Dowco Guardian 50124-00 WeatherAll Plus Indoor/Outdoor Waterproof Motorcycle Cover, Black, Sportbike

I’ve been using the sportbike version of this cover on my 2012 Yamaha R1 now for 3 straight seasons of outdoor storage and it works really well as a daily-use cover and fits like a glove. The fitment literally couldn’t be any more perfect for this bike and it’s almost like they form fit it specifically for it rather than being a universal sport-bike cover. It keeps debris and the majority of the rain from completely soaking the bike and helps add a measure of anti-theft to the bike by making the bike less obvious to the casual passer-by.The motorcycle cover comes with a single strap that runs under the bike and clips into a buckle on a strap on the other side of the cover to help keep it on the bike and it does a fine job at that. I’ve yet to have this thing shift or move barely an inch through many heavy wind and rainstorms.The interior of this cover is a fairly soft material that shouldn’t harm your paint finish as long as the bike is relatively clean, since you don’t want to throw any cover on a dirty bike and scrape the dirt into the soft clearcoat finish. One thing to watch out for though is that you can get some light scratches on a plastic sportbike windscreen with this cover even though it has a sewn-in white windscreen protector in the section that lays on the windscreen. I figured this out fairly quickly and I take two microfiber towels and drape them in overlapping fashion over my windscreen so that the cover isn’t laying directly on it and it will be protected from abrasion by the microfiber towels, and the cover fits tight enough to hold them in place as long as you put the cover on starting in the front of the bike and then slide the towels in under it after the front 1/3 of the cover is in place (over the front wheel and ready to go over the windscreen).This cover is not completely waterproof and it will let some water through to your bike if store outside, particularly as the cover ages. There is also a little vent built into the cover that goes in the corner where your left-hand mirror is which helps you line the cover up with the front of the bike and allows trapped moisture to escape out from under the cover. If you plan on using this outside as a permanent winter cover to get you through a snowy off-season, I recommend putting this cover on and then putting a tarp over it while you have another tarp under the bike, this way you are keeping as much moisture as possible off of it while it hibernates through the dreary winter misery of a cold place like New England.One thing I don’t like about this cover are that the buckles on the straps aren’t lined with some sort of soft material. I’m always very careful when putting this cover on because they can sometimes smack against the painted surfaces of the bike and it feels like they might make small scratches. Maybe if there were a fabric cover of some sort going around the latches it might help prevent this from happening, although it might make it harder to use the buckles. There is a large white and red “Guardian” symbol on the front of the cover that helps make it obvious to you where the front of the cover is, but it would be nice if it had some sort of reflective striping down the back of the cover both for safety purposes and so that it was easier to find the back of it when you are picking the cover up while it’s folded or balled up in storage. I often have to hunt and fumble around a bit to locate the “Guardian” symbol when I am putting this cover on by myself so I can tell where the front of it is and this could be a lot easier with the rear portion also marked.I would definitely recommend this cover to other riders, especially since I can’t think of any better alternatives for the money. I am giving it 5 stars, but I would like to give it 4.5 if half-stars were an option just due to the windscreen-scratch threat and the latches also being potential scratch hazards.

Circumstances have dictated that, for the first time in my life, I own a motorcycle without a garage to store it in. As fate would have it, it is also one of the few I’ve owned that is more plastic than steel (which has been a severe annoyance on the tank-bag front as well, as mine is magnetic). So I knew if this bike were to survive the year in the Midwest, I was going to have to figure out some sort of protection for it, so picked up one of these.The fitment is excellent. I got the sport bike size, and it covers my naked Yamaha MT-03 quite well. Goes almost all the way to the ground, providing excellent cover for the tires and chain. Chain holes are well placed, and the belly strap is easy to use. If I had a gripe, it’s that I wish there were some color difference or some sort of easy-to-spot marking that indicated “This section goes front!” Minor gripe, but it’s there.Last night it went through its first thunderstorm, and I was impressed. Keep the whole bike dry, except for a bit of splash-up on the absolute very bottom of the wheels and tires. I don’t even think the bottom of the chain got wet though. Even though the wind was blowing like mad, the cover never shifted or tried to blow off. It did its job, and it did it well!Can’t speak to the longevity just yet, but it seems to be made of pretty quality material, so I’m hopeful. If it dies within the next year I’ll post an update.