Kawasaki’s new Z400 is a sharp-looking, compact, fast but not-overly-ferocious motorcycle that’s ideal for either the new rider or someone living in an urban area. With a curb weight of just 369 pounds, anyone from a teen to a smaller-dimensioned grownup would have no trouble balancing it. I sure didn’t over a 5-hour jaunt a week ago.
My test was no pleasure cruise, though, at least for some of the ride. I started the journey at the front of a line other journalists, which was fine for the straightways and winding county roads outside of Fallbrook, California, where the roads curved slightly and we went through the bit of water and mud.
But then we came to Palomar mountain, the sort of mountain we don’t really have in Brooklyn and the surrounding suburban areas where I learned to ride and where I’ve tested about 100 bikes from every manufacturer, the majority of them big-ass cruisers, since 2003.
Picture the letter S printed vertically 20 times and you’ll get an idea of the challenge I faced, with a mob of far more experienced riders behind me.
I had to go slow and that’s all there was to it, lest I go sailing out into oblivion over the guardrail-less road and into the valley below. After a few hairpin turns, I safely pulled over and a dozen or so motorcycles accelerated past me, vrowm, vrowm, vrowm.
It’s no fun to be passed and no fun to go slow. But at the back of the line was where I really learned about the motorcycle at my own pace, as well as getting used to these type turns, with my ego shattered rather than, say, every bone in my body.
The Z400′s strengths are its sporty characteristics combined with a comfortable relatively upright seat position, meaning your wrists don’t get walloped as on other sport bikes. Its sharp handling maintained the road like a dog hanging onto a rag, once the hang was gotten. You’re powered by a 399cc, four-stroke, water-cooled, parallel twin, fuel-injected engine which purrs but does not roar, and you don’t expect it to.
A big plus – and, again, a boon for newbies - is its buttery clutch mated to a six-speed transmission with a “positive neutral finder” mechanism, saving you from that maddening foot tango we’ve all done when trying to get an “N” to show up on the instrument panel. That alone is worth the price of admission.
All riders this day were equipped with ABS brakes administered by a Nissin ABS controller, but non-ABS brakes are also available featuring a lone 310mm rotor with a two-piston Nisson caliper for your front tire and single 220mm rotor on the rear tire, again with two pistons.
The final icing on this grasshopper-green motorcycle – it comes in red, too – is its ridiculously reasonable sticker: $4,799. If you’ve always hankered for a motorcycle but thought you had to hemorrhage 10 or 15 grand, the Z 400′s price tag puts it within relative affordability, and for the money you get an ultra-mod, ultra-capable bike.
There’s more, much more. Check out more specs and more photos, here.
