Introduction
The 2023 Honda Gold Wing DCT is an incredible touring motorcycle. Packed with tons of great features like the GL1800 DCT engine and full touring setup, this is the ultimate in transcontinental motorcycle touring comfort. Join me as I take you on a long test ride and give you a review of the 2023 Honda Goldwing DCT!
~ Ride Safe, Ride On!
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#Honda #GoldWing #motorcycle #hondagoldwing
Video
Foreign yeah all right guys welcome back to Americade.
We are sitting here at Honda getting ready to take off on the Gold Wing for our big test ride.
This is the Honda Goldwing DCT, with Tor package in this beautiful sparkling, maroon red color, and we are off on our group.
Ride Honda's only doing group ride so can't go off and ripping around and riding like I do on the Indian test rides or the Harley test rides for you guys, but we are still going to go over all the features of this bike and give you guys a nice overview and ride of what this new bike can do.
All right guys.
We are out on the highway I just popped.
The windshield up and almost immediately 100 of the wind noise I mean 100 of the wind noise, I'm getting went away and we're pushing uh.
What are we doing here? 65 I still have no wind noise in the helmet super quiet Goldwing lives up to its reputation.
It's a quiet bike not just with the engine, but with the sound as well.
Now I do want to put us in sport mode.
Here, we're currently in tour, which, if I dig deep into this throttle here, is pretty smooth in tour: we're going to go into sport mode there.
Now it grabs a little bit more.
That's what I like to feel when I'm on the highway I want Instant Power response, so you have a couple modes.
You have sporty of economy, you have rain, you have tour and then back to sport, we're going to leave it in sport for the duration of this ride in sport we are now pushing 70 and still no wind noise with that windshield up, it's amazing actually a little warm.
It does such a good job at blocking the wind I'm, not really getting any cooling back here and it's a hot day outside very hot.
So let's talk about my features that I like to go over when I review a motorcycle, the first of which is Comfort by the way.
If you guys want to jump to a certain section, they will be time stamped down below.
You can just skip on the timeline on YouTube starting off with Comfort, if a bike's not comfortable you're, not going to want to ride gold wings are known for their comfort, this seat out of the box very comfortable.
It's a little soft I would almost want it to be just just a bit firmer.
For my taste, I mean just a little bit more I, don't know a little more supportive, just a hair, but that's just personal preference.
I like it I like it quite a bit so other than the seat.
We also have a very comfortable riding position.
It's very upright.
The bike feels very Nimble very light because you are more upright over top of the handlebars okay, so you've got good control over top of these handlebars over that front wheel.
It handles very, very well- and you have mid controls for the foot pegs now since you're not really shifting on this bike.
You do have an electronic shifter, but there's no shift Peg, so you're not shifting with your feet.
You do have a right brake, a right foot brake for the rear brake, but that's really the only foot control you have.
Otherwise.
Your feet are just hanging out down there resting on these mid pegs and it feels very, very comfortable.
You could sit in this position for a very long time be very comfortable on a very long ride and that's the point of a Gold Wing is to go across country and feel comfortable.
So for Comfort out of the gate, with a stock seat, probably the most comfortable stock seat, you will find on a motorcycle.
You guys know I'm, not a huge fan of stock seats, but I like to put a saddleman on mine, but for a stock seat.
I will give it a 10 out of 10.
that 10 out of 10 is for Comfort overall the seat, the riding position, handlebar position, foot pegs, all of it.
It feels great.
Let's get into engine power, you guys have already seen we're on the highway we're in sport mode.
This is an automatic and it's a Gold Wing.
Will it go crazy? Well, the speedometer caps out at to what about 1 30.
if you're buying a Gold, Wing you're, probably not looking for a crotch rocket, but it will get up and move, especially in sport.
If I dig in and give a little bit of throttle yeah, you guys can hear it kick in there.
I could easily easily get up to 100 very quickly here, but unfortunately they won't.
Let us but there's plenty of power in this motorcycle GL 1800 engine DCT, dual clutch transmission, some people call it an automatic technically, not true, but yeah.
