[Rob]

I was wondering if any of you beautiful people have had any experience with motorcycles; sport/street bikes to be more precise. You see, I will become a graduate of the University of North Texas in December, and would like, as a present to myself, to purchase a motorcycle. While I'm very excited about the prospects, I am sorely lacking in motorbike knowledge. What brands are good? How large of an engine do I want? Do I really need motorcycle insurance? These questions and more have been pummeling my synapses for the past couple of months and I'm not real sure about where to go for solutions.

Thus, I call upon the SB hive-mind to hopefully answer not only these questions, but also to bring up those which I have not considered. Any information would be beneficial at this point and I heap my supreme thanks upon anyone who can help me out.

[Rob]

Well, let's see. I was kind of leaning toward ~600cc, but am open to suggestions. As for use, this would probably be something to play around with on the weekends and occasionally commute to work. Speed is not really a determining factor, but it would be nice to have. I have a hard limit of $6000, so that pretty much limits me to used. I'd even be alright if it were beat up a little. Basically, I want something that will be good to learn on but won't need to be upgraded once I get the hang of things.

[Rob]