Product Review:: Nuvi 350 GPS

I get lost often. It's not that I can't follow a map, it's just that due to all the illegal substances I "sampled" back in the 70's... and 80's.. and 90s.. and....where was I??.. O, yea... I have no short term memory. I can memorize a trip itinerary and before I'm 5 miles from the house, I've forgotten every turn of it which leads to much stress and anxiety as well as occasional penile dysfunction.

Due in no small part to the fact that Amber and I got lost 8 times while making a recent 6.5 hour drive from Asheville to the coast, I decided to buy myself a freakin' GPS. I'd been debating the financial outlay for the last 2 years and this trip was the straw that broke the wondering Pirate's back..

I did the usual anal research as to all the best units on the market and while the Nuvi 350 is nowhere near the best..it is in the top 4 or 5 and it fit my demented criteria of being super sleek, chimp-like easy to use, and fully loaded with US and Canadian street maps. The best part (for me) is that it gives you the option of running on batteries (up to 6 hours) so there's no need to hardwire it...For pics of the Nuvi mounted on my own K1200S.. Just e-mail me.

Unlike the larger brick-size Garmins on the market like the 2730 or 2820, the 5oz Nuvi 350 is no larger than a pack of playing cards at 3.87" W x 2.91" H x 0.87" with a nice bright display of 2.8” W x 2.1” H (3.5” diag.) I have almost no trouble seeing even in bright daylight. Another difference is that the Nuvi has no buttons on the front.. All controls, save for the power button, are done via the touch screen. It is so intuitive that Jessica Simpson could figure it out in 10 minutes without a manual. Not only can you plan your trip to the Emerald city and back again in a matter of seconds, but the Nuvi speaks your directions turn by turn either via an external speaker or via headphones if you plug some in to the audio port. It's also a MP3 player, translates currency, plays audio books, is a picture viewer, world clock, calculator, recommends restaurants, tourist attractions, leads you to the nearest gas station, and yes.. cures penile dysfunction.

One downside of the Nuvi is that it is NOT waterproof like the larger Garmins, so if you're gonna use it on your bike, you'd better carry a zip-lock with you for the unexpected rain storm. Would be a shame to ruin a $700 foofoo gadget like the Nuvi. Also.. unlike the larger ones, the Nuvi does NOT offer you the option of putting in predetermined coordinates.. only street addresses unless that's a feature I haven't figured out. As I said.. it doesn't even come with a manual..

After using my Nuvi 350 for the past 2 weeks..I can honestly proclaim from the rooftops.."I'm in love!" While I was in Vermont last week touring the Vanson Leather facility, the Nuvi effortlessly guided me from the Providence, RI airport to Vanson (which is in Massachusetts), to restaurants, to movie theaters, to gas stations, and back again with zero probs. I never got lost once. This may not seem like a big deal to you, but I now feel like the little device is indispensable. My own private Tenzing Norgay .. except with a female voice.. and no mountaineering gear. With a little creative mounting, I can now swap it out between my K1200S and 2 cars in a matter of seconds with the result being that Amber no longer has to put my name on milk cartons every time I leave for a brief trip.

Vanson leathers has been around as long as motorcycles? Hell.. I've owned over a dozen of their garments through the years and the quality has been second to none in my omnipotent opinion. Usually I gain a little weight and have to sell my jackets or pants and get something larger. A penalty of growing older I guess. Nothing has worn out. After sampling all the other brands on the market.. I always end up going back to Vanson as the fit is generally excellent.

Due to the recent theft of ALL my riding gear, I had to look at replacing 2 Vanson jackets and a pair of Vanson pants. NOT a cheap undertaking, but necessary to my riding safety. The jackets I can buy off the rack and they fit like a glove. The pants are another matter so as I had to spend the megabucks anyway.. why not invest in a custom made pair?...and perhaps tour the factory?? As I have a kajillion air miles accrued on my Delta AmEx card, I recently booked a freebie flight and headed to Massachusetts.. well.. actually Providence, RI airport which is only 20 minutes from Vanson's Headquarters in Fall River, Ma.

My Nuvi (GPS) guided me to the front metal windowless door which I would have NEVER found on my own and if it hadn't been for the old 3 foot yellow sign in front I would have suspected that my GPS was lying to me. The facility was NOT what I expected. Instead of gleaming structure of chrome and glass towering into the gloomy Massachusetts sky, Vanson is located in an aging brick warehouse in the middle of fum-buck Egypt.

I had expected a high-tech building with massive signs, marble floors, lots of motorcycles in the parking lot, preppy-ish personnel with clone-like polo tees with VANSON emblazoned across their left nipples ready to jump to my wallet's bidding. Instead, I found 2 or 3 people who seemed to be working the floor in jeans and tees. In the back were about 4-6 women working their magic on 100 year old sewing machines. While there was virtually no other customers there it took a full 15 minutes before I got help, but when the help came.. I was treated very well. It took another 15 minutes for Heidi (the seamstress) to take my measurements and she seemed like she knew exactly what she was doing. Nice woman.

