BMW R 1150 GS Adventure versus KTM 390 Adventure

Cheap never, well mostly

MW driving has never been a particularly cheap pleasure. Although many specimens are around 20 years old and have collected correspondingly many kilometers, these GS are still not a bargain. It must be at least 5,000 euros, top-maintained specimens like our test bike like to scratch at the five-digit. You can understand this: The BMW R 1150 GS, if you don't catch a rocked-out model, is an almost ideal companion for the very big tour.

If you can do without cornering and agility, the GS is the ideal travel moped, where the road can be three steps below perfect.
As I said, a buddy for the good and the bad days.

Good, but expensive

What about the third puzzle mentioned at the beginning? What kind of bike is this? Then we get the gaaaaanz big club out. The world would be better if we all ate less meat, practiced safer sex and not just drove as an A2 driver's license holder KTM 390 Adventure. The safety equipment is convincing. Alone, the world is not like that. The problem with the KTM is that it is so wonderfully equipped that it is as safe as possible, but therefore cannot be cheap at all. Is it not, at EUR 6,195, what makes the answer to the question of classification even more complicated.

For a good 6,000 you get a good bike with the KTM, which has no development possibilities. It will always have 44 hp, that's the end of the flagpole. This is either enough for you in the long run – or you put a few hundred euros on it and move in the area of the Kawasaki Z 650 or Yamaha MT-07, which are throttled A2 compliant and later after the penitenting period with 75 hp are extremely enjoyable fun bringers.

The KTM 390 Adventure is too expensive to be used as a pure beginner bike. On the other hand, 44 hp is not enough for most motorcyclists in the long run. So a great bike is finally found between all the chairs.

The test bike was provided to us by Motorrad Ruser in Haseldorf near Hamburg