2024 Honda Trail 125: It's Not a Big Motorcycle, Just a Groovy Little Motorbike

I went out for another 60 miles yesterday. About 40 of those miles were on dirt.

Overall, I'm very happy with the bike. It's pretty good at just about everything except being a big bike. I'll still need to make some adjustments to get a little more comfortable on it.

I'm getting better at the rev matching on downshifts, and my opinion has really changed regarding the automatic clutch. It's not as good as a traditional hand clutch, but I think it's a great choice for me, at least on this bike and at this point in my riding life. You can definitely feel the gears and clutches in there, and engine braking is a real thing on this. I didn't expect that. I had always thought of these as manually shifted automatic transmissions, but that's not what going on here. The clutch is disengaged as the shift lever begins its move to another gear. You can actually slip the clutch with your foot and help with the rev matching.

It would be really nice to have a gear indicator on the gauge. You never confuse first or second, but sometimes it's easy to forget if you're in third or fourth.

The funky shift pattern did catch me once, though. I was leaving a stop sign, and the one-two shift went fine, but I screwed up the two-three and banged it back down into first. Total brain fade. I don't even know what I was thinking there. Locked up the back wheel and revved the engine through the roof. It's probably good that there wasn't a car behind me.

The tires were mostly fine. There was plenty of grip for hard cornering on the street, and they got me through everything that I needed them to on the dirt roads, trails, washouts and creek beds. Lots of loose rocks and gravel. They got a little greasy in wet mud, but I don't really see the need to swap to knobbies right now, at least not for my purposes. I doubt that they will be any good on wet leaves. I didn't have any issues with the bike bogging down or with ground clearance. The low center of gravity was really nice in the sketchy stuff.

What I would like to investigate, though would be to go with a slightly bigger, dual purpose tire for a little more flotation and to soften the ride a little bit. I'm sure I can find something out there that will work.

Top speed that I saw with gusty wind coming at me from 2 o'clock on a long straight was 54 mph. Honestly, with the short wheelbase, steep steering angle and small tires, I wouldn't be comfortable going much faster than that. It was surprisingly good at zipping through traffic downtown. No worries there.

Also, lots more waves and thumbs up!

30 more street miles today. Saw another bike coming towards me from a distance. I could tell that it was new from the LED headlight. Wondered if I would get a wave. I did. As he passed, I saw that it was an even smaller new Honda, possibly a Grom or Dax. I need to find that guy.

With around 100 miles on the odometer, I stopped for gas, because the fuel gauge was at two bars. Filled up with 0.963 gallons of Premium at a total cost of $4.68. Rode for another hour. Fuel gauge still showing Full when I parked it.

Just to the left of the speedometer, there's a hole in the mounting bracket, covered by a rubber plug. It's not officially meant for a USB charger, but it kinda is. Some other Hondas have connectors taped up inside the wire harness to add one, but the CT125 doesn't. Even so, adding a charging port is one of the first modifications that many people do to their bikes.

You can just buy a generic port and wire it directly to the battery or splice into the wiring harness, but I bought a plug and play kit off of Amazon that included two adapters that hide inside the headlight assembly. That way, I can avoid splicing into the original harness and can easily remove it without any trace. And because it gets its power supply from the headlight, it's switched on by the ignition, and I don't have to worry about draining the battery, as I would if it were wired directly. It takes it's ground through one of the turn signals.

I would have preferred an outlet without the LED back-lighting, but it was a fair trade to get those little adapters. You don't even notice the light if you have something connected during the day, and there's a tethered weather-tight cover, so you don't see anything when it's not in use.

Installation was simple. The port fits nicely into the hole in the bracket, and the connectors fit perfectly. There's not a lot of space between the back of the headlight and the housing, so I shortened the wires (it's a universal kit, so there was more wire than I needed), and just soldered the two connections from the unit itself to the adapters. It took a little fiddling, but everything tucked up inside and I put the headlight back in. The whole job took less than an hour.

Sure, it was basically a two wire installation, and I could have accomplished this with a wire tap and a ground wire to the frame, but I really didn't want to splice into the factory harness  

I'm not 100% sure if I like this part or not, but after my first ride through the woods, I knew that adding the head light guard would be a good idea.

This is an H2C part that I bought from Webike in Japan. The only English bits on the paperwork more of less confirm my suspicion that H2C parts are genuine Honda parts, badged for sale through the Cub House..

Installation was simple. It took about ten minutes. I'm not sure if this is going to stay on the bike or not.

I do love the shipping label on the box though!

In reply to Woody (Forum Supportum) :

I like the headlight grill but not the crotch bar.

In reply to Slippery :

Good news / Bad news Slippery...

The Good: I bought a Nelson Rigg Trails End Fuel Bottle holder. It's designed to hold a 30 oz. fuel bottle on the bike.