The facility, while unimpressive with it's shabby outer appearance, 100 year old wooden floors, and lack of air conditioning, made up for my visual disappointment with it's massive inventory. I have never seen so much leather in my life.. Hundreds and hundreds of jackets, suits, pants, etc.. Impressive!

I guess I had expected more opulence due to the astronomical prices their gear brings on the open market. What the f#* have the owners been doing with all the profits?? Other than investing in MORE inventory.. I have no idea, but I'll say it again.. The best motorcycle jackets I've ever worn were made by.. you guessed it... Vanson.... a company worthy of our support.

Lastly.. You may be asking why I devoted a full section of this .. the most holy of newsletters to a puff piece on a tour of the Vanson factory? Because IMHO supporting a leather company that has been so good to the motorcycling community for so many years is important. The motorcycle garment industry is booming these days and competition is fierce. While the new foofoo "polybalisticcorduralon" materials are very "practical"choices .. waterproof, cheaper, comfy, etc..., they do NOT offer the same crash protection nor one iota of personality. A leather jacket is still cool to own and wear! They get better as they get older... they look sexy with age....they become a friend. Would Brando, Elvis, Bronson, Fonzie, or the Terminator have been the same icons of "coolness" had they been wearing Cordura? Hell no! Nothing, my friends defines motorcycling like a good leather motorcycle jacket. Besides being a wonderful piece of protective gear, it is a statement to the non-riders who we allow to share the world with us..

Here's two detailed reviews of the new K1200GT peg lowering kits made by Verholen of Germany from former man about town, Phil Space.... and a follow up by our second tester and former Sith Lord , Kevin Ward

"They are installed. Easier than the US POS's I bought from Bob Henig, but the pin for the pegs into the MV piece is a PIA. The flange is very tight against the rubber, so you have to both push that back as well as keep on the retractor spring, but with a vice and some rags or a good long punch it's not a big deal for a farm boy.

The left peg went on much easier, the rubber on my right one must have been off a bit, but just the same, a set of instructions suggesting the use of a punch for alignment so wrenching retards don't bugger things up might be nice.

The other thing I would add is an actual torque spec and maybe, if MV agrees some loctite blue or less. Also the big ass screw with the 8mm allen could probably use some thread lock and a torque spec to since it's pretty big and wrenchin retards will just torque away not thinking about the aluminum threads underneath.

The ability to adjust them front/back is also very cool. As I have them now, the horizontal distance to the shifter is the same, just lower. I could rotate it forward and close that and bring them up, or even better, rotate them back a bit bringing them up, but moving the pegs back. There is more than enough adjustment in the shifter to make things work. After a couple trips around town and readjustments, it's dialed in and perfect.

The downside is the brake lever. There is a turn buckle on the shaft going to the master cylinder, but I don't see a stop adjustment, the lever is spring loaded and comes right up against the frame from what I can see. I adjusted the turnbuckle one turn in to desensitize it a bit, but I don't see it as a show stopper at all. Some might complain, and maybe there is a stop like there was on my RT that I can work with and then readjust the linkage, but I don't see it. As it sits, I can use the brake, it's fine, and I'm not going to bitch about it.

Hey, I'm sold. I tried doing this on my RT, but the shifter was a bitch so I took them off and with with highway pegs instead for the occasional knee stretch. This is a much better setup than the one for the RT. I think they are cool.
Lastly..., I found one other “be careful”. For me, now that the shifter is spot on with the peg, there isn’t a lot of clearance between the shifter and the tang on the side stand. You have to be careful when you hit the tang with your heel to put the sidestand down, or you could knock it in gear, if you had it in neutral. My bike is NEVER in neutral, so it’s no big deal, but I have seen some guys that actually leave their bike on the stand in neutral." Phil Space

"The brake and shift lever adjustments went good! To adjust brake and shift all you need is a 10mm open end. The shift adjust rod you need to loosen the lock nuts. The lower has reverse threads. Then you can adjust the lever to as low as you want to by twisting the adjust rod. The brake has a single lock nut. Loosen it and shorten the rod by twisting it. Everything feels and works good. The side stand is slightly less convenient because the pegs are closer to it. " Kevin Ward

1. Do you own a K1200S or K1200R and are experiencing sudden deceleration when slowly closing throttle? .. Occasional On/Off throttle action that's bad enough that it virtually snaps your head back and forth during deceleration and/or acceleration? Join the club my friends as you are not alone. I've heard this from a few dozen other owners in the last few weeks. This is a serious software problem and as of this writing BMW has no fix for it..
The good news is.. we have spoken with the people at BMW NA. They are fully aware of the problem, as is Germany, and they are working on a new SW release. They cannot quote a release date, as according the the source... "they need to make sure this one is full-proof" but we have heard release is imminent.