Honda Deauville NT650V - Test Ride and Review. Can you get a Good Touring Bike for Pennies?

Hello Guys! Today we have a new bike to review. It’s one of those highly underrated motorcycles. Yep, this is the Honda Deauville. Named after a French resort the Deauville is an entry level touring bike from Honda. It is also known as the NT650V. It’s maybe the cheapest and most reliable tourer that you can get from any brand. It features integrated side panniers, full fairing and most importantly it has a shaft drive. Yes that is really important when you travel long distances and you don’t want to deal with oilers or lubing your chain constantly. It also keeps your rear wheel clean and in my opinion it’s quieter than a chain. This bike is based on the NTV650. Confusing eh. But the NTV650 was a naked bike with a v-twin engine. Actually this engine is one of the 3 best Honda engines of all time, maybe only V-four engines and the 6 cylinder boxer on the Gold Wing can top it up. I think that this engine with some modifications was used in the first Africa Twin and some other notable models. It has a capacity of… you guest it 650 cc. It outputs 55 ponies at nearly 8000 rpm. For the Deauville it was tuned to have more low end torque. I really like that engine. It has a smooth power delivery but it can pack a punch when you need it. The engine is mated to a 5 speed gearbox but sometimes I feel that it can have one more gear especially on the highway. As I said above the bike is equipped with a driveshaft and this fact alone makes the bike worth for long travels. The engine is liquid cooled and has 3 valves per cylinder. Each cylinder has two spark plugs. They rarely need to be changed but it may be tricky to get to them. Tank capacity was enlarged to 19 litres from the naked model but the bike is not very thirsty. If you ride with around 100 km per hour it doesn’t drink more than 4.5 litres of gasoline. So in theory with this fuel tank you can go more than 350 km with one fill. One drawback of the Deauville is that the fuel system still uses carburettors. The later model has fuel injection and a bigger engine. The carburettors work fine for the most part. But this one here has one problem. If left more than two weeks without starting up then it may not start and one needs to drain the carburettors. The side panniers are not too big but for a single rider they are enough to pack luggage for a two week trip. The left pannier is 18 litres and the right is 16.7. At least according to wikipedia. Panniers are non removable but flush nicely with the bodywork. But enough with statistics. Let’s ride the Deauville. Despite its size and the Dry weight of 233 kg (514 pounds for our overseas friends) the bike is really nimble and easy to operate at low speeds. It’s nothing like my Africa twin that weighs a bit more but is a really top heavy. Actually if you want to see my Africa Twin click somewhere on the screen where I will put a link to my video. The saddle is comfortable and the riding position is upright and well suited for long rides. The one that we have here was redone from an old leather jacked and I really can’t tell how the original was in terms of softness and support. At high speeds the standard windscreen is doing its job but for speeds above 120 it may not be sufficient. Actually the bike can handle such speeds with no problem but it’s really not made for them. If you want calm and relaxing ride my recommendation is not to go above 110. Overall this bike is really lovely. It can go for miles without maintenance. Just change the oil every year and that’s it. These engines are known to last more than 100 000 km. And if it’s to be believed some people achieve up to 300 000 km. So if you need a nice reliable touring bike for a really low price, you should go with the Deauville. Still the Deauville is an old bike. There is not much tech on the dashboard. No self cancelling turn signals, no GPS no ESP and trip computers. Sometimes this may be a good thing but if you are tech savvy you might start searching elsewhere. However these bike retail for around 1500 euros with good mileage and in very good shape. Thanks for watching. And if you enjoyed my video please make sure to give it a thumbs up, share it and subscribe. Have a nice day and ride responsibly. Peace!