The Bad: I'm not going to be using it to carry extra fuel.

I drink a ton of water, and can't go anywhere without it. 30 oz. will just get me started, but this is why I need that center rack. It mounts very securely onto the rack, keeps the weight low and centered, is easy to access, and keeps the bottle clean. I can easily fit a Poland spring bottle in there or a 30 oz. Stanley or Hydroflask.

This is a really nice product, and I will probably buy more gear from Nelson Rigg. I may even run two of these side by side.

After re-reading my own words, I went ahead and ordered a second fuel bottle holder from Nelson Rigg (Amazon, $32). I should be able to fit a pair of them side by side on the center rack, and I think two 24 ounce flip top Poland Spring bottles will be the easy button for hydration. 

Doubled my water supply and rode it for another 30 miles on a mix of pavement and dirt. 
 

I really like these bags. 

A 42 tooth rear sprocket just arrived from Thailand.

The two things that I've heard about this sprocket are that it's the single best modification that you can make to a Gen2 bike, and "Good luck trying to find one in the States".

Challenge accepted. 
 

I looked at sites in the US, Thailand, Japan, and probably a few other countries. I couldn't even find it listed among JT Sprockets normal offerings in their catalog. There were none on Amazon or eBay.

It took some creative thinking, a little time, and a bit of trust in mankind. But I had a screenshot of what I needed, along with the part number, and the name of the scooter that I think it was designed for. I contacted someone in Thailand who sells JT sprockets on eBay. I sent a message along with the photo. There was a serious language barrier, but the response was essentially, "I try".

A few days later, I got a message through eBay. That seller sent me a new photo of the sprocket that I needed, with the appropriate part number on the sealed bag, and a link to a new eBay auction. One available. I clicked "Buy it Now", and it arrived 14 days after my initial contact. Very happy.

Big box from Thailand. 
 

Whaaat?? A sidecar for Violet!!!??

In reply to Slippery :

I'll give you a hint:

In reply to Woody (Forum Supportum) :

Fancy!! No milk crate for Violet

I haven't ridden this much lately because I was distracted by a pair of needy Accords for a few months.

But we had some really bad flooding around here last weekend, and a bunch of roads and bridges have been washed away. The Trail 125 has been super useful for getting in and around places that would be otherwise inaccessible. It hasn't become my new primary DD or anything, but it's nice to have a Little Honda around when you need one.

This is the bottom part of my road. Fortunately, there's another way out  

Lots of this sort of thing around town:

There's been a Mustang SVO down the hill that I've had my eye on for the past few years. I'll think I've decided to pass on it though.

The Mustang came down this driveway:

While I really like the look of the nicely made Honda seat, paired with the beauitiful little rear rack that came from Japan, I decided that I finally needed to give in and sacrifice them in the name of comfort. I'm just too tall for the stock seating position.

I ordered a new passenger seat and rear rack from Thailand.

The rack is pretty huge, and I would have preferred to skip it altogether, but I need something back there to grab onto when I'm going on and off the center stand, plus the little tool box mounts to it and that's the best place to carry the registration paperwork.

The longer seat will allow me to stretch my legs out a bit and, along with the new rack, transform this bike into a proper Third World minivan.

Compared to the Honda-made seat and Kijima rack that I'm removing, the quality of these new parts falls solidly into the range of sub-mediocre. They also add a few pounds of extra weight.

The vinyl cover on the new seat looks cheap and fragile. The foam is thin and doesn't offer a lot of cushioning. The plate that the rear of the seat rests on is pretty crude and heavy. The rack has some bad welds, poorly aligned brackets and lousy paint. Installation was fairly easy, but both the seat plate and rack needed some muscle to get them to align with their mounting points.

Are the last two posts supposed to have pics? Because I want to see your minivan :)

Unreasonably heavy steel seat base may be duplicated in aluminum to save some weight.

Longer bolts with new spacers

In reply to Keith Tanner :

Patience, my friend.

The cushioning sucks, but it's nice to stretch my arms and legs out into a more normal riding position. I guess it's a fair trade for the sub-par quality.

I'll be keeping my eyes peeled for a better option from Honda or Corbin, and maybe an H2C rear rack.

Now that you have the new seat you could make something that is better or design something better that a local upholstery shop could make for you. 

In reply to Rons :

I thought about that, but the molded base to this seat isn't all that impressive either. This will do for now, and I'll just wait for Honda or Corbin to design and build something and pay up for their expertise.  It's not like I'm taking this thing across country or anything. 

More flood touring, but now with the longer seat. Much more comfortable.  
 

I'm shocked that the little covered bridge at the park is still standing. This was surrounded by rushing water. Fifty yards downstream from this point, the bridge on the state road was washed away and swallowed an SUV.