Top Motorcycle Gear of 2024: Innovations Worth the Ride

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2024 is in the rearview mirror. So what were some of the hot new items in motorcycling over the past year?

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Welcome to the Throttle & Roast podcast. I'm your host, Niels Meersschaert. Every year there's new gear but which gear stands out from the rest. In this episode, I'll cover my favorite new motorcycle gear of 2024.

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Our first item is the Sena 60S Bluetooth headset.

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headsets are very popular amongst motorcyclists for a few reasons. Number one is you can listen to music on the road.

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Number two, you can get your GPS directions in a turn by turn right into your ear. And the third feature that a lot of riders enjoy is the ability to have an intercom with people that they're riding with. And it's this last capability that actually is really compelling on the new 60S. Sena, of course, has had mesh for a long time. T is a capability that allows it to almost dynamically add in and remove riders so you don't get any of these broken communications that the old Bluetooth standards had. And in the Sena 60S, it now has mesh 3.0, which is their newest version. So all of this stuff that has been learned over the past several years has been improved. The other thing and this will really be happy for people who love to listen to music improved speakers which have greater volume and a wider dynamic range. So if you want to have the absolute best sound quality in your headset, the 60S is really having that. The other capability and this ties in with that mesh 3.0 is another way for you to do communication now.

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Mesh allows you to extend the range because you can piggyback among many riders who are riding along. What they've added in now is something called wave intercom and this is a VoIP option or voice over IP that effectively gives you limitless intercom range, whereas the standard mesh might be able to get you a few miles at the outer rim. This gives you effectively limitless. But you have to have cell data service in order for that to work. But if we look at all of these capabilities, they're just advancing the state of the art of what we see in Bluetooth headsets. And if you want the absolute best Bluetooth headset today, the Sena 60S is the one to get Next on our list is the Arai XD5 helmet. Now this is a replacement for the venerable Arai XD4 dual sport helmet. And if you're an adventure rider and you do actually take your bike off road, odds are you either own or have considered owning a dual sport helmet. And I've personally had the Arai XD4 for many, many years. I actually replaced my old XD4 with a newer XD4 as it aged out about a year ago and the XD5 has some more changes that may expand its interest to a broader range of riders. changes is it has more of an intermediate head shape.

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And what this allows you to do is have a helmet that's going to fit you more comfortably than perhaps the old version did. And if this fits you, you're going to enjoy a comfortable ride, comfortable helmet for a much more improved experience. The second thing is that the face shield on the old helmet was not removable with out using tools, and the new face shield is removable without tools. So it mimics what you have in some of the other standard street oriented array helmets. Now you can actually remove that face shield without tools. This is very cool for when you go off roading. If you want to take that face shield off and just use a pair of goggles. This is now much, much easier to do than the older version is. The other thing is that there is a detent in the face shield which allows you to hold it partially open.

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Now, the old one was, yeah, I mean, it existed as a faceshield, but it was really very simplistic. So it doesn't have those abilities to have the sort of detents that would hold it open. But we have that in the new shield. The downside is that we have lost the brow vents. So you did get a little bit more ventilation through those brow vents in the old version. Those are gone now. But the tradeoff of having that detent is pretty powerful. There's a second one, and this is probably the most powerful, especially for riders who ride year round with this helmet. Want to have something that can expand for all sorts of conditions. It's pin lock ready.

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Now, the old helmet was such a very strong curve to it that you couldn't realistically put a pin lock. So they flatten that out a little bit in the new one, and it is now pin lock ready. The next item that is really critical for this is that the peak has been redesigned to reduce buffeting, especially at high speeds. When you did a head check on the old helmet. It would catch a lot of wind. And what they've done is they've made it a shorter length front to back, which should help reduce some of that buffeting that you would get. if you're an adventure rider, I'm very excited about the XD5 helmet. I think it's one of the best new items in 2024.

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Now continuing in with our off road aspects because I am an ADV rider is one of the type of bikes that I ride quite often is we have to talk about the new Alpinestars TechAir off road airbag. Now this joins the Tech Air three and five, which were street airbags released over the past few years. But now that they've released a new airbag that works with riders who may take their bikes off of the beaten path. It's the first airbag available that really targets those off road riders.

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It has level one and two protectors to protect you, even without the airbag deploying. So it's going to give you more protection. If you think of using a typical chest protector that you might have used for off road riding. This gives you all that same capability with the added benefit of the airbag. It has a pocket for a hydration pack on the back. So if you are riding off road, you normally would carry an extra backpack to throw a hydration pack in there.

