for a day and hang with our good friend Chris at MotoGP Werks in beautiful Anaheim, California. It all takes me back to the day when new exhausts were the first thing we did to unleash the anger in our neighbors, followed by weeks of tinkering with jet kits and dousing ourselves in gasoline to try to get the bike to run as good as it used to. I kid, those things really did used to make big performance differences – but it seldom seemed as easy as the directions made it out to be.

Riding boots. You’d be silly not to wear them, right? This is even more true if you’re on a cruiser, where your feet are in front of you, the first of your body parts exposed to the elements – or debris if something is kicked up ahead of you. And when you talk about cruisers, you naturally think of Harley-Davidson. The giant behemoth of the motorcycling industry, The Motor Company’s motorcycles are well known. But did you also know H-D has a whole collection of riding gear to boot? Wait, boot? How appropriate, as here we’ve got a small sampling of 10 Harley-Davidson boots on sale now. With choices for both men and women, there should be something for everybody.

Just yesterday we debunked some myths about Lithium motorcycle batteries, and now we’ve received word on this excellent deal for the Oxford Oximiser 900 battery charger for lead-acid batteries. Normally retailing for $59.95, you can get it now for $35.95.

When Dunlop began its presentation of the all-new Trailmax Mission 50/50 adventure tire *insert record scratch*. Wait, what? 50/50? There are no knobs. There are hardly even lugs on this new adventure offering and it has the rounded profile of your typical street tire. What gives? Well, Dunlop says it’s reinventing what it means for a tire to pull double duty both on-road and off.

Add helmet communicator to the long list of new tricks this old dog resisted learning. Riding always felt like the only quiet time in a wired world, where I could do a little of what felt like meditating – I always enjoyed the solitude. Well, screw that. The voices in my head are increasingly pissed off lately at the absurdity of it all; how about a little diversion?

-by Ian Falloon

Are high-end sport-touring tires sticky enough for everyday canyon carving and an occasional trackday, or is it smarter to trade tire life for ultimate grip with race-bred street rubber?

Blow, winds! Blow until your cheeks crack! Rage on, blow! Let tornadoes spew water until the steeples of our churches and the weathervanes are all drowned. Let quick sulfurous lightning, strong enough to split enormous trees, singe the white hair on my head. Let thunder flatten the spherical world, crack open all the molds from which nature forms human beings, and spill all the seeds from which ungrateful humans grow!

Have you ever wanted to grab an oblivious motorist and scream “CAN YOU SEE ME NOW?” after narrowly avoiding a crash? There’s no doubt that the number-one cause of multi-vehicle crashes involving motorcycles is a car violating a motorcycle’s right of way at an intersection. “I didn’t see him!” is the frequent excuse. “He came out of nowhere!” Sure. “MAYBE IF YOU WEREN’T INSTAGRAMMING YOUR LAUNDRY LIST YOU WOULD HAVE NOTICED ME,” you scream in your fantasy dialogue. What can we do to combat the motorcyclist’s arch-nemesis: the distracted driver?

Oil filters. Not the most glamorous component of a motorcycle, but many would argue it’s one of the most important. As we all know, oil plays a critical role in keeping our motorcycles running optimally, and the filter’s role in keeping the oil clean is vital. While fundamentally one oil filter is similar to the next, there are several different companies making them. Here, we’ve gathered a few different kinds together for a broad overview of the best oil filters you can get for your motorcycle. This should go without saying, but many oil filters are model specific. So, not every filter you see below will have an application for you.

Arai was in a bit of a pickle. The company felt it was making the best helmets possible, but couldn’t get some riders to try them on. You see, the round shape of the Arai helmet made for a somewhat tight opening at the bottom of the helmet. Apparently, when trying on Arais, some folks were getting the helmet down to their ears and not liking how snug the opening was. Then they either decided not to try on the helmet or (worse) selected a larger size that slipped on easier but offered a less secure fit. Had they persisted and gotten the lid over their ears, they would have learned that the interior of Arais are as comfortable as you would expect from a helmet from a premium brand. This realization was the genesis for the Arai Regent-X. 

It’s the free marketplace, hello. Products are constantly coming and going. In with the new, out with the old. Frankly we have no idea how free enterprise works, but we know a deal when we see one. Here are a few out of the thousands, as Revzilla segues from summer to fall.