It's close enough, so DCT they're automatic and uh.
It's an awesome bike on power plenty of power for yourself or for two up.
It's really really really good.
Let's talk about that DCT for just a moment.
The Dual clutch transmission- I am not shifting over here.
At all.
My left hand is just here for steering and hanging out and working these controls for my infotainment Center.
If I want to I have no shifter, they do make a Honda Gold Wing with a shifter.
So if you still want to shift a bike- and you don't want the bike doing it, for you- don't worry that is still an option.
You can still get a manual six-speed, Honda, Gold Wing, with all the same features.
It's just the six-speed normal shift all right, so they make that option.
Most people, however, in the Gold Wing Market, apparently the dcts out, sell the standard six-speed shifters by three to one, that's what they were informing me of.
So that's what most of you guys want to see.
That's why I'm riding this one, otherwise I would personally be on the six-speed shifter, because I like to shift myself now a little bit of Best of Both Worlds Honda wanted everybody to be comfortable, and maybe you want to shift or downshift or play around in the twisties up on the mountains, where you're using more engine braking than you think the normal DCT would allow you to.
If we go over here on the left.
I can see this and I know how to do this on the or on the right hand, side.
Here we hit M we're now in manual mode.
The bike will downshift it won't.
Let me hurt the bike, so, if I get too low on the RPMs, it will downshift for me.
Otherwise, I have to shift myself so over here on the left.
Handlebar I have a paddle shift.
Electronic shifter for up and down I can control, with my thumb and my first finger so I'm going to shift into seventh there and I can click down and shift back into six.
It will not shift up on me, but it will downshift because it won't allow me to Lug the bike be on a certain extent, and it won't allow me to harm the bike.
So if you still want to get a DCT, but you don't want to give up shifting entirely they've thought of that they put the manual shifting in there.
So you can still have fun and play around with that and pop that back and forth and have the normal shifting experience while still protecting the DCT.
It just feels weird, with your left hand, hanging out with really nothing to do without a shifter to rest.
My fingers on it's just kind of weird I've always felt weird riding a DCT, but they are very cool.
I see the attraction some people might not want to shift, or maybe you have arthritis or something that's making it difficult for you to use your hands and shift like you used to on a heavy hydraulic, clutch or cable clutch on your motorcycle, and this just makes more sense for you.
There are all kinds of reasons.
People have done that and of course, a lot of people.
Take it a step further.
They need the stability, they can't hold a motorcycle upright anymore.
This bike, with the automatic transmission turned into a trike conversion.
Kit is kind of like the ultimate for your Riders, who you know they.
They need the stability, they don't want to injure themselves or they can't risk um.
You know dropping a bike, or maybe they have an injury that prevents them from holding a motorcycle upright.
You can always convert this to a trike and have a nice automatic trike.
Now, let's talk about something controversial with the gold wings, and that is the looks.
The look of the Gold Wing got significantly redesigned kind of radical new design by Honda just a few years ago, and people some of them like it, don't like it, the jury's still out on whether Honda made the good call there personally I think it looks good I do like it with the tour pack versus without the tour pack.
I think it makes it look more like a complete Gold Wing.
If you will but overall I.
Like the look of this bike, they did keep kind of the center console with all the big buttons right here in the middle, just like the 2000s gold wings and even before I guess the 80s and 90s gold wings.
So everything you'll find in kind of the same location.
It still looks similar to the older gold wings, but a little more angular in the design of the Fairing and the tour pack.
It looks almost more like a angular spacecraft in a way that's kind of the look.
They went for it's a little more futuristic and in the motorcycle, Community more people are about classic than futuristic and that's why it hasn't set entirely well with their audience.
So the jury's still out a lot of people like it.
A lot of people.
Don't let me know down in the comments what you guys think about the styling.