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You don't need that With this particular unit, it does simplify the amount of kit that you need to bring with you. And it has three different modes you can ride, run it in street mode, enduro and rally in each of these have varying levels of intrusion so that you can actually ensure that it's going to deploy effectively. Whereas like a light get off that you might do, let's say. Off-Road You don't want it necessarily to deploy, but on Street you probably would want that to deploy just because typically the road speeds are going to be a bit faster. Now there are dual canisters, so you effectively get two almost they call them like lives when you're adventuring. The beauty is that these can still be replaced by the consumer. So really cool to see this come out to the market.

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This is one of the algorithmic type of airbags as opposed to the tether based. So you do need to make sure that it's charged.

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That's the one thing I would say is a down side with these type of airbags. But really cool to see this out there for ADV riders who take their bikes off road or even just pure dirt bike riders.

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All right. Next is the Insta360 X4 camera. Now I have an INSTA360 camera. Mine is actually one of the earlier models. It's the X2 this camera is really cool for a few different reasons. When you're riding anywhere on your motorcycle and you want to capture what the essence of your ride was. The beauty of a 360 camera is that it gives you the ability to change the viewpoint, to capture anything that was in the field of view of the camera.

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And because it's a 360 degree lens, that essentially means anything and you can even animate those view changes. So you could rotate it from looking forward on the road to rotating back and looking at you as a rider. It's really cool, just as a capability for a camera to have. And if you're going to only have one camera on a bike, I think this is a great option.

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Now, the features of this compared to earlier versions of the 360, like the one that I had, the X2, is this one has 8K of resolution. Now, of course that's split amongst two sensors, but this is going to give you even higher resolution than you would have had with the other older cameras. And it can capture up to 100 frames per second in 4K and 60 frames per second in eight K. So if you want to have some slow motion views with your 360 camera, you can really do a lot. The other thing that this camera has versus older models is it has a larger battery, which is going to give you more runtime than older versions. And it has this enormous screen. One of the things on my X2 is it had this almost circular screen and while you could use it to review footage, it was round because that was effectively the native way that a 360 camera captures.

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It's this sort of a they call it like a tiny planet, sort of a view. But if you were to zoom in to see a field of view that smaller, it was a really tiny screen to really observe and see any detail. It now has a huge screen which is going to make it much easier for you to be able to review your footage, check shots before you get going.

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Really, really awesome. Now, of course, the cool thing with the 360 is you can change your field of view in post-production so you don't have to set that up before you begin recording. And that to me is the real power of A360 camera. So I do I do appreciate them for that.

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next is the Krieger R25 v2 backpack. Now I've had the original R25 for more than a decade, now. The R25 is the most popular backpack in the lineup for Kriega. Kriega, if you don't know, they are a manufacturer that specializes in producing motorcycle gear, and this is a motorcycle specific backpack.

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And what that means is it doesn't have the flopping around that you would have with a traditional backpack. It has a harness that really holds on very well when you're riding to take some of that load off of your shoulders. It just keeps everything from flapping around.

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So they're an amazing option to use for it. They actually have a review all about backpacks on our website, so I'll add a link in the show notes. But the new V2 is really cool. The biggest change to the V2 versus the original version is now the main section is fully waterproof. Now the old version is effectively a zipper that you would be able to open and then you could put whatever gear you needed. There was a secondary pocket up in the front that was more for like quick access, but nothing was waterproof. So if you wanted to carry a laptop or camera gear, and you were worried about maybe hitting some bad weather conditions, maybe it was in the middle of weather, it was going to rain or not. That's where the R25 kind of failed. I actually had an R18 that I use in partnership with my R25 for where I do need to carry that type of gear. And it might be some rain conditions, but this gives you the ability to have that 25 liter size, which is super popular. Really. I've actually done weekend trips with an R25, so really great to see that this is now been updated for their most popular line.

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All right. Next is probably a brand many people may not know. This is one of the Chinese brands that is starting to make new kind of devices to support motorcycles with a secondary display. And this is called the Chigee AIO-5 play for BMW. And what's really cool about this specific unit as compared to the more generic Chigee, AIO-5 is this one works with the nav prep that most modern BMW motorcycles have for their own. You know, this was the old now five nav six kind of dedicated GPS devices.

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This will plug into that directly so you can have it fully powered really instantly from it. But it has some more intelligence because most of the newer BMW is also have this wonder wheel that they use for adjusting displays on either the native TFT that is for your normal motorcycle in terms of the speedometer, etc. is on there, but also to control that Nav5 Nav6. And then the newer connected navigator. This actually integrates into there so it can display information from your motorcycle, and be controlled by the Wonder Wheel.

