Transformation, complete!

[FIRE UP]

Well guys,
Some of you have seen pics before that I've posted of my transformation of my UGLY all BLACK 2020 NC750X DCT to what in MY opinion, is a WAY better and outstanding looking NC. Annnnnyway, I finally finished the process with the painting of the side cowls to a bright Silver. Since the only color available on the NC to the U.S. in 2020 was black, and when I was ready to purchase, a black 2020 with the desired DCT was the only bike in the used market available to me at that time, I bought one. Within a couple of weeks after purchase, I began the transformation to a set of colors that was/is WAY more acceptable to me. Basically, the bike now represents the exact version that was sold to the U.K. in 2020. While the actual color labeled by Honda is *Glint Wave Blue Metallic*, I painted my NC Hydro Blue Pearlcoat which is the color of our 2015 Jeep Rubicon. It's very, very close to the Glint Wave Blue metallic.

That paint work has been done for a while and I was just putting off painting the side cowls to match the U.K. version. I tried my hand at wrapping one of the side cowls but wrapping is a way more complicated process than one would think. Especially if the part you're wrapping is mobile, plastic, and small enough to flip-flop around while you're using your two hands and all fingers to heat and stretch the wrap. Soooo, I tore all that off and has some paint blended to the color I thought would match the British ones. Both the blue and the silver were multistage paint processes. The blue was a 3-stage paint and the silver was two stage.

I had the CEO use here magic on her Cricut machine to duplicate the Honda wing/decal that's on those side cowls. We have about a hundred different colors of vinyl that I could pic from and did make up a few different color versions. The bike is now blue and I thought blue vinyl decals would be a bit of "one off" type looks. Well, yeah, it would but, the bike would not look aesthetically correct. Soooo, I had her make them out of BLACK to look stock. The only difference is, the black vinyl I used is REFLECTIVE black, not just black. It looks identical to the stock black Honda decal only, when you put headlights or any lights on it, it reflects, COOL!

Anyway, here's the finished product, all finished, before and after. Now, to find a top box.
Scott

 

[670cc]

Your NC looks great. It’s similar to the blue and silver Goldwing, a color scheme I really liked.

 

[the Ferret]

Very nice!

 

[Dan German]

Nicely done! It looks really good in your colour scheme. I like a bit of colour on a motorcycle. Here in Canada, we tend to get fewer colour choices from Honda, so sometimes 75% of the bikes in the showroom are variations of black. Booooring! (Oddly enough, in 2020 Canada must have gotten NCs in pearl white metallic, since we just took a ‘20 in that colour as a trade.)

 

[FIRE UP]

Nicely done! It looks really good in your colour scheme. I like a bit of colour on a motorcycle. Here in Canada, we tend to get fewer colour choices from Honda, so sometimes 75% of the bikes in the showroom are variations of black. Booooring! (Oddly enough, in 2020 Canada must have gotten NCs in pearl white metallic, since we just took a ‘20 in that colour as a trade.)

Thank you Dan and others who've made nice comments. Very much appreciated. While BLACK has taken a large percentage of day to day living in terms of vehicles, motorcycles, bicycles, wheels on NEW cars and trucks and wheels on used of the same, it's just not for me. I'd have never touched this NC in terms of a major color change if, IF, I could have found one in the used market that was just about any other color. But, as stated earlier, this one was the only used one with the DCT in it several western U.S. states, and, it had minimal miles on it, 2,100 at the time, I figured, yep, I can always paint it. And I did.

