I had one. It was a pretty good bike. Not perfect, but pretty good. I
loved it. I did a few mod's including a header pipe, clubman bars,
Dunlop Sport Elites, etc.
But not to digress...too much.
Yeah. A shaft drive would just about make the GTS a primo sport tour
bike. But I suspect that designing a transmission to hitch the engine
and drive-shaft together would have put the cost of the bike into the
stratosphere, as if it wasn't already a pretty expensive piece to begin
with. The GTS benefits with an almost 'bolt in', off the shelve, engine
and drive train, hence, no 'custom' parts to design. (Yeah, I know about
the heads and valves and stuff, but you know what I mean! ) :^)
Unfortunately, we don't usually know what the 'designers' were thinking
of at the time of conception. I know, I know, they should have checked
with the proper demographic groups to get their opinion, and who knows,
maybe they did and this is what they came up with. However, as much as I
would not like to say it's so, I doubt that the bike will be
're-released'.
Wouldn't it be cool if JC Whitney sold an aftermarket bolt-on driveshaft
for bikes?
Hehehee....
Brandon
----------librally edited original message-------------------
Ken wrote:
>
> Once upon a time, I bought a 78 XS1100.
> The only I mean Only thing that keeps
> the GTS from being the most first class is it doesn't have shaft drive. Are
> any Yamaha product researchers listing in? If they are going to bring out a
> GTS again they need to have a shaft drive. If BMW can make the K12 which I
> have played tag with and do respect it's capabilities then Yamaha can do the
> same.