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So it's really cool to see this thing fully integrated. one of the frustrations that a lot of BMW riders have is that if you were to use, let's say, the connected app to connect into your TFT, you can get turn by turn navigation with that. But it's, you know, just going to give you some basic like, hey, make a turn at this junction coming up. it's based upon their own software and people are really like the option to use Android Auto or Apple CarPlay.

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And the beauty of the Chigee is this actually gives you that capability. But of course, BMW has always just used their own proprietary app. So this is a way to get around that with a device that actually integrates into the bike. You can lock the device to the bike with the native controls that are on there already. Now there is a non BMW version of this as well, so if you're not on a BMW motorcycle, you can still get it.

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It doesn't, of course, have that integration with the Wonder Wheel because it wouldn't be targeted towards a BMW. But they do have a couple of other options so you can get front and rear cameras if you wanted to have, kind of just a running dash cam is available on those non BMW play options. But I really think the integration and the simplicity of be able to use the Wonder Wheel if you're a BMW owner is amazing. So it's one of my favorite new pieces of gear in 2024.

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All right. Next up is going to be another camera, and it's actually from the same manufacturer of Insta360. Now, Insta360 is really coming to the forefront of a lot of camera gear. The thing that where it's really stood out is GoPro was always the de-facto choice when it came to action cameras. And they've been doing it for ever.

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They effectively created the genre and so there's a lot of credit that people will give to GoPro, but it kind of got where they weren't really innovating and a lot of other brands were starting to come in. You'd see DJI Insta 360 came out with some of their original action cameras, and this year they came out with the Ace Pro two. And this particular camera is really cool that it's an 8K action camera.

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So like the 360 X4 that we talked about earlier, this is 8K but only in a forward dimension.

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It's not a 360 camera, it's a traditional action camera. The advantage is all of that resolution is being used over a smaller field of view, so everything can be super, super sharp Now this uses a 1/1. 3 inch sensor and it's a Leica lens. So very high quality. This particular camera also has much better low light performance than the previous Gen Ace Pro and even better than the GoPro.

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To be honest. It looks amazing if what you're able to get directly out of the camera in low light conditions, if you're riding a motorcycle at night, maybe through a cityscape and you want to be able to see all of the visibility of everything that you're seeing, this camera will actually capture that. And if you're using it off of the bike, you can actually flip the touch screen over to have a selfie mode. So if you wanted to record yourself in front of the camera, very common sort of situation with Moto Vloggers allows you to actually do this and get some amazing, amazing shots and still be able to see them with a large enough screen while you're doing that selfie mode. Now this has dual AI type of chips that gives plenty of on camera image processing. This is how they're able to get, for example, that night looking so good with low light performance.

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And it has a new integrated wind guard which will give you some improved audio. One of the downsides with most action cameras when you're riding along is that wind is directly hitting into the mic on the camera. And when you listen to the audio of the video, it's just pushed the whole time and it's just really annoying. This is going to reduce that dramatically. And those A.I. chips will also help to improve that audio quality.

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So it is pretty smart It is waterproof to about 39 feet so it can handle any rain that you might experience on your ride.

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And it claims 180 minutes of battery life. So huge amount of time that you can be riding and recording with just that standard battery that's built into it. So I think this is a phenomenal upgrade for the action camera genre. And if you have an older GoPro or some other brand, this could be a really serious contender. And that's why it's on one of my favorite new motorcycle gear for 2024.

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All right. Now this is a episode about motorcycle gear, but every once in a while you do have to include a motorcycle that may hit onto your list of something that really stood out as an amazing release of 2024.

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And one of the bikes I did talk about it in a previous episode is the BMW F900GS. Now, this was such a change from the previous model.

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It definitely stands out as one of my favorite new bikes from 2024. And the reason is even versus the F900GS adventure that came out at the same time and the F850GS. Those are kind of built on the same old chassis and platform that the previous Gen 850 was based on. But this new F900 has a very different look than the other bikes. It looks almost a little bit more Off-Road. It gets rid of the sort of the bug eye asymmetrical headlight that has been traditional. A lot of the the motorcycles from BMW for a number of years. But the most compelling thing is that different chassis is giving it much better Off-Road performance than you had on previous models.

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It actually has a phenomenal new Off-Road suspension, both on the front fork as well as in the rear shock. It's much lighter than the older model. It has more power. It's up to 105 horsepower out of that parallel twin engine. And this makes the specs much closer to a KTM 890 adventure and that bike is held up as being one of the gold standards of a mid-size adventure bike that can really go off road. Most people just say it's like it's just a big dirt bike in. This gets really, really, really close to it. Now, of course, with KTM having a lot of certainly with the 890 line, a lot of people were complaining about, you know, cam failures, which seems to be mostly related to poor oil flow in the engine and and then KTM having a little bit of some question ability of longevity given the bankruptcy that recently came through. I think this F900GS could be a really, really compelling option So this is why it's number two on my list for favorite new motorcycle gear of 2024.