That's going to be subjective to everybody, we're going to pop on our navigation here, because I don't have my phone paired up with Bluetooth I can't really give you guys a good test of audio and I'm, not about to fool around with figuring out am and FM audio, while I'm riding here on the highway I'm not going to mess with that I gotta focus on this group ride here, we've already had two people try to cut us off in a construction area.
I try to be very, very, very nice when I'm riding, especially in a group, but there was one guy who cut us off and dove in front of our group up there and forced us into another Lane and almost hit one of the people in front of me.
I didn't show that here in the video, but some people deserve to be flipped off on the highway and that guy was one of them, so I'm not going to try anything out here on the highway I'm just going to focus on our group and the safety of our group here, I'm not going to look down at these buttons, but the infotainment Center up here you guys can see.
You've got a big analog speedometer on the left.
Rpm on the right gauges down here.
We're currently in seventh gear just dropped into six, of course, liquid cooled.
So we have engine temperature on the right on the left.
We have fuel gauges mileage our range.
We have 265 miles left.
Oh, they must just topped us off then in front of us.
We have that big screen GPS.
It's currently showing us on the Adirondack Northway, which we are.
You can zoom it in and out again I'm, not 100, versed on that I'm not going to fool around with it right now, but you've got a great audio system in here, it's very loud more than enough to hear on the highway, especially when you have this windscreen up and there's no wind noise to contend with.
The audio comes through crystal crystal clear, very good job by Honda.
You've got more info here than you could possibly need on a motorcycle almost to the point of it could be a distraction if you're, not careful, that's how much stuff is packed into this bike.
It is the epitome of a fully loaded motorcycle.
It is the ultimate touring loaded motorcycle that you could possibly get from Honda.
Oh, it feels so weird not to be shifting your left foot's, not doing anything.
Your left, hand's not doing anything if you're a lefty riding this bike is going to make you into a righty real, quick.
Now that we're on the back roads I want a little more air I'm going to put that windshield down oh and try to get some Cooling in here.
It is hot hot out today, very hot, so we talked about the power of the DCT, the infotainment system, the comfort we're going to go through a couple twisties up here.
Hopefully, I'll get a good idea of what the handling is like for you guys it felt very stable closed my visor there, so I can talk to you guys a little easier.
It felt very, very stable in the parking lot back there.
Low speed handling was very gentle.
Nimble just felt good I would not leave it in sport mode when you're trying to do low speed maneuvering, because the throttle has a little bit of a kick to it, make sure you're in tour mode or rain mode when you're in the parking lot trying to do slow, speed, maneuvering as far as handling goes we're not really hitting any hard curves here.
I'm, not sure I can lean this bike over much for you guys it feels like it would handle well I feel very stable on it.
It feels Nimble at the controls, but just don't feel like we're really going on any hard curves here, so we'll come back to handling whenever we hit some twisties up here, uh, maybe if we do I will come back to that.
For you guys all right, leaning over feels nice handle's easy drops into the corner.
Well, very light pressure.
Probably not the lightest handling I have felt on a like touring bagger.
It's pretty darn close, though the lightest that I have felt is actually the Indian Pursuit and it seems kind of weird, but it actually felt a little lighter to push into a turn than the Gold Wing.
Just a hair, they're, pretty close all right guys.
We've talked about everything that has to do with the motorcycle.
What do you guys think? Let me know down in the comments.
Tell me all your thoughts about it.
Would you get this bike, or is there another touring bike that you would rather see me uh do a test ride on please.
Let me know Down Below in the comments and I will try to get to those this summer.
Obviously, there's a bunch of stuff here at Americade I've been filming, so you might see the requests that you have come up in a future, a marricade video, but please, let me know down in the comments what you want to see me uh, compare and what your thoughts are on the Gold Wing.
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When there are new videos to watch here on Moto blade, I should be having new videos coming out all summer long everything I filmed here at Americade, plus we are head to do Sturgis again later this year we are headed to Sturgis 2023, so those videos will all be right here, for you guys until next time.
You all know what to do be careful out there right, safe right on and I'll catch.
You on my next video from Americade 2023 deuces.