And yes, if my research is correct, you folks in Canada received ONLY WHITE ones in 2020 and, the folks in the United Kingdom received ONLY BLUE ONES for 2020 and, here in the U.S. for 2020, we received ONLY BLACK ONES. I'm relatively sure Honda has some form of insight or has taken some sort of polls, or takes a broad look at what kind of prevailing color each national entity is favoring and or is at least more apt to lean to in a purchase and then makes a decision to manufacture those potentially bought colors and runs with them. It's just a guess on my part. Maybe for 2020, the Brits were favoring blue, the Canadians were favoring white and we all know here in the good ole USA, BLACK was then and still is a very popular color so, let's make the 2020 models IN BLACK!
Scott

 

[vinay]

Beautifully done! I don't have any numbers but I've got a feeling that Honda primarily targeted the NC700 and NC750 at the European (mainland) market. Roads are good so little need for off-road performance, speed limit is somewhere between 100 and 130km/h depending on the country (and the Germans without a limit, but they seem to prefer German brands anyway) and fuel prices are high and quite a few people like to keep their environmental footprint in check. I'm sure I'm generalizing but then again for a major brand (shifting loads of products) to decide on a marketing policy you do need to go with a general picture. So in that sense I can imagine it is much more efficient for them to offer a single color and be able to deliver on time. Imagine the bad rep it would get them if people would get to choose out of eight variations (manual and DCT, all in eight different colors) and not be able to deliver on time! Rather stick with what they're able to deliver. I'm honestly surprised they're offering the manual transmission version as well there as I always had the feeling Americans (again, generalizing indeed) prefer automatic transmission. In which case it would have made more sense to offer just DCT in both black as well as a more lively color.

Now that they're developing the electronic clutch, I can imagine this might eventually replace both manual shifting as well as DCT on the next generation of NC750X. Sure a clutch by itself doesn't shift but it wouldn't take too much to make the shifting electronic as well. And once they're there, maybe they will introduce a second color for the US market!

 

[670cc]

. . . So in that sense I can imagine it is much more efficient for them to offer a single color and be able to deliver on time. Imagine the bad rep it would get them if people would get to choose out of eight variations (manual and DCT, all in eight different colors) and not be able to deliver on time! Rather stick with what they're able to deliver. I'm honestly surprised they're offering the manual transmission version as well there as I always had the feeling Americans (again, generalizing indeed) prefer automatic transmission. In which case it would have made more sense to offer just DCT in both black as well as a more lively color.

In the early days of the NC700X, Europe’s customer’s were offered, in a given model year, the two transmission choices, along with four colour ways. One year I believe there was red, black, grey or white all available on the NC700X in the UK. So yes, eight choices.

The DCT was a novelty but a rather hard sell in the first few model years in the US. Honda then reduced the price of the DCT and raised the price of the manual apparently to make DCT a more attractive buy. It took some time, but gradually the DCT caught on. It’s inclusion and acceptance in the Africa Twin and Goldwing products probably helped.

As interest in the NC wanes and it gets long in the tooth, colour choices are shrinking and in some country markets a transmission type or the whole model has already been eliminated.

 

[Dan German]

In the early days of the NC700X, Europe’s customer’s were offered, in a given model year, the two transmission choices, along with four colour ways. One year I believe there was red, black, grey or white all available on the NC700X in the UK. So yes, eight choices.

The DCT was a novelty but a rather hard sell in the first few model years in the US. Honda then reduced the price of the DCT and raised the price of the manual apparently to make DCT a more attractive buy. It took some time, but gradually the DCT caught on. It’s inclusion and acceptance in the Africa Twin and Goldwing products probably helped.

As interest in the NC wanes and it gets long in the tooth, colour choices are shrinking and in some country markets a transmission type or the whole model has already been eliminated.

Yes, for 2023 onwards, the NC in Canada only comes in stealth camo. Totally invisible!

 

[FIRE UP]

" I'm honestly surprised they're offering the manual transmission version as well...."
I was under the impression that in the U.S. for '22 or '23, one could only purchase the DCT version. And, I think that one was or is offered in something like the "Denim Jeans Matt blue" (something like that) color.

 

[670cc]

" I'm honestly surprised they're offering the manual transmission version as well...."
I was under the impression that in the U.S. for '22 or '23, one could only purchase the DCT version. And, I think that one was or is offered in something like the "Denim Jeans Matt blue" (something like that) color.

The DCT or manual transmission was available in the US market for 2022, but it’s DCT only in 2023 and 2024.