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Now, number one on the list of favorite new motorcycle gear of 2024 shouldn't be a surprise to any of you who follow our coffee rides on Tank of coffee or who've even read the article where we did highlight our review of this new device. And that is the Beeline Moto 2. now the Beeline Moto 2, if you're unfamiliar with it, is a small GPS meant for navigating on your motorcycle and it's maybe about two inches in diameter. It's a very, very small device and can very discreetly fit onto the handlebar of any motorcycle.

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Looks phenomenal on cruisers, on old bikes because you don't even really notice the device sitting there. It's not this giant screen sitting up looking horrible or a phone mounted and sticking way up off of your bike.

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It looks really discreet The original one had a just kind of an arrow, and that's how it would point to where you had to go. And then it would give you an indication of how you're going to make it turn in, you know, two miles or whatever. The new one still maintains that same basic idea to it, but it will also show a little mini map.

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And the mini map is it's a simplified view. It's not like a normal, let's say, like a Garmin Zumo would be, but it's just showing you a simplified view so you can see intersections with where you're passing along. You can see the curve of the road and if you had to make a turn where you might have a turn and then another turn shortly thereafter, that will be clearly indicated on this display, which is a big step up from the older model. Now it's a slightly larger screen than the original Moto one, but it has a smaller bezel, so it's easier to see what's going on. But the device itself is not much bigger than the original one sitting on your handlebar. This also supports a powered mount using pogo, which is the little pins that will be on the bottom of it. So if you do need to run for extended periods and you just want to leave the beeline mounted onto your bike, you can actually have it powered directly from the bike. I found that, you know, you can easily get 10 hours of battery life out of it, so you may not need it in most cases, but it is an option if you want.

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And the other cool thing about this particular one, when you're coming up to a junction or a turn that you need to do, there's a little led at the top of it which will begin flashing just before your turn to kind of get your attention. So if you don't have the beeline plus where you'll get audio turn by turn that can go into your Bluetooth headset, This will give a flashing led and also a beep, an audible beep from the device itself to get your attention before a turn. So versus the original moto one where if you didn't have the turn by turn from Beeline Plus, it was really easy to be just riding along and completely miss a turn because you aren't staring at the GPS all the time.

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This gives you a lot more of an indication. Couple of other things I really love about this.

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One is it has some additional screens beyond the norm, normal sort of navigation screen with the map where you can see things like remaining distance, estimated time of arrival and particularly the estimated time of arrival is one that was missing on the original Beeline Moto. So having that is really wonderful when you're riding along. Maybe you have a very long trip and you want to be able to see how long you have until your destination. Having that capability right on the beeline is super easy and it's a quick tap. The buttons are also changed on this. Instead of being physical buttons that were along the sides of it, you kind of just it sort of rotates the display that on the bevel, you kind of tap on the bevel and we'll kind of like do a quick little bump there. And you can very easily just tap up, top down to be able to get to one of those other screen. I do it all the time on there. It's super, super easy. the original one had was you would have on your phone would be connected directly into the device. That's what's actually providing the navigation is your phone. So it's really kind of a remote screen, but your phone is now not sitting on the bike and all the vibration and exposure to rain and everything. It's sitting safely in a tank bag or in your pocket. But the way that it worked for the backlight, it was it say, oh, okay, well, when sundown or sunrise, and it would use time based just to say, okay, I'm going to turn this on. This now has a sensor that will look and see, okay, you need the backlight or you don't. So if you have more clouds coming in, you go into a tunnel. So it will be smarter. And that and this is far more I found it far more useful to have that capability.

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I use my beeline Moto 2 all of the time, every single coffee ride that we do on Tank of Coffee uses the Beeline Moto 2.

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It's just a phenomenal, phenomenal device. I use it on my scooter, I use it on my vintage bike, I use it on my cruiser, I use it on my ADV, on my sports bike. I mean, just it works on any bike. It's so tiny.

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It's really easy. It's absolutely my favorite new piece of motorcycle gear for 2024.

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so these are my picks for my favorite new motorcycle gear of 2024. What do you think? Is there something you think I missed that should be on the list? Text your thoughts through the link in the show notes or you can also leave us a voicemail at throttle and roast dot com slash voicemail. We'll talk to you next week.