2x2: 2009 Kawasaki ER-6n vs. 2009 Suzuki Gladius

Completing the Triple Play with a pair of all-around Twins.

By Matthew Miles | Photos by Jeff Allen

July 2009

Photos: Kawasaki ER-6n vs. Suzuki Gladius >>

All good things come in threes, right? Blondes, brunettes and redheads. Detroit's Big Three (well, not so much these days). Tic Tac Toe. Ready, set, go! Yadda, yadda, yadda. Kawasaki and Suzuki...

Come again?

Think about it: two Twins, each engine powering a trio of entry-level machines targeting the popular sport, adventure and, now, naked market segments. While Kawasaki's fully faired Ninja 650R and stilt-legged Versys have been available stateside for some time, the stripped ER-6n is brand-new to the U.S. this year. Ditto Suzuki's Gladius, a gussied-up, bare-it-all spin-off of the trackday-friendly SV650SF and go-anywhere V-Strom 650.

Stripped to their essentials, the ER-6n and the Gladius are practically, uh, twins. Both employ steel frames and swingarms. Both are fitted with conventional 41mm forks and spring-preload-adjustable monoshocks. Both feature tubular handlebars, low-slung seats, rubber-covered footpegs and beefy passenger grab handles. Both come with disc brakes at each end pinched by twin-piston, pin-slide calipers up front and single-piston stoppers at the rear. Wheel and tire sizes—17-inch cast aluminum hoops shod with 120/70 front and 160/60 rear radial rubber—are identical, too. Same goes for claimed seat heights—30.9 inches. It is as though each factory knew exactly what the other was building.

With one all-important exception: engine architecture. While the 649cc ER-6n pairs its blacked-out cylinders side-by-side, the 645cc Gladius splays its battleship-gray barrels 90 degrees apart. The rest of the spec sheet is pretty much state-of-the-art Modern Japanese Motorcycle: liquid-cooling, double overhead camshafts, four valves per cylinder, electronic fuel-injection, six-speed transmissions and cable-actuated clutches.

When it debuted in 1999, the SV650 was an instant success. Retailing for $5699, that original carbureted model was part commuter, part sportbike and all bargain. The midsize Suzuki even scored an Honorable Mention in CW's annual Ten Best balloting—no faint praise.

For use in the Gladius, the latest version of this now-decade-old V-Twin received a number of model-specific updates—intake and exhaust tweaks, higher-lift camshafts, a heavier flywheel and a redesigned clutch mechanism. An automatic Idle Speed Control (ISC) integrated into each 39mm throttle body is said to stabilize engine revs at start-up and reduce emissions. An oval throttle pulley softens low-end-to-midrange power delivery. The result is an even more user-friendly package, making 68 horsepower at 8450 rpm and 49 foot-pounds of torque at 7500 rpm on the CW dynamometer.

We first came to know Kawasaki's semi-dry-sump parallel-Twin with its modern vertically stacked transmission shafts in the 2006 Ninja 650R—called the ER-6f in Europe. The ER-6n debuted at the same time, but its sale was for the past three years limited to overseas markets. Now, the 6n is available on these shores.

While the 650R and the Versys use the same 180-degree firing order, tuning is different. The last Versys we tested made peak horsepower (59 hp) and torque (42 ft.-lb.) a full 1000 rpm lower in the rev range—at 7600 and 6225 rpm, respectively—than the 650R. The ER-6n, meanwhile, is Ninja-spec all the way: 62 hp at 8680 rpm and 43 ft.-lb. of torque at 7340 rpm. More powerful, yes, but still down 9 and 12 percent to the Gladius.

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