 

[the Ferret]

I seem to have a habit of buying Honda motorcycles that get discontinued. Bought a 2006 ST 1300...great bike... discontinued in 2012. Bought a 2014 CB 1100 ...great bike...discontinued in 2017 now an NC 750 in 2021 ......

 

[vinay]

A discontinuation by Honda means only so much. They may quit the model name but they won't necessarily leave that part of the market. They recently dropped the popular CB500X, replaced it with the NX500. With the NC750X, they own a pretty exclusive market segment. I can imagine they would choose their next model to no longer be market as something that might be happy eating dirt hence might drop the "X" in the name and come up with something different outside the "adventure" bracket. Just a thought though as an equally big portion of people seem to get a dirt-ready bike and drive it paved roads exclusively (BMW GS, Honda Transalp, Honda Africa Twin etc).

Either way, I do think that electronic clutch might replace manual shifting and DCT for models that currently offer both. Not that I'm here saying it is better than DCT but I can imagine streamlining their logistics can be worth it to them.

That said, I'm not too sure whether the NC750X is on the way back. It is just that there are good options on the used market now, whereas a few years back a newer model really was a big step up and worth the investment. As for something like the CRF300L, that's the bike people really wanted the CRF250L to be so getting something new is more worth it. So along those lines, to meet the increasingly stricter emission rules they might choose to increase the stroke again of the NC750X and call it a NC800. Different things I can see happening but I don't expect it to disappear altogether.

 

[670cc]

That said, I'm not too sure whether the NC750X is on the way back. It is just that there are good options on the used market now, whereas a few years back a newer model really was a big step up and worth the investment. As for something like the CRF300L, that's the bike people really wanted the CRF250L to be so getting something new is more worth it. So along those lines, to meet the increasingly stricter emission rules they might choose to increase the stroke again of the NC750X and call it a NC800. Different things I can see happening but I don't expect it to disappear altogether.

The NC series stroke was never increased. Ony the bore was increased to go from 670cc to 745cc.

 

[FIRE UP]

The DCT or manual transmission was available in the US market for 2022, but it’s DCT only in 2023 and 2024.

Yeah,
Way back when I was reading up and watching youtube reviews quite a while ago, all I remember was that at one point in time, ONLY the DCT was being offered in the U.S. I just couldn't remember the exact year that was/is targeted.
Scott

 

[davidc83]

A discontinuation by Honda means only so much. They may quit the model name but they won't necessarily leave that part of the market. They recently dropped the popular CB500X, replaced it with the NX500. With the NC750X, they own a pretty exclusive market segment. I can imagine they would choose their next model to no longer be market as something that might be happy eating dirt hence might drop the "X" in the name and come up with something different outside the "adventure" bracket. Just a thought though as an equally big portion of people seem to get a dirt-ready bike and drive it paved roads exclusively (BMW GS, Honda Transalp, Honda Africa Twin etc).

Either way, I do think that electronic clutch might replace manual shifting and DCT for models that currently offer both. Not that I'm here saying it is better than DCT but I can imagine streamlining their logistics can be worth it to them.

That said, I'm not too sure whether the NC750X is on the way back. It is just that there are good options on the used market now, whereas a few years back a newer model really was a big step up and worth the investment. As for something like the CRF300L, that's the bike people really wanted the CRF250L to be so getting something new is more worth it. So along those lines, to meet the increasingly stricter emission rules they might choose to increase the stroke again of the NC750X and call it a NC800. Different things I can see happening but I don't expect it to disappear altogether.

Even KTM is coming out with an electric clutch on an adventure bike.

 

[vinay]

The NC series stroke was never increased. Ony the bore was increased to go from 670cc to 745cc.

True, mixed that up indeed. The Africa Twin (and obviously the shift of the CRF250L to the CRF300L) did that, not the NC750X.

 

[Dan German]

A discontinuation by Honda means only so much. They may quit the model name but they won't necessarily leave that part of the market. They recently dropped the popular CB500X, replaced it with the NX500.

They didn’t drop the CB500X, just renamed it and gave it a lipstick-and-mascara makeover. The NX500 is almost completely identical mechanically. Honda’s model code is still CB